Chapter 4

This chapter begins by talking about Freire. He discusses the desire to achieve social change and the idea of critical consciousness. He believes it is all a system of oppression and domination and that the oppressed need to use critical consciousness in order to take a look at what is going on in schools. They need to critique knowledge they are gaining in school and link it to the interests of the dominant groups. Knowledge is power and it is also socially constructed. Therefore being socially constructed, the oppressed population needs to do something about it.

Next there is a discussion about resistance and The Alternate School. “Resistance is any behaviour, passive or active, that goes beyond simply opposing one or many elements of the dominant group” (Barakett, p.91). The Alternate School is for youth subcultures who are resistant to the power structures of schools and the knowledge that is imposed upon them. When they go to the Alternate School, they must first phone themselves to get an interview. Students who go there have experienced personal and social difficulties that have interfered with their academic success such as sexual crises, assault, alcohol abuse, etc. Students and teachers are like equals at this school and they discuss what is going to be learned together. They have a lot of freedom and are able to share their opinions and thoughts with everyone. A safe environment is created and students are able to talk about their difficulties. They do volunteer work to overcome the difficulties they have faced and even get offered jobs afterwards. Students here begin to feel empowerment and have their own voice.

The feminist theory discusses the need to have a gender-inclusive curriculum. This would include writings and life experiences by women, as well as their accounts of history and analyses of the body of knowledge that is currently the content of curriculum. Feminist pedagogy focuses on social transformation, is concerned about whose interests are being served, and issues of class, race, and gender. They would like to move toward social justice.

Some anti-racist pedagogies are looked at. Critical multicultural pedagogy believes classroom practices must emphasize the sources of social injustices of racism and economic inequity. The pedagogy of whiteness looks at the unquestioned acceptance of whiteness and white privilege in the dominant group. The anti-racist black feminist pedagogy states that women of colour should be able to express their fears and concerns associated with oppression.

I believe that the Alternate School is quite an interesting concept. I like it and I don’t for a few reasons. I don’t like it because it is as if we are giving up on these students in the regular schools, or they are giving up on themselves and we are letting it happen. I think we as teachers need to be accepting of all students no matter what their background; no bias should be demonstrated because of something someone has done. Everyone should have an equal right to education. I like the idea because students who do decide to go to this alternate school are deciding they don’t want to completely give up on themselves. They are given the opportunity to discuss their personal difficulties, learn from them, and strengthen themselves by working with their difficulties in volunteer positions. I like the fact that the teachers really work with the students and try to be or do go to the same level as the student in order to not use any power over the students. It is great that these students develop a voice when they are done and can feel a sense of accomplishment, as well as attain success. These students do have to follow normal curriculum even though they also decide other things they are going to learn. They can be just as successful as students in the regular school program.

I am not a feminist but I do believe we should be aware of the male dominance that still occurs in society as well as in our school system. We should make sure that the literature we choose has an equal amount of male and female authors. We should make sure the characters in these stories do not have stereotypical roles and male dominance. We need to teach our students that males and females are equal and everyone can succeed and everyone has a voice. Things are different today than what they used to be but there is still gender bias and a strong male role in our schools.