To understand what the "full picture" is in education, you must first know what the partial picture is. In education, we already have the partial picture. A simple example of this would be how public schools teach history. I took the liberty of looking up some common history textbooks used in schools and textbooks I remember using in high school, and every single book I found was written by a white American man. How can we get the full picture if we only have one perspective?
There are so many different stories and perspectives on everything that happens in our world, and yet we hear the same, very few stories in our public education system. Our education system and textbooks focus heavily on the experience of white Americans. When we discuss other races, we give brief stories that only focus on the final moments of overcoming racism. We don't talk about their achievements. We don't talk about the years and years of oppression and abysmal things that happened to them. An example of this would be the story of Ruby Bridges. The only thing I learned about her was from seeing a picture of her walking into a white school. I only saw her one moment of overcoming a racist boundary. I never knew about the awful remarks, the ostracization, and the rocks that were thrown at her. History books only show a glorified version of America overcoming racism and the achievements of white historical heroes, but that is not real history. That is not the full picture.
To get the full picture, we need to find unspoken stories. We need to listen to marginalized groups. We need multiple perspectives. If you look up Ruby Bridges, you will still just see the picture of her walking to school. It is more challenging to find pictures of the awful things happening, but if you listen to her story... you will get the full picture.
you are absolutely right that we need to find the unspoken stories about the marginalized groups. I agree that the History curriculum taught in America is very one-sided and avoids emphasizing on all the wrong doings of our founding fathers and the laws they advocated for. This disparity in our education systems' history content needs to be addressed and changed for our society to finally address the inequities faced by marginalized groups. As things are brought to light, Americans will being realizing the extremity of these social, economic, and class disparities. Only then will we be able to bring peace to our country.
ReplyDeleteHi Cayenne!
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your clear and well developed response and you also mentioned some very interesting points! If I was not studying to become a future educator then I would still be completely blinded by how bias our history textbooks, our classroom lessons and overall the education that children are receiving are with only allowing one perspective to be seen and heard. As you mentioned, the history books only glorified a version of America that involved white historical figures which is 100% to be true otherwise I would know more minority historical figures and more about them. I too, did not know the full story of Ruby bridges until I began doing research myself. It is sad to think that I was not taught the entire story of her experience going to school as an African American little girl in a white elementary school. It is disturbing to know that grown people made death threats and even felt it be necessary to take their child out of the same school Ruby Bridges attended due to the color of her skin. We do need to make sure that the full story is being heard and not just bits and pieces, students deserve to know the entire picture!
Ana,
DeleteThank you for your comment! I am glad that as an education major you have learned about the bias that we have/had in classrooms growing up. It is so important to recognize these things in order to better the future!
Hi Cayenne!
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your excellent blog entry this week! You make a good point about how the current education system only brings up a partial image of what American history really is. Most of the books I have read for school seem to be written by white Americans and British people. It is really unfortunate that American students do not really get to experience the stories of people of different ethnicities, religions, sexualties, etc.. In fact, we are only doing them a disservice by purposefully cutting out the experiences of others. American history is a grab bag of unique experiences and cultures. I also think that if we learn more about other cultures, it will be much easier to empathize with the suffering of others. We have become so accustomed to only care about those who are most like us. If we see everyone as “like us”, I think we would be able to come together and expand our appreciation for each other.
Hello Cayenne,
ReplyDeleteI appreciated your blog entry and the thought and research that you put into it! "Do I Have The Full Picture?" This is hard for a majority to understand when it comes to an educational standpoint. "How can we get the full picture if we only have on perspective?" This line stuck out to me as it is so true in the context you mentioned with American History, but also just in life in general. Thank you for sharing such valuable insight.
Hi Cayenne, I really enjoyed reading this blog post about the full picture. I agree with the statement you made regarding the history books being written by a White man. This goes to show that the material being taught to students is already showing bias. It is important for students to learn about their culture and other sides of the story we all learn about. There are rarely any stories about different beliefs and cultures in US History classes. I remember always being bored in my history class because I never related to anything.
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