Return-Path: <nifl-aalpd@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from literacy (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) with SMTP id j53E5oG05105; Fri, 3 Jun 2005 10:05:50 -0400 (EDT) Date: Fri, 3 Jun 2005 10:05:50 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <d2.2a161115.2fd1bd0c@aol.com> Errors-To: listowner@literacy.nifl.gov Reply-To: nifl-aalpd@literacy.nifl.gov Originator: nifl-aalpd@literacy.nifl.gov Sender: nifl-aalpd@literacy.nifl.gov Precedence: bulk From: BlastGrant@aol.com To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-aalpd@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: [NIFL-AALPD:2184] RE: challenges of learner leadership X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas X-Mailer: 9.0 Security Edition for Windows sub 5200 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Status: O Content-Length: 2965 Lines: 50 I'd like to pick up the thread from Ernest Best's post on May 13th. It was a challenging, thought provoking post. Ernest wrote about one of the hardest areas of student leadership and ABE -- real equality between student leaders and educators. Ernest took the question past student leadership and raised the question of respect and condescension to students in all of ABE. This topic gets to the center of traditional education: Teachers have knowledge, students are there to learn that knowledge. Its not equal. Participatory education and student leadership change that fundamental relationship. This is not a black and white topic. Its not about giving all power to the students. We can't just say "We're all equal here." Because we're not. There are real differences in skills, knowledge, and access to the system. But the power does not all flow in one direction. Students bring as much to the table as educators. Students and teachers have different knowledge, different strengths, different blindspots. The question is how do we learn to communicate with each other about them. Two weeks ago at a student leadership training here in New Mexico a teacher said "Students, you have to understand that we teachers are not trained in how to do student leadership. In teacher training, we are taught to be traditional teachers. We teach you. We are not taught how to work with you as equals. All of these topics about culture and voice and leadership are great, its why I am here. But they are new to me. I was taught how to write a curriculum and a lesson plan. I know how to make a good test. You want me to teach you as an equal, but I don't know how. I was not taught that way by my teachers, and I don't know how to teach you that way. I'm still learning how to do that." These are learnable skills. When I first started working with student leaders, I had to learn the hard way. When would I let my ego get the better of me and start to think that I knew what the students needed to do, students left. In my mind, they were right. When I stayed true to having students' ideas and values lead, the projects worked. When a student leadership project isn't working, the first place I look is at the communication and trust between the students and the teachers. Over time, building trust and real equality with students have become the most important things I've learned as an educator. I think that building trust and taking leadership from students are also some of the most important skills a classroom teacher can develop. These are not just new teaching skills. For a lot of us, they are a new way to relate to people. Its a multicultural skill. To be student centered, participatory, or student led, we have to learn to share power with people from different economic classes, education levels, cultures, races and genders. And where can teachers learn these skills?
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