I’m not ignoring your question, but trying to figure out a response that doesn’t just involve “we need more money.”
Duh.

Peon

First, your suggestion to

“keep stocks of school supplies, snacks, clothes and other basic necessities handy for students who may need them, but find quiet ways to distribute these resources to avoid singling anyone out”

seems very concrete, supportive, and appropriate. As does the suggestion to “continue to reach out to parents even when we feel they are being unresponsive”…as you note, it is in the relationship building which will allow students to form a foundation for success.

I have to agree with Larry, however, when he sees the “high-level curricular” goal as a bit squishy; what does that mean in my classroom tomorrow? I know from your previous post that the idea that tomorrow concerns me concerns you, but don’t we both have to show up there in front of them on Monday?

I also think that your desire for equally high levels of expectations for low-income students is a bit undermined by your very first goal

“assign work requiring computer and Internet access or other costly resources only when we can provide in-school time and materials for such work to be completed”

because for many low-income students & the schools who serve them…particularly in urban areas…computer access is a very low bar to leap over even when there is not a machine in the home. Also, don’t low-income students need to develop the technological skills their higher-income contemporaries are already working on and possess? There isn’t time in the day to practice all the skills a teacher might teach around this subject, so the production must be done outside of the classroom. Also, I’m fairly sure the world outside the school isn’t interested in a handwritten resume…if these students don’t learn how and where to access the basic technological resources available to them in their communities, what will they do when they leave us? A better suggestion might be for all teachers to know of and possess a list of all publically available computers in the community, with hours of operation and suggestions for transportation included. It seems to me that helping students leap over the higher bar that society has set for them is our job in this case…not just ignoring that the bar might exist.

On another note, I have a bit of a hard time teaching the “injustice” of the “dissolution of labor unions.” I would prefer to have my students form their own opinions about labor unions, big corporations, forms of economic governance, etc.. Just to lay something out as wrong because of my own viewpoint seems to rob the students of the opportunity to think critically about important subjects. While racism, classism, sexism, etc. are fairly well established as wrong headed, there is still room for thought about these issues…Gladwell’s “Blink” has a fascinating chapter about the origins of some of these “isms” and is exactly the type of higher level, interesting reading you might want students to engage with.

For my part, I would include “Teach your students that the squeeky wheel gets the oil.” If we want our students to move out of their lower economic bracket, we need to show them that they can have power over situations and people through sheer tenacity. That power could be over the principal, the president, a CEO, or even you; it could be over their grades, their employment, or their health. Tomorrow, this could mean having student write letters to their teachers justifying their self-assigned grade in the class; it could include time in class to write, edit, and send follow-up notes for job interviews; it might include class participation points given for talking to the teacher about the class outside of class…these are just a few thoughts pounded out at 1 am. I’m sure there are better, but any work to develop ways in which their personal tenacity and persistence is developed, recognized, and rewarded would seem to be immensely valuable over the long haul of their lives. I’m sure the activist part of you is now warm all over…:)

Looking forward to hearing others’ suggestions,
Josh

First, I want to re-clarify something. I don’t see myself as a “theorist.” I am a practicing educator and activist who does some writing. This illustrates one of the points I’m making–simply because I do some writing among the myriad other things I do, including formal and informal forms of education, I’m called a “theorist,” which, in education, seems to suggest I have nothing to say about practice.

All of us are, ultimately, theorists and practitioners. Every time any of us has a conversation about something that is working in our classrooms, we’re contributing to theory–we’re providing evidence that something is working.

I think some folks are using “theory” to mean “philosophy.” And certainly there are a LOT of people who introduce various philosophies about education that have no support in actual practice.

But I digress…

Larry — you pulled one example out of one of several lists of practical strategies. I’m not sure why you did that, specifically. Yes, most (not all) educators would agree with my point philosophically. But what is very clear from decades of research is that low-income students do not have access to the same sorts of higher-order thinking curricula and pedagogies as their wealthier counterparts.

And the strategy here has nothing at all to do with poverty. It has to do with best practice in general. There are certain things we know pedagogically: (1) students learn best when they see themselves reflected in the curriculum; (2) students learn best when their teachers teach in ways that reflect their learning styles; (3) students learn best when their learning is connected somehow to their lives; (4) students learn best when teachers demonstrate high expectations of them consistently. We also know that all of these things happen with more consistency in predominantly wealthy schools than predominantly low-income schools. So this may sound like loftiness or theory, but it’s a very practical concern. And it has nothing to do with poverty per se. In other words, the “problem” isn’t that the students are from low-income backgrounds. The “problem” is manifold: (1) that low-income kids are segregated into schools (or within schools, into classes) that in which they don’t have the same opportunities; (2) that we–U.S. citizens–are socialized, generally, to think that low-income people are incapable of achieving to the extent their wealthier counterparts achieve; and so on. The “problem”, in other words, is inequity, not poverty.

If we can’t begin with that, then the practical ideas, or what people are calling the “alternatives” will make little difference.

And all of this, unfortunately, is a serious shift in consciousness for most people, despite Larry’s point that this sort of thing is agreed upon by most educators. It may be agreed upon philosophically, but it’s certainly not understood by the average person in the U.S. In fact, Larry, my sense is that you might be looking for a set of pedagogical strategies, and this is something that simply does not exist. The lingering belief that it does exist is not a problem of practice. It’s a problem of consciousness.

So, here’s my alternative:

Stop now with the idea that there is “a way” to teach low-income students or female students or Latino students or any other group of students as defined by a single dimension of identity.

For classroom teachers, refuse to make any assumption about any student based on any single dimension of her or his identity.

Identify the preferred learning styles and gifts of every individual student and make sure that they are fed what they need to achieve–this tends to happen more readily for wealthier students, who tend to be in smaller classes.

Continue reaching out to low-income families, even when they appear to be unresponsive. We don’t undo generations of alienation with two or three phone calls.

Work on creating opportunities for family involvement that are accessible to parents or guardians who work multiple jobs, who work night jobs, who don’t have “leave time” from their jobs, who can’t afford childcare or transportation.

Teach about class issues. The students who come from low-income backgrounds know they’re getting an unfair deal (just as students of color do). Part of drawing them into a system that many of them (and their parents/guardians) experience as hostile is to acknowledge the reality of their experiences.

For more very practical solutions, see:

http://www.tolerance.org/teach/magazine/features.jsp?p=0&is=40&ar=777

I want to say again: there is no set of pedagogical solutions that will work with all low-income students in any context, any more than there’s a set of pedagogical solutions that will work with all wealthy students. As a practitioner, I refuse to begin the conversation there because it’s based on fallacy–and oppressive fallacy at that. If people are waiting for a list of practical solutions–if this is the “alternative” for which we’re waiting–we’re only setting ourselves up to be fooled, as many have been fooled by Ruby Payne’s work. (And as I’ve been fooled more often that I’d like to admit!)

Paul