Brave New Schools: Identity and Power in
Canadian Education
Jim Cummins
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
2008 R.W.B Jackson Lecture
The Toronto District School Board wins the Carl Bertelsmann Prize 2008
The Prize honors exemplary work in fostering integration and promoting equal opportunity in education
Students at the Don Mills Collegiate Institute.
The Bertelsmann Foundation has announced that the Toronto District
School Board has won this year's Carl Bertelsmann Prize of €150,000
for its exemplary work in promoting social integration and improving equal
learning opportunities at its schools.
“The equity policy of the TDSB represents a holistic, systemic approach to
ensuring equal participation and chances especially for students of migrant origin.”
PISA Data on First and Second Generation Migrant Student Achievement
Overview
From Effective to Inspirational Pedagogy
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Pedagogical orientation
pedagogy as instrumental
pedagogy as personal
pedagogy as political
How linguistic and other forms of diversity are constructed in school
policy and practice
diversity as problem to be resolved
diversity as resource for learning
How educators individually and collectively position themselves with
the matrix of societal power relations
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coercive relations of power
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collaborative relations of power
Power and the Negotiation of Identity in Classrooms
Societal power relations are flowing through the teacher to his or her students.
However, through their pedagogical choices, teachers can seize this power and redirect it so that it becomes collaborative and promotes “empowerment”.
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Coercive Relations of Power
= exercise of power by a dominant individual, group, or country to the detriment of
a subordinated individual, group, or country (power over);
Collaborative Relations of Power
= collaborative relations of power operate on the assumption that power is not a
fixed pre-determined quantity but rather can be generated in interpersonal and
intergroup relations. Participants in the relationship are empowered through their
collaboration such that each is more affirmed in her or his identity and has a
greater sense of efficacy to create change in his or her life or social situation
(power with);
Empowerment
= the collaborative creation of power
Power and Identity in “Brave New World”
"We also predestine and condition. We decant our babies as socialized
human beings, as Alphas or Epsilons…”
“There was a pause; then the voice began again.
‘Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because
they're so frightfully clever. I'm really awfully glad I'm a Beta,
because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the
Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta
children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children.
And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able …’ “
Fiction? One of the most consistent research findings across international
contexts is that schools largely reproduce the social class divisions and
power relations of the society.
Is this because we lack instructional techniques or because we choose as a
society not to challenge established systems of power and status
relations?
Power and Identity in Teacher Education: The OISE
Policy (from the 2009 Applicant Profile)
“OISE is strongly committed to social justice in everything it does. This
means that we are committed to the just treatment of each individual
member of our community and the communities we serve.”
This question is an opportunity for you to show that you understand
that who you are will affect your work as a teacher.
Each person's social identity is influenced by gender, race, socioeconomic status, sexuality, religion, geographic region, ethnicity, age,
dis/ability, and other characteristics. The students in every school are
diverse in at least some of these ways.
Describe your social identity. How and why do you think your social
identity will influence your work as a teacher with groups of
students who are diverse in their social identities?
Identity Destruction in Residential Schools
Dolphus Shae’s testimony to the Berger Inquiry (1977) of his
experiences at the Aklavik Residential School:
‘Before I went to school the only English I knew was “hello” and
when we got there we were told that if we spoke Indian they
would whip us until our hands were blue on both sides. And also
we were told that the Indian religion was superstitious and
pagan. It made you feel inferior to whites ...We all felt lost and
wanted to go home ...Today I think back on the hostel life and I
feel furious.’ (p. 90)
American Sign Language and Cochlear Implants:
Evidence and Ideology
Hard-of-hearing children and deaf children with cochlear
implants also benefit from exposure to a signed language
(Preisler, 1999; Preisler & Ahlstrom, 1997; Spencer, 2002).
Perhaps, especially for this group of children with some hearing
abilities, acquiring a signed language early in childhood can assist
spoken language development in significant ways.
Yoshinaga-Itano (2006) cites three case studies of infants,
involved with the Colorado Home Intervention Program, who
acquired ASL and simultaneously received cochlear implants and
auditory-oral stimulation. These young children’s broad ASL
vocabularies became a foundation for developing spoken English
word perception and production skills.
(Kristin Snoddon, Canadian Modern Language Review, 2008, 64:4,
p. 594)
Two Scenarios
Diversity as a problem
Diversity as a resource
Diversity as Problem
In recent years, increasing numbers of ESL students have
come into my [science] classes. This year, one of my
classes contains almost as many non-English speaking
students as there are English speaking ones. Most of the
ESL students have very limited English skills, and as a
result are not involved in class discussions and cannot
complete assignments or pass tests.
Diversity as Problem (cont.)
I respect these students as I recognize that often they have a superior
prior education in their own language. They are well-mannered,
hard-working and respectful of others. I enjoy having a multiracial
society in my classroom, because I like these students for themselves
and their high motivational level. However, I am troubled by my
incompetence in adequately helping many individual students of that
society. Because of language difficulties, they often cannot
understand me, nor can they read the text or board notes. Each of
these students needs my personal attention, and I do not have that
extra time to give.
Diversity as Problem (cont.)
As well, I have to evaluate their ability to understand science. They
cannot show me their comprehension. I have to give them a failing
mark! I question the educational decisions made to assimilate ESL
students into academic subject classes before they have minimal skills
in English (extracted from "A teacher's daily struggle in multi-racial
classroom", Letter of the Week, Toronto Star, 1994, April 2, p. B3).
What’s Wrong with this Scenario?
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Isolation – no evidence of any communication with ESL
teachers or other content teachers;
Leadership vacuum – why is this issue not being discussed at
school level?
No awareness of relevant research – at least 5 years is
typically required for ELL students to catch up academically –
can’t be “fixed” in 1-2 years of ESL;
No awareness of scaffolding strategies to make content
comprehensible for ELL students;
No conception of possible alternative assessment strategies.
Uncomfortable Questions
This classroom reality can be understood only at the institutional level. It
reflects the curricular and organizational choices made at multiple levels of the
educational hierarchy. These choices reflect the priorities and values of our
society – in other words, they reflect the power relations in our society.
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In a context where half the students in the school system have learned or are
learning English as an additional language, how do we explain the fact that many
teachers may still lack the knowledge base to teach these students effectively?
How do we explain the fact that there is typically very little attention paid to
issues of linguistic diversity in Principals’ courses? If principals are unaware of
what constitutes effective content teaching to ELL students, how can they
evaluate whether teachers are instructing these students effectively?
To what extent are Faculties of Education preparing new teachers to teach our
current student body rather than an imagined “generic” student who is white,
middle-class, monolingual, monocultural and heterosexual?
The Collaborative Creation of Power in One Classroom
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Lisa Leoni: Year 1 – Grade 7/8 mainstream class; Year
2 – Grades 4-6 ESL;
Large Muslim student population from Pakistan;
Lisa explored implementation of bilingual instructional
strategies as a way of enabling literacy engagement
from a very early stage of students’ learning of
English;
Video clips are from a presentation at the Ontario
TESL conference in November 2005;
Identity Negotiation in the Classroom
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The way I see it everything has to relate
to the identity of the students; children
have to see themselves in every aspect
of their work at school.
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My overarching goal as a teacher is to
uncover all that is unknown to me about
my students–linguistically and culturally,
and especially to understand the
community they are part of (their parents,
their friends, their faith) and the list goes
on. So when a student enters my class, I
want to discover all that I can about that
student as a learner and as a person.
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For example, when Tomer entered my
class last year, a lot of the work he
produced was in Hebrew. Why? Because
that is where his knowledge was encoded
and I wanted to make sure that Tomer
was an active member and participant in
my class. It was also a way for me to
gain insight into his level of literacy and
oral language development.
Tomer’s Identity Text
I think using your first language
is so helpful because when you
don’t understand something
after you’ve just come here it is
like beginning as a baby. You
don’t know English and you need
to learn it all from the
beginning; but if you already
have it in another language then
it is easier, you can translate it,
and you can do it in your
language too, then it is easier to
understand the second language.
The first time I couldn’t
understand what she [Lisa] was
saying except the word Hebrew,
but I think it’s very smart that
she said for us to do it in our
language because we can’t just
sit on our hands doing nothing.
Kanta’s Perspective
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And how it helped me was when I
came here in grade 4 the teachers
didn’t know what I was capable of.
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I was given a pack of crayons and a
coloring book and told to get on
coloring with it. And after I felt so
bad about that--I’m capable of doing
much more than just that. I have my
own inner skills to show the world
than just coloring and I felt that those
skills of mine are important also. So
when we started writing the book
[The New Country], I could actually
show the world that I am something
instead of just coloring.
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And that's how it helped me and it
made me so proud of myself that I am
actually capable of doing something,
and here today [at the Ontario TESL
conference] I am actually doing
something. I’m not just a coloring
person—I can show you that I am
something.
Kanta’s and Tomer’s Pedagogical Theory
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Effective pedagogy aims explicitly to promote cognitive engagement and
identity investment on the part of students.
Effective pedagogy constructs an image of the student as intelligent,
imaginative, and linguistically talented. Lack of English does not imply
less intelligence, imagination, or linguistic talent.
Effective pedagogy acknowledges and builds on the cultural and
linguistic capital (prior knowledge) of students and communities. if
students’ prior knowledge is encoded in L1, then L1 should be encouraged
as a cognitive tool;
Knowledge and skills transfer across languages – teachers should
encourage and enable that transfer rather than restricting it;
This orientation to the teaching of linguistically diverse
students is very different from what is being proposed within
the discourse of “evidence-based” ‘ school effectiveness
research.
Emerging Policy Framework for Educating Immigrant
Children Based on OECD Data
Migration Policy Institute
Bertelsmann Stiftung
The Transatlantic Task Force on Immigration and Integration
Language Policies and Practices for Helping Immigrants and
Second-generation Immigrant Students Succeed
Gayle Christensen and Petra Stanat
September 2007
The Construction of Students’ Home Language
as a Cause of Underachievement
The Transatlantic Task Force on Immigration and Integration articulated
the policy options of Christensen and Stanat’s (2007) paper, together with
two others they commissioned (Crul, 2007; Lesemann, 2007), in the
following way:
The reports recommend that lawmakers focus on policies that
bring children of immigrants into the education system by the age
of three, immerse them in the language of their host countries,
provide language support through both primary and secondary
school within a clear framework, and afford more flexibility to
move between academic and vocational education.
(http://www.migrationinformation.org/transatlantic/)
The unspoken logic here is that total immersion of immigrant students at a
very early age in the host country language will ensure cultural and
linguistic assimilation and get rid of the “problem” of children’s home
language.
Pedagogies of Choice: School Improvement through Teacher Agency
Instructional Options
Content
How do we adapt curriculum materials to link with students’ prior
knowledge and cultural background (e.g. purchase dual language
books) and also to promote critical thinking about texts and issues
(e.g. whose perspectives are represented in a text)?
Cognition
How can we modify instruction to evoke higher levels of literacy
engagement and critical thinking?
Tools
How can we use tools such as computers, digital cameras,
camcorders, web pages, etc?
Assessment
How can we complement mandated standardized assessments in
order to present to students, parents, and administrators a more valid
account of student progress? (e.g. a role for portfolio assessment?)
Language/Culture
What messages are we giving students and parents about home
language and culture? How can we enable students to use their L1 as
a powerful tool for learning? Can we increase students’ identity
investment by means of bilingual instructional strategies (teaching for
transfer)?
Parental Involvement
How can we engage parents as co-educators in such a way that their
linguistic and cultural expertise is harnessed as fuel for their
children’s academic progress?
Current
Realities
Where Are We?
Vision for the
Future
Where Do We Want
To Be?
Getting it Done
How Do We Get
There?
What Image of the Child Are We
Sketching in Our Instruction?
Capable of becoming bilingual and biliterate?
Capable of higher-order thinking and intellectual
accomplishments?
Capable of creative and imaginative thinking?
Capable of creating literature and art?
Capable of generating new knowledge?
Capable of thinking about and finding solutions to social
issues?