In the Service of What?

… "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country" like the late John F. Kennedy once said, what can WE do to better the place in which we live? The choice is ours to make really. Service learning is a form of education that not only provides classroom time, but time spent out in the community doing service for others in need. Many school systems and teachers are trying to promote service learning in their communities because it is a great way to get students learning but out of the classroom doing good things for others. Service learning classrooms or projects can be done individually or as a group, the choice lies with the teacher. Service learning classrooms teach children how to give up their time and energy and help those who are in much more need of it than they are.

When in High School and all of my life growing up, my community was very "service based". We literally could not graduate without completing 30 hours of community service of our choice. We would always go to local soup kitchens, homeless shelters, and help fundraise by bringing in food, clothes, household needs, and any other things others might need. We would clean up the lakes near our school that would get covered in trash by all of the people driving by that would throw stuff out of their window and into the water. When it snowed, we would go and shovel out neighbors that may not have been able to do it themselves. I would even babysit family friends of mine that needed someone desperately to help out. Sometimes I would even volunteer at my grandmothers Nursing Home. Not everyone in this world understands what it is like to be unable to do something for their own or not able to have what others may have but if we give a little bit of time and dedication to something, we may be able to change the way someones day turns out.

I make sure every time I go to my classrooms at Harry Kizarian Elementary School I have a smile on my face and I am ready to help all of the children I am working with that day learn something new or help them perfect something that they may be having trouble with. Though I am not giving them something physical to hold in their hands, I am giving them something to help better their future. I think that is is important to be the person that wants change in this world, and if more people like us,  (because I know we are such a kind class) could help out in any way possible in their communities there would be a much stronger bond between each and every place in which we live. 

I think that more school systems and communities should have service based learning within their classrooms. It is the best way to teach students in the classroom and have them actually doing what you are teaching them while they are learning it. 

Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us

"Many students do not want to believe they have been manipulated by children's media or advertising. No one wants to admit that they've been handled by the media." I think that because Disney movies and cartoon movies were so much of our child hoods we set that as the standard for what we wanted to be. I know I'm not the only girl that dressed up as Cinderella almost every year for Halloween. Then as I grew up, I would start dressing like Snow White because I realized I looked the most like her-- because she had dark hair. (Great comparison I know) They had what we wanted as a young age, they had long beautiful hair that never looked messy, a beautiful prince just waiting to kiss them and change their world, and a huge palace in which they would live once they lived "happily every after." We also learned a lesson that I never put a lot of thought into, you can never trust "old, ugly, and scary looking women." Isn't that horrible? We always saw the villain as an older women who was never as beautiful to us as the princess, and us as children feared them. Princesses were predominantly white, never until recently did we see a princess of color. (I mean unless you count Princess Jasmine, Pocahontas, and Mulan).

It is said in the reading that, "The impact of racism begins early. We are exposed to misinformation about people different from ourselves." Which is very true, I grew up watching mainly white people on TV and in movies. I did not think it was bad, I just thought that they all looked like I did. The world is changing. They are making a lot of remakes of older movies and shaking things up. I know this Christmas Eve I took my little cousins to see the new Annie that came out. I saw the older one and of course she was a young white girl. In the remake, she was African American and I thought the movie was great! Many people are creatures of habit and did not like the fact that they changed the original story line. Everyone watches these old movies or television shows, so I think it is necessary to make changes and show a different take on things. I know Disney is planning on making many changes in the upcoming years to show a different race in one of their princesses! Yay! Not only is this just with the princesses, it is with all Disney characters in all movies, parks, and television shows.

The media is a huge thing for children as they are growing up. I would watch things like that all the time and I know when I was younger, my cousin who was adopted would constantly wonder why none of the princesses looked like her or were from where she was from? What could we have told her to make her feel better while teaching her a lesson? I would love to know what some of you think we should have said?

Speaking the Unspeakable:

I think this day in age this is a topic that people are more open to talk about in a public setting, even school. I know when I was going throughout school, we always had assemblies and weeks when we spoke of what the school called "diversity". We had speakers come in from all over the state and talk about their stories whether they were gay, straight, lesbian, transgender, or bisexual. My parents are not as open to talk about these types of things as my friends and I are. They have been somewhat sheltered from it all because it was something that was NOT discussed in their day (both of them going to catholic schools of course). I think it is important to talk about things that are different from your "norm" because not talking about sexuality that is different from your own creates phobias of others.

In the article it states that, "it can be argued that teachers should take the responsibility for helping pupils to recognize sexuality and thereby work towards a greater social justice." The way that the first teacher handled coming out to her classroom of young students could not have been better. It is not something that you can just tell students and expect them to understand. You need to teach them all the different ways that people can be together. But on the other hand of it, teachers are scared for their own safety if they DO come out to the classroom because not everyone is understand like we hope for them to be. It is sometimes the easier way out to stay in their "private space- or in the closet."

Teachers within the "No Outsiders" project have displayed fears of discussing sexuality inside the classroom. They were unsure of how to properly address the topic of "sexuality as a classroom subject". The article said that these fears came from within a notion that schools are a place for child's innocence and a place to shelter and protect them from the outside world. But in reality not talking about it with children shelters them in a bad way and they will not know what actually goes on in the outside world.

I think that talking about sexuality in the classroom when children are ready for the topic is best for the teachers and the students. I believe that when children do not know of certain situations they begin to fear them and will never truly learn about them but only form negative thoughts to go along with the situation. Children are very understanding and a lot smarter than we give them credit for. Children need to learn differences and understand what it is to accept them.

This video is a GREAT way to show how much the world has changed and how much more accepting the world as a whole is becoming and it is starting with CHILDREN: Children Reacting To Gay Marriage