Our class had PE with another 5th grade class every day. My class was a bilingual classroom, so all of my students were Latino. The other class was a monolingual English classroom, so mostly white children. There was a student teacher in PE that year. I don't even remember his name (I'll call him Mr. Johnson) but the students had started coming back to my classroom after their daily PE with complaints. It started out small, but the complaints began to increase. I heard things like, "Mr. Johnson ALWAYS calls the other class to line up first," "Even if we're quiet and ready, we are called last every single day," "Mr. Johnson doesn't even know our names, but he knows all of the names of the kids in the other class," "Mr. Johnson calls the other class by the teacher's name, but calls us 'the other class,'" and "he's racist because he treats us worse than the other students."
Now, keep in mind that I'm telling this after only hearing things from the perspective of my students. They were feeling marginalized. Even at 10 years old, these kids have lived and know racism. However, there are times that they are quick to label things as racist that might not necessarily be. As a teacher, I try to have serious conversations with students about things like discrimination and racism in real life. I don't deny that these things happen, but I try to make students realize the importance of identifying and labeling those situations correctly. If problems stem from a place of discrimination, the way that it is handled would be very different than a problem that has other motivations.
I also like to try to give students strategies to approach and solve problems on their own, rather than jumping in and fixing their problems for them. We had a few discussions about this, and we talked about what they might do to deal with the way that they were feeling about their treatment by Mr. Johnson. We decided as a group that they would try to have a conversation with him; ask him if there was something that they could do to sometimes get called first (because maybe they're not quieting down fast enough, or are not showing proper behavior). They were also going to politely inform him of mine and their names when he calls them something like "hey, you," or "other class."
They tried these things. They didn't work and nothing changed.
At this point, these kiddos were starting to feel more and more frustrated as this had been going on for several weeks. They came back one day with a report of one of the students getting in trouble. When Mr. Johnson said, "Mrs. Dahl's class, line up. Other class, line up," my student had responded with something like, "our teacher and class has a name, and it's Mrs. Fausett. You should call us by our class name." The student did this in front of everyone, and admittedly maybe not in the most respectful tone or manner. He got pulled aside and was in trouble for showing defiance and disrespect. His punishment was to have to sit out of a school celebration.
The class came back from PE pretty worked up after that. Talking as a group, they came up with the idea to refuse to line up if they are called "other class" instead of "Mrs. Fausett's" class again. After they discussed this, they turned to me to look for my approval. I tried my best to stay as neutral as possible. This seemed to be taking a life of its own, and I didn't want to take away from their experience of working through this problem themselves. I told them that if they decide to do that, they might (probably will) have consequences, and they would have to decide if the benefits outweighed the consequences. I didn't offer to get them out of trouble, but I also didn't tell them that they couldn't do this. One girl asked me if I would tell their parents about this situation if she gets written up. My response was that I would tell their parents about the situation as honestly as I can from my perspective. She seemed okay with that. They ended the conversation without a real consensus - some were angry and ready to raise hell, some were terrified of defying a teacher, and some were seriously considering the situation but were on the fence about if they would actually take part in this.
The next day comes, and the kiddos are visibly nervous before going to PE. The class has many students that are well-behaved and have never had a write-up or detention in their entire school careers. I'm wondering what they'll end up doing. Whatever they chose, though, I was ready to discuss and help them work through it after PE.
I pick them up and we walk into my classroom. They are nervous and excited. Their faces are red. Some are smiling and a few look scared. As they clamor over each to tell me what happened, I learn that Mr. Johnson did indeed call them to line up last and referred to them as "the other class" again. They stayed on their spots and did not line up. Every. Single. Student. Someone told him (again) that they have names, and that they wanted him to call them by their class name, just like he does for Mrs. Dahl's class. And they all continued to sit. The other class was lined up at the door, just staring. He told them to line up again. They stayed on the floor. Finally, he relented and called them by name; they lined up to get ready to leave.
I listened to them telling me about this. On the inside, I was beaming and filled with pride. In front of them, I tried to show support but without leaning too much one way or the other. I wanted this experience to be theirs. I wanted them to own it, good or bad. They were still not sure if they would be getting in trouble or not. It was very possible that they might be getting called down to the principal's office any time now, and were uncertain if their stand was even successful. Was it worth it?
The end result was that their act of defiance prompted discussions between the cooperating teacher and the student teacher. Mr. Johnson said that he didn't realize how his actions were hurting the students. He didn't mean to single them out, and after discussions with other teachers, he began to change the way that he spoke to the students. I didn't hear another complaint from my students after this happened.
I was so glad to have been a part of this experience. Even though part of me was wondering if I'd get in trouble for "allowing and encouraging" this to happen, I was with the kids on this one. A consequence to help kids stand up for themselves was worth it, if it came to that. They were willing to put themselves out there and take a risk; I was behind them 100%.
There were so many things that I valued from this experience:
- The students took ownership of this problem for themselves. Instead of a teacher just solving it for them, they sought advice from me, they approached Mr. Johnson and spoke to him, they told him how they felt, they made a stand, and they saw results of their efforts.
- The students really worked together to solve this - they spoke with each other as a class, offered suggestions and ideas, and even though they reached out to me for help, they ultimately made their own decisions about what to do.
- My class got to experience the power of solidarity. Every single student was a part of something, even the ones that were terrified of getting in trouble and had never broken any rules before. They all stood together, and were willing to accept individual consequences to support a group and a common cause. They saw the power of a group versus an individual.
- They taught themselves a lesson in civil disobedience. I didn't tell them that it was what they were doing, but I think that being a part of something like this probably taught them more than I could have by reading things out of a history book to them.
- They learned not to blindly trust or follow everything that an adult says or does. I invite my students to call me out if I do something that isn't right. I admit my mistakes to them. We work together to make things better. There are many adults that do awful things and are not good role models for children, yet in schools, we train them to obey without question. I want students to know if that an adult does or says something that they're uncomfortable with, they need to evaluate the situation and respond accordingly; not just do whatever they're told. A teacher's job should be to train kids to be obedient; we should be teaching them how to be independent thinkers.
- They realized that there are consequences for standing up for themselves - one student was written up and lost privileges to participate in a school celebration. The rest could have had that or worse. They knew that they might get in trouble at home. And they STILL carried on, because they were doing what they thought was right. They had to make the difficult decision: is the risk was worth the cause?
Overall, this was a rewarding experience for me, and I hope that it was for my students, as well. I hope that their ability to stand up for themselves, for what is right, and for others doesn't diminish as they get older. Even at ten years old, kids can do some pretty amazing things.