It has been another week of observing student teachers, which means another week of watching them try really hard to impart knowledge and skills and get frustrated by the larger systems within which education operates - a middle-school student chronically absent due to housing issues who understandably can't make homework a priority was one example out of many.
Still, there were some fun and inspired moments, like the lesson where 7th graders, having spent several days reading primary documents, had a class discussion on the question "Should We Celebrate Thanksgiving Or Not," The question itself is a trick one, because the answer isn't necessarily the point, rather it is to get them to understand how complex colonialism is, to be able to use evidence to support a claim, to be able to disagree civilly with peers, among many other things.
The students took it wonderfully seriously. There was the one who I'm half expecting to make their family sit through a land acknowledgement statement before their turkey dinner. And the one who spread out their hands to the class and said "But food IS love. You prepare a meal to take care of people."
And then there is the person down the street from me who puts up a Thanksgiving lawn sign every year. Not even a caricatured Native American joining Joe Pilgrim there for the harvest feast.
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| Someone get my neighbor some primary documents, stat. |
The power of the fabricated national origin story, man. I mean, the pilgrims couldn't have been more against religious freedom, yet here we are, proud of them, for what, exactly? And Plymouth was only one of many colonies in North America, yet the the myth centers on them why? Their Englishness? Is the truth really so scary we have to work this hard to deny it? Yeah, yeah, I know.
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