Promising Practices 11/07/09

After getting only about 3 hours of sleep Friday night, it was quite a struggle to get myself out the door to go to Promising Practices on Saturday morning. By the time the day was over though, I was very glad that I went; I actually enjoyed myself and learned so much more than I ever expected.
The first session I went to was called ‘Teach Transgendered Children’. I found this presentation to be extremely interesting. Although I am a firm believer that people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender are born that way and that it is not simply a ‘life choice’ I had never really thought about the topic of transgendered children before and what it would be like to be a young child that feels trapped in the wrong body. I have seen plenty of Television shows, such as MTV’s “True Life” and movies that deal with transgender adults, but this session was the first time that I really ever heard anything about transgender children.
This session was extremely interesting, not only because of the topic, but because the presenter brought a variety of different materials with her. The session began with the story of a child who was born a boy, named Joseph, who from a very young age insisted that he was a girl. Joseph now lives a girl named Josie and although she is only 10 years old she has been giving speeches about her experience. Although Josie is now legally recognized as a female, the military base on which her family lives would not allow Josie to attend school and so her mom must home school Josie and their other adopted daughter. I found this completely sickening. This child is simply living her life the way she was meant to and that somehow justifies not allowing her to attend school.

After learning Josie’s story the presenter talked about how limited the resources are for the classroom. At this time there are only a very limited number of books in print that deal with transgender issues. She read us a book called 10,000 Dresses in which a little boy, who felt he was a girl, would dream every night about trying on different beautiful dresses.
After learning about different books available we then were taught about the concerns of parents of transgendered children which included:
• Will they be welcomed?
• Should the teachers be aware?
• How to work with the school
• Should they be allowed to dress in preferred gender?
• What name will be used?
• When should they transition?
• Safety
• Emotional safety
• Will there be a safe bathroom?
We then talked about what the school should do in order to accommodate transgendered students which included:
• Having welcoming employees
• Being knowledgeable
• Have a no tolerance policy for teasing and bullying
• Teach students to respect difference and to stick up for those being treated unfairly
• Have resources available
The next topic we covered was about how to refer to transgender children. I think this information was very beneficially to everyone, I know I have found myself stumbling on whether or not to call someone he or she when talking about a transgender individual. The presenter told us it if best to refer to the student by their preferred name and gave us the example of “This is Janice’s pencil. Give it to Janice.” Rather than saying “This is his/her pencil. Give it to him/her”. I think this piece of advice is very valuable, it causes less confusion and a lot less awkwardness for both the teacher and the student.



Finally, the last thing we did in this session was a short film that concentrated on the issues of transgender adults finding an appropriate restroom to use. I was shocked at the fact that although there is no law stating that girls must use the girls room and boys, the boys room, transgender people who are simply just trying to use the restroom are not only taunted by everyday people, but police officers as well. Transgender people are forced to sometime hold it in all day because they are either unable to find a unisex bathroom to use, or that are too afraid of physical/emotional harm that may take place by using a facility that is marked to only be used by one gender.
The next session I went to was on teaching Global Studies. In this session the two presenters, who are teachers from Henry Barnard, taught us about different ways to teach global studies in the classroom, such as using literature to show students that ‘even though they may be different from people in other countries they can still be friends’. One idea that I really liked was the idea of “Cuddly Friends”. The teachers talked about how when a student has to miss school to on vacation they take a “cuddly friend”, a stuffed giraffe or frog, with them. The stuffed animal has a note card tied around its neck with different questions on it that the child must answer while they are away, such as “where did you go? Who did you meet? How did you get there? Journal what you did today”. Then when they go back to school, they share their experience with the class. I thought this was a great way to ensure that the students are still learning when they go on vacation, in a way that is still fun for the students.
After going month by month on their curriculum of teaching global studies we all got to make different crafts that they let the students make when learning about the countries. We got to make Japanese fans, Native American Story Sticks, Carnival Masks, along with several other crafts. While we did our crafts they played a CD with children’s songs from different countries, one of which was a song I recognized. I commented on this to the other Brianna (who I went to elementary school with) in our class who was in this session with me about doing this song in elementary school teacher Mr. Valente used to sing this song with us. The woman sitting next to me then looked up and asked us where we went to school, we told her Thornton Elementary in Johnston, and we then realize we were talking to our Art Teacher, Ms. Pringle, from Kindergarten-2nd Grade. She remembered us from all those years ago, partly because she knew our moms. It was great to catch up with her, and we ended up having some great conversations about what its like once you get out of college and teach on your own, and about our feelings of No Child Left Behind.
Before I knew it my second session was over and it was time for lunch and to listen to the key note speaker, Tricia Rose. I absolutely loved Dr. Tricia Rose’s speech. As someone said in class, it was like her talk was made for our class. Everything she talked about reminded me of something we talked about in class, or a piece that we have read. One of my favorite parts was definitely the pledge, in which she talked about not being personally responsible for things such as racism, but that we can make a difference in changing these situations.
Although Dr. Tricia Rose’s speech could probably be connected to any of the authors we’ve read for this class one of the authors I felt it closely represented was Johnson’s theory that ‘We must learn to say the words’. One of the stories Dr. Tricia Rose told was about how people will talk about race, and give entire speech on the topic without ever actually using the word ‘race’. One of her points on ‘How to teach difficult subjects’ was also “Be painfully honest about the subject- face the reality”. In Johnson’s piece, he talked about the same idea of being able to talk explicitly about these issues in order to work towards making a difference.
Another author I found her speech to be closely related to is Christensen: “Students need to find real ways to “talk back” and take action against oppression”. Tricia Rose first brought forth this idea with the pledge in which she said (and I apologize for just writing a rough idea of what she said, I regret not copying it all down!) ‘I, Tricia Rose am not personally responsible for these issues but I can change them’. This theory was also present in her third way to teach difficult subjects which was “teach structural circumstances of inequality and solutions to resist them”. Like Christensen, Dr. Rose is saying that we must teach our students about the problems that exist and give them the tools to then go out and change them.
Even though I was only running on 3 hours of sleep, I left Promising Practices feeling completely energized. I learned so much in this conference, things that will not only make me a better teacher in the future, but a better person now.