collegial connections

On Monday morning, classroom teachers were confronted by a set of competing priorities. On one hand, most are immersed in testing and test preparation. Teachers and schools are focused on preparing students to do well in a high stakes and uncertain process. At the same time, the world was humming with the discussion about one of the most important events in recent years: the killing of Osama Bin Laden. How do teachers decide what to teach in this context? Can teachers truly avoid incorporating such a historic event in their teaching in the face of testing and curricular demands? Current events constitute a background curriculum, the experiences from which teachers must draw to make content relevant and interesting for students. They are also a part of the content of students’ daily lives. As caring teachers, we are responsible for our students’ healthy socio-emotional development. Students need us to help them process and understand what often are confusing, scary, or upsetting adult actions or events. Even from a practical perspective, students will likely be distracted by the images and stories prompted by President Obama’s late-night announcement, the celebrating crowds outside the White House and Ground Zero, and the myriad pundits jockeying for attention. In order to think about these decisions and strategies, we turned to our colleagues at the Mills College School of Education gather some initial reflections on how to respond to this historical moment. We invite you to add your own reflections or classroom experiences.

Priya Shimpi – Yesterday, as the wait for the press conference went from curiosity, to fear, to speculation, to the announcement of Bin Laden’s death, we found ourselves as a family, interrupting bedtime in order to attend to the details of the historic event, as they were made available. My 2 1/2-year-old son sat on my lap and watched our president make his brief speech confirming the earlier news reports. While we were watching, he asked, “Why is Barack Obama on TV?” I replied, “He is on TV because something important happened.” My son did not ask any further questions, but as a parent and Early Childhood professional, I wonder what I would have said if he had pressed for more information. How much do you talk to very young children about war and the celebration of the killing of a man whose actions led to thousands of civilian deaths? How much is a young child capable of understanding, and what would such a young child do with this information? For other children who have been more directly impacted by the events of 9/11 or who have older siblings, the weight of the event will be revealed by the emotional and behavioral changes in conversation and social cues—and toddlers will pick up on these differences. My choice was to honestly, yet broadly, approach the topic, but to be mindful that for a toddler, words like “war” are incredibly abstract; he (thankfully) has not had the opportunity to link this word to a concrete referent in the world. I am more relieved than happy to wait for the time when such a learning opportunity will arise.

Betty Lin – Today, young children—ages 0 through 9—do not have the same context as adults about Osama Bin Laden. Even though the images of 9-11 are fresh in my mind as if it occurred only yesterday, it happened 10 years ago. As early childhood educators, we must keep context in mind when the topic of Osama comes up amongst the young children in our care. Take the stance of wondering with the children. What have you heard about Osama? What have you noticed about the adults’ reactions when they talk about him? Help children frame their observations into questions. They may not understand the magnitude of this event, but they also don’t need the trauma from it. What they can relate to is what’s concrete in their lives. Ultimately, the question of defining good and bad comes up. I prefer to discuss the values of good and bad around human compassion and the ability to empathize. Why would someone NOT want to engage in acts of kindness? I have had many forms of this same question asked. My most recent answer is such: Because no one has shown him how to be kind. My message to the young children is that it is important for all of us to be kind and to show our friends how to engage in acts of kindness.

Anna Richert – It feels to me a bit surreal to know Osama Bin Laden was found, caught, and killed. A ten-year search is a long time—and as Dave Donahue and I were saying while walking across campus earlier today—even longer for the high school students our students teach. For them, ten years is a big chunk of their lives. Most probably don’t remember much about life before this search began. I wonder what they are thinking now. Were I teaching them, I’d ask. Though surreal, it’s also a relief to know that this chapter of our “war against terror” is over. At the same time, while the war on terror is a step further towards resolution, I feel a bit terrorized by the response of “my fellow Americans” dancing in the street, waving the American flag and shouting with joy. Buried not so deep in me are my recollections of Bin Laden’s followers dancing in the streets when the twin towers and all in them fell to the ground. Granted the circumstances are profoundly different, but our response tempers my hope that as a nation we can bring about real change that moves towards compassion and peace. Osama’s capture and death warrant carefully planned discussion time in school. If not there, where will our students have the opportunity to make sense of the world in which they live?

Rick Ayers – I find myself at a bit of a loss and, as usual, caught up in an uncomfortable observation of the national culture, at least as reported in the media. We can agree that Osama Bin Laden was a horrible, dangerous, unspeakable man. But I would want my students to think of some other things as well. First, the idea of Al Qaeda as a coherent, unitary, functioning organization with Bin Laden at the head has been put forward by some US government sources but this has always been in doubt. Second, that the number of people eager to carry out suicide attacks has proliferated since the US incursions. But most importantly, I would want to chip away at the sports metaphor that seems to control our thinking about world politics. The celebrations of his death were like Super Bowl victory parties. Some students outside the white house had big “We’re #1” foam hands. Many of my students have been raised in a world of superheroes, video games, sports—all projects that simplify life into bad guys and good guys. I would perhaps try to use something from Joel Westheimer’s “Pledging Allegiance – The politics of patriotism in America’s schools,” such as Debbie Meier’s piece, “On Patriotism and the Yankees – Lessons Learned from being a Fan.” (See also for example: Cheering a Monster’s Death Is Not the Same as Patriotism)

Vicki Van Steenberg – With the news of Osama Bin Laden’s death, the topic of terrorism and “combating” it are headlines everywhere. I think about the efforts to protect and provide security this last decade in the United States. The lenses of Intelligence and an Afghani father in California come to mind—the tension for both parties seems related to the circumstances of 9/11 and Osama Bin Laden that created and continue to put question marks around individuals’ movements and actions.

A CNN producer, Chuck Afflerbach, brought an actual court transcript to a play-reading group I am in, a court case he was covering at the time. This case involved the interrogation of a father and son from Lodi who had immigrated to the U.S. from Afghanistan. The young Hamid Hayat, an American citizen, had traveled to Afghanistan to visit relatives. He was detained upon returning to the U.S., on an FBI tip that he had studied at a terrorist camp while away. After 20 straight hours of interrogation in separate rooms, the father Umer Hayat and son Hamid Hayat were saying anything to sleep it seemed, the father misunderstanding English and attempting to protect his son by going to jail himself, instead of his youthful son. The statements of the two men contradicted each other. The FBI questions were tricky ones, especially for English language learners.

Quoting Chuck:

Umer were arrested in 2005 and put on trial in 2006. There is a lengthy article available on Wikipedia. What I liked about the transcript/play is that it allowed the readers to draw their own conclusion. Either they were innocent dupes who were entrapped by the FBI, or they were sneaky characters exposed by the investigative skill of the FBI.

Both men were jailed and their guilt was not so clear. If anyone would like the transcript as a play to be used in a classroom, to see through different lenses on the topic of terrorism, Chuck can be contacted for this script at his e-mail: caffler@aol.com

Ruth Cossey - Our teaching and our learning are impacted by many events and emotional experiences that take place outside of our classrooms.  For you or your students, acts of violence may spark such classroom intrusion. You may be aware of your students’ experiences – a local, national or international “incident” blasted by the media, or you may learn of the emotional disruption only after a student discloses it to you.  Know that violent events often evoke values related to justice, fairness, religion, or national and personal identity. We have a responsibility to support our students’ moral development and listen carefully to them as they sort out their feelings; however, we need to take care not to allow our own sense of outrage, of sorrow, of despair or jubilation overwhelm student views during in-school discussions.  Instead we need to find places and colleagues where we are free to process the impact of the world on our wellbeing as teachers and fellow travelers on this planet.  In the case of recent events surrounding 9-11, I have seen our students at Mills pushed to silent retreat or rage as classmates expressed strong values in professor sanctioned discussions.

Kathy Schultz – I learned about the death of Osama Bin Laden Sunday evening from my daughter who texted me: “Are you watching the news on T.V?” My immediate reaction was to write back to ask whether something new was happening in Syria. My son is living in Damascus and studying Arabic. What was foremost on my mind, and the lens through which I heard this news, was my own child’s safety at that moment. We all understand events like this one through our own lived experiences and beliefs, whether we had a loved one who died on 9/11, a relative harassed after 9/11 because of her Arab heritage, or a son living in the Middle East during a time of uprisings and change. As teachers, leaders, parents and citizens, we bring these experiences and ways of understanding the world into our classrooms, homes, and communities. Our students and the young people in our lives also bring their own perspectives and daily experiences. As teachers, our most important response is to listen carefully to our students. Listen to what they say and also to their silences. Create time and space for response that is individual and communal. Find opportunities for young people to articulate questions and reflections through words and also through other media such as art and music. We live in times filled with complexity and as teachers, mentors and parents we can find ways to hold onto that complexity rather than seeking the simple solutions of praise or condemnation. We can work to insure that we recognize and point to what is being said and what is omitted from the public discourse and the conversations in our own classrooms.

Tomás Galguera – I’ve been thinking about the relative meaning we as humans attach to lives and deaths, the significance and apparent justification behind each act, and how we deal with the aftermath as we go on living. I suppose that few people on this planet don’t know who Osama Bin Laden is. I also guess that everyone can form an opinion about his death, from the detached, calculated analysis of pundits who imagine likely discussions between President Obama and advisors about the practicality of not capturing Bin Laden alive, to the raw sadness of relatives and Al Qaeda members who mourn his loss. I have no doubt that even young students might have something to say about the news of his death, which is likely to be shaped by their developing sense of justice and morality. Ultimately, this one man’s death, a murder, justified homicide, war casualty, martyrdom, or killing is a significant event, a milestone set in the collective memory like the World Trade Center Towers’ collapse, the Challenger disaster, the fall of the Berlin Wall, or even Obama’s election. These are events that punctuate our experiences and, eventually, history. They soon are codified as “official” and worth learning; academic content. Quite likely, new history textbooks are being revised to include Osama Bin Laden’s death in them. Of course social sciences teachers are discussing and will discuss with students not only his death but also its historical significance.

But there is also a local dimension to how students process violent deaths, one that unfortunately is all too familiar to them: murders that take place around us often, but in much greater anonymity. The current homicide count in Oakland is 34, with the last two killings taking place on April 25, near Jack London Square. Despite the tragic loss these deaths represent, the murders barely registered in the collective consciousness. And yet these deaths will be a reference point for Oakland students, perhaps as they participate in a discussion of Bin Laden’s death in some classroom.

This year’s murder rate for Oakland is higher than last year’s, a statistic that trivializes the loss of lives and their impact on those left behind and that dulls the rest of us into acceptance. Strangely, a single killing, thousands of miles away is more present in my mind than two others nearby. I wonder what knowing about humans killing other humans prompts in children’s minds.

Edna Mitchell – I find myself feeling a bit as I did when the Challenger exploded with Krista McCaulliff aboard, being touted as the teacher in space with children tuned in watching with lesson pages in hand as the space craft exploded. What a terrible and unnecessary tragedy to which to expose children.

And, now what to say about another terrible thing… a government sanctioned search and murder. It is complicated, of course, by his complete commitment to the destruction of the US and those complicit with US and Western governments. He was by all assessments our enemy…. we should be celebrating. But to teach children and students to celebrate a politically sanctioned murder seems to contradict other values about the sanctity of life that we hold dear. Is this justice as our President proclaimed?

Having lived and worked in Afghanistan for a significant portion of time since 9/ll I have some personal basis for weighing reactions to this event as will be felt by Afghans, Pakistanis, and Muslims in countries who may have been shocked and sympathetic when 9/11 occurred ten years ago, but whose views about American power and American intentions have taken a sour turn in recent years.

Bin Laden will emerge a hero in death, a martyr for Islam. He will be revered in history by many who teach children.

For teachers, our responsibility in handling controversial issues (and I do think this is controversial) in the classroom is to maintain the role of the reflective adult. Teachers need to keep their personal opinions out of the discussion, but can encourage expression of divergent views without approving or disapproving; with acceptance and questions or comments that enable students to consider alternative viewpoints and their implications if broadly applied. Teachers should attempt to understand what the students comprehend—what do they know, believe, understand about the reason for the President’s speech. The topic now is, and in the future will be, one that inspires debate and that has the likelihood of being divisive within a class. What needs to be kept in mind is that this American action need not be embraced as “RIGHT” in order to show one’s patriotism. Right and wrong are not black and white in this instance. The complexity of it is what is most challenging and attractive as a discussion topic. But, care must be taken. Attitudes and beliefs are at stake. Even teachers may be judged by comments made with good intentions.

The world is not safer with Osama Bin Laden buried at sea. Students at some levels may be able to understand that this is not the wild West with the Sheriff at High Noon as much as we would like to join in the celebration of the climax and the success of the right side. This political drama has ramifications that can divide the world into “us” and “them” and can even divide US as Americans. Let the debate continue, but find ways to help students, and adults, listen to and respect the views of others while also trying to understand what lies behind and is shaping those views.

Afghans are wondering, “Does this mean the Americans can now go home since they have found their target?” I predict the answer to that will be, “No….” for a variety of complex reasons but few that will have the best interests of the Afghans truly in the center.

Off my chest but still in my heart!