Mary Cowhey.  Black Ants and Buddhists Thinking Critically and Teaching Differently in the Primary Grades. For classroom teachers, curriculum specialists, diversity personnel  $18.50  amazon.com

Harry Grover Tuttle

This book focuses on social justice in the primary classroom. Mary Cowhey passionately retells her adventures in her second grade classroom as she helps her students not to talk about diversity but to live it.  She organizes her book around these chapters: Introduction; Compassion, Action and Change; Routines- A day in the life of the Peace Class; It takes a village to teach first grade; Talking about peace; Learning through activism;Teaching History so Children Will Care; Nurturing History Detectives; Seeing Ourselves and Our Families Through Students' Eyes; Responding When Tragedy Enters the Classroom; Building Trust With Families and Weathering Controversy; and Going Against the Grain.

“Learning Through Activism” exemplifies how she develops appropriate, authentic and meaningful ways to engage her second grade students in activism. Not only does activism promote social justice but also her students use critical academic skills in a real life context. After she teaches the struggle for voting equality, introduces some civil rights “everyday activists” and has the students sing some some civil rights songs such as Sapp's “Vote for Me”, she hasan attorney visit the class to explain the Help America vote act. Her students decide to carry on a voter registration  drive. Before and after school, they approach each adult to ask if that person is a registered voter; if not, the children give that person a card. The students make voting posters for local apartment complexes and stores. They  take their completed cards to the city's registrar office, prepare an exhibit for the mayor's office, and  participate in candlelight vigil to encourage voters. The students become empowered. Equally important,  their parents after several trips to the mayor's office come to feel like they now have access to the mayor. In a similar manner, when there is a problem on the playground with playing football, her students do not just complain, they write up “Ideas for making Recess Easier and more fun” with observations  (“Some people get yelled at when they are learning the game”) and suggestions for improvement (“Teach the person the game if they don't know it”) or a petition (Can we play football if we include people, have fair teams, and not have too much fighting?). She invites the physical education teacher to teach them simpler rules for playing football so children who are from other countries  or children who have not played football can learn to play it.

Her chapter,  “Teaching History so Children Will Care”, symbolizes her approach. She teaches her students history as a a contextualized story. She starts her stories from the perspective of the voices whom students do not  usually hear. She tells the story of the Taino or Arawak indigenous people that Columbus encountered;  she teaches about their culture, language, lifeways and spirituality to help the students' develop a deep respect for these people. Students then learn about Columbus and they illustrate a Taino perspective on one half of a paper and Columbus perspective on the other.  Likewise, she teaches students to continually make connections (text-to-text, text-to-self, and text-to-world) between parts of the same history story and other historical stories. The students identify patterns and parallels in history such as a student who created a poster of slave owners and include Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and Columbus. This teacher does not smooth over conflict but rather explores it  to help her learners comprehend the real issues. She has her children read primary documents and then debate an issue from various Native American perspectives (Epinow who opposes any cooperation with the English and Samsoset who favors it). This educator puts her students into history by having them write captions in which they express their view such as “There was a war with English. If I were Wampanoag,I  would die for my people.”

If  primary teachers want to know how to change from teaching history to have students becoming engaged in it,  and to change  from their students learning about others to respecting others, then they will want to buy and read this book as a model. 

Comments (0)

Subscribe to this comment's feed