Lover and Respect for Students: A Discussion of Three Sources

SA similar thread of love and respect for the students runs through all three books under discussion. In Sylvia Ashton-Warner's Teacher, her concept of "organic learning" tapped into the innermost being of each child in order to initiate them into the world of reading and writing. Instead of imposing texts containing experiences of middle-class white people on the Maori students, she made use of the texts created by the Maori children to teach them. Herbert Kohl's 36 children depicts the triumph of a teacher who succeeded in motivating children in ghetto schools to learn. By encouraging them in the development of their individual interests and incorporating them within the classroom setting, Kohl created a sanctuary for these students away from their chaotic existences and a school system that has failed them. Living between the lines, by Lucy McCormick Calkins and Shelley Harwayne, sends a clear and powerful message to teachers working with students that their first goal should be to "fall in love with our children, and to do so quickly" (1991, p. 11). All three books testify to the incredible accomplishments of the unflagging human spirit that overcame tremendous odds to succeed.

In Teacher, Ashton-Warner elucidated her creative teaching scheme that encompassed several interesting concepts, such as "key vocabulary" and "organic reading." Fundamentally, she believed that the first words chosen to initiate children into the world of reading and writing should come f

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to another way of learning. Rather than judging the Maori's communication in single words as primitive and incomplete, she unveiled the inner complexity of the communication styles of the Maoris: "An image is represented by a single spoken word but its associated meaning is supplied by expression, gesture, intonation, cadence and, above all, touch" (Ashton-Warner, 1986, p. 139). Like Ashton-Warner who was teaching students outside the mainstream institutions in New Zealand, Kohl also faced the challenge of teaching disadvantaged children who had been neglected by the school system. Furthermore, he was a conventionally-trained teacher who did not know how to deal with children who were not motivated to learn. Kohl's book is a personal account of his journey of navigating his way into the minds and hearts of his students. Not only did he have to overcome the apathy of the students, he was given texts that were relevant only to middle-class people with pleasant life experiences and thus utterly foreign to these children from Harlem (Kohl, 1988, p. 19). What is most impressive about his narrative is his honest portrayal of his struggle with the role of the teacher as he grappled with his task of helping these students. His in

Category: Psychology - L