Cairo Association of Teachers - Newsletter

CAT Tracks for January 16, 2006 TOO YOUNG TO RELATE

Just a reminder...

To all of our students (and many of our teachers!), Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy share a common bond...a couple of presidents that got assassinated "back in the day". Unlike me (and more than a few of you!), they don't remember where they were when they heard the news about President Kennedy!

According to the article below, half of the world's population was born after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

So, it's up to us to try to find a way to put history into terms that the students of today can relate to...to understand. Even though discrimination is still alive and well, the world that our students have grown up in is radically different from the one that was common in the 1950s.

In the article, a couple of teachers describe their efforts to "keep it real".

From the Cincinnati Enquirer...

From memory to history
Teachers' stories and methods bring lessons to today's kids

By Jennifer Mrozowski and Cindy Kranz
Enquirer staff writers

Ludlow teacher Cyndy Jones remembers being seated at a Covington restaurant as a child in the 1950s and having her grandfather tell her they had to leave because a black family sat next to them.

Her first-grade students look at her like she's crazy when Jones, 53, talks about the type of racism that relegated black people to the back of city buses and forbade them from drinking from the same fountains as whites.

Many of her students - and even colleagues - weren't born when the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. crisscrossed the nation, leading peaceful protests and espousing the importance of civil rights for all Americans.

"The children I teach are clueless about it. They just read about it in a book," Jones said. "I do have a memory of how our world is so different than it is now."

The national holiday to honor King today comes nearly four decades after his assassination in 1968, forcing teachers to try new ways to make his legacy come alive.

Some weave his teachings into debates on contemporary issues like stem cell research or school uniforms. Others analyze King's speeches to show students how they, too, could make an impact through persuasion.

And some students take their knowledge on the road to emulate the civil rights leader through service projects.

But many children, born long after schools were integrated and blacks got to exercize their right to vote, have trouble understanding the times in which King lived.

"It's difficult to make the association between the past and present, but good teachers can overcome that challenge," said Paul Bernish, chief communications officer at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center.

Bernish recently read that half the world's population was not alive when Neil Armstrong landed on the moon in 1969. That's one year after King was assassinated.

But there are some advantages to the passage of time, in terms of learning about King and the civil rights movement, Bernish said.

"At the time Dr. King was alive, he was a controversial figure. Many people didn't like him and didn't like his nonviolent approach to changing laws. There was a heated controversy about the civil rights movement," he said.

"Now, with the passage of time, you see how serious the situation was. Such a large percentage of the population was shut out from an equal chance, in terms of jobs and voting and education."

To make King's life more real for students, some teachers like Jones tell personal tales of their experience with racism.

Jones' first-graders at Ludlow Elementary in Kentucky devoted the entire day Friday to learning about King in English, art and reading. But Jones' memories of discrimination during the 1950s and '60s make the most impact year after year.

While her parents weren't prejudiced, Jones said, she couldn't say the same about her grandfather. She remembers going into a Covington restaurant at age 6 or 7 in the late '50s. "There was a nice black family at the table next to us," Jones said. "My grandfather got up and said we were leaving."

The example from Jones' life helps students understand that these incidents really happened and not all that long ago. It sets the stage for discussion about living together peacefully.

"They accept the differences," she said. "If I catch them young, and they don't learn prejudice at a young age, when they do get older and are in a different situation, they'll make the right choices."

But even the personal stories can be hard for children to comprehend.

Rosa Jason's students look at her in disbelief when she tells them their paths might never have crossed if not for King.

Jason, a second-grade teacher at Indian Hill Primary School, is African-American. Most of her 20 students are white.

"I break it down to them and tell them I would not be allowed to teach them. We would not mingle. Our lives would not have coincided. I went to Miami University in Oxford. I tell them that would not have been an option if not for the end of segregation."

The students get a peek at history through their 41-year-old teacher's eyes. Jason's late father, Robert Hunter Sr., was part of the Tuskegee Airmen, a World War II unit of black fighter pilots. Her mother, Rose Hunter, grew up in Georgia and heard King speak on her college campus before he became a household name.

She tells them when she was a young girl, her family traveled in the South and were sometimes told they couldn't use the restrooms in a gas station, but they could go behind the station.

"That puts it in perspective for kids," she said. "It's important not to tiptoe around it, but to talk about it. It's part of our history, but at the same time, let's learn from this. ... We need to learn respect and acceptance, not tolerance. We tolerate ants at a picnic."

Didi Partridge, a Mount Healthy High School English teacher, tried to show students how King is still significant by studying his philosophy in the context of current events.

The students read Coretta Scott King's memoir, listened to several of King's speeches and analyzed his message and persuasion techniques. They wrote persuasive essays, applying King's nonviolent approach to contemporary social issues, such as the death penalty and gun control.

But students said King's message is getting lost.

"We don't live like that," said sophomore Eric Tate, 16. "And he's not recognized until his birthday comes around. Black leaders aren't really talked about at all."

Classmate Courtney Smith, 16, said King should figure more prominently because his teachings are relevant in today's society.

"Certain people take into consideration what he's done for us," she said. "Other people don't care. Still, we should follow his path."

To help students understand the concept of discrimination, Morrow Elementary teacher Lori Partin let her first- and second-graders sample it.

Without explanation, Partin handed each blond child one M&M during a lesson last week.

"The faces of the other students just drop. Their eyes get big. 'Mrs. Partin, you forgot us,' " they told her.

She assured them she didn't forget them. "I tell them, 'Blond people are special. They're smarter. They deserve that.' You can feel the undercurrent right away in the room. They get mad at the blond-headed kids," Partin said.

Later in the week, she taped signs near two water fountains. One reads: "Girls Only." The other: "Boys Only."

Then she stood back and listened to her students when they first saw the signs.

"I was kind of angry, because the boys' water fountain doesn't work as well," said Kevin Rothermund, 8, a second-grader. "They got the best one. Some boys drank out of it and got in trouble. ... It really wasn't fair for the boys."

Both exercises led to discussions about King and civil rights, about fairness and justice.

"I learned that Martin Luther King wanted to make everything fair for blacks and whites," said Holly Shepherd, a 7-year-old first-grader. "We are just the same, only a different color."

Partin, 46, worries that King's legacy and the civil rights movement are becoming just footnotes in our history, so she thinks it's important to reach kids at an early age.

"You've got to find something they can connect to, so that they can understand, or it's just going to be another story in another book."