Jones, S. P., & Sheffield, E. C. (2018). What kid’s love (and hate) about school: Reflections on difference. Gorham, ME: Myers Education Press.
For a couple of reasons, this book has been on my mind of late. Firstly, many kids are not in school, at least not in body, and I know that many of them are missing the things they love about school. I also know some kids who are not minding that they’re learning from home as it has let them avoid some of the things they hate. Secondly, as I’ve watched the news over the past year, I’ve wondered so many times about the ways in which the education system in this country is complicit in what I would call a gross lack of critical thinking. (Just two of many pieces of evidence…people who were and are influenced by lies promulgated on social media to the extent of law-breaking and people who claimed to be surprised by violence in a country that is built on the foundations of the violence of slavery and the near obliteration of indigenous people – “This isn’t America!”)
And even though this book is about “kids,” the principles shared in its pages are for “students.” In my experience, the same kinds of things that make school work (or not) for students in preK-12 schools are pretty much the same things that make it possible for college students to learn and thrive.
Jones and Sheffield have pulled together the wisdom of so many important voices in this conversation. I want to make just a few summary points about what kids love and hate about school and encourage you to read the entire book to get the details and practical guidance that is so generously offered.
Learning environments in which students can learn and thrive…
· Make sure that everyone belongs (safe and valued in all their identities) through affirming relationships among teachers, classmates, school leaders and staff at every level
· Include regular “check-ins” to assess students’ bandwidth, especially during the pandemic, and let students have a moment to reflect on their learning
· Are culturally responsive, recognizing that culture affects how students relate to the material and what makes them comfortable enough to have lots of available bandwidth for learning it
· Recognize students “funds of knowledge;” start with their assets
· Make assessment part of everyday so we’re not trying to teach students what they already know
· Give students just enough help and just when they need it (Vygotsky’s “zone of proximal development”)
· Feel like “makerspaces” where students and teachers create and learn together
· Have faith in their students – “all children…start school with a desire to learn” (Rueda, p. 77)
· Use universal design to create classrooms for everyone – no one is forgotten or excluded
· See mistakes as golden opportunities to grow our brains – potential is precious
· Have curriculum in which all students can see themselves
· Use restorative practices in place of an emphasis on punishment and humiliation
What do students hate? What impedes learning for so many students?
· The opposite of all the points above
· Fear – people can’t learn when they’re afraid (not much at all happens in the panic zone)
· Forced conformity – when the students who are rewarded and valued are those who just do their homework, come to class on time, and pay attention (be quiet?)
· Bluntly, “…culturally inept curriculum and authoritative, bullying teachers” (Harvell, p. 29)
· School that works for some… “Most adults and even many people still in school today experienced their education with the same number of options in every class: one.” (Schulze, p. 118)
· Instead of love and support, lots of blaming and shaming (of students and families)
· Teachers who are stressed out and tapped out, wanting to do right by students but not having the bandwidth themselves to do the next good thing
This list could go on and on. Fortunately, this wonderful book has a strengths perspective; while clearly articulating what is seriously wrong, it gives us hope by sharing many ideas about how we can do things right for kids and teachers and families and communities.
Especially in the current climate in this country, this statement about the purpose of schools feels vitally relevant in this moment: “…the production of an educated citizenry, which, in actuality, has been a deeply entrenched and often unexamined view toward producing and reproducing citizens that follow traditional lines of White and heteronormative power and privilege” (Carter, Sugimoto, Stoehr, & Carter, p. 104). Have we accomplished this too well? Watching the social unrest, the political violence, and the gross inequalities brought to light by the pandemic, I suggest that a close examination of our entire educational system is in order. This book offers many beginnings to long-overdue conversations.