#SCOLT19 Culture Shock

To be honest, I generally avoid social justice and culture-oriented sessions. I feel like they all sound lovely and fun during the conference high, but somehow, I leave knowing they’ll never work their way into my lesson rotation. I took a chance, though, and stacked my Saturday morning at SCOLT this year:

1. “Authentic or Stereotypical?” with Matt Coss
2. “Raise a Fist” with Stephanie Schenck and LJ Randolph
3. “No One Walks Alone” with Joseph Parodi-Brown

It looks like I might have actually had some kind of plan for myself, but really I was doing what I always do and picking mostly by the speakers–all spectacularly insightful amigos I had yet to hear speak (except, of course, for Stephanie, the non-Laura third of our grad school trifecta presenting that afternoon).

So here’s how it went down:

ssSSSPOWPOWPOWPOWPOW*whirl* snapclickPOPBANGsimmersimmersimmerAHHHH

And that’s all you have to do!

No, but for real, Matt kicked my brain into high gear so high I couldn’t tweet fast enough, and then kicked up ANOTHER notch so I couldn’t snap PICS fast enough and had to bum one I missed from the NC/SCOLT ToY to my left (you know, NBD, just how we do in the Carolinas–shout out @FrauWorthington BTdubs)

So if I were to distill what I got from @CossLaoshi, it would start with the obvious Don’t say ALL ___s do X, BUT, it would end up with: Start with students’ own cultural identities and experiences and help them step outside them.

I know, I know, it’s nothing Dorie and the interculturality standards haven’t been telling us the last few years BUT, the way Matt broke it down and exemplified it made all those little recognition bulbs I’d been gathering spontaneously LIGHT UP! I mean, things as simple as day 1, writing my whole name the Amurkin way and then next to it with paternal AND maternal surnames (it might be kinda confusing with marriage norms factored in for me, but still) and THEN having them create name tags the same way: POW!

And then the whole idea of starting with the language for what my kids ALREADY like to eat and do so they can have meaningful cultural exchanges with native speakers–POW–and building off of authentic cultural experiences from both cultures with recognizable similarities and roots, ie McDonald’s and Pizza Hut in China (guess which us best for candlelit dinners??)–POWPOWPOW.

And then the whole notion of why stereotypes are so damaging even when they’re not what we consider “negative”: just the sheer erasure of identity lumping large groups of people together without getting to know them! I mean, isn’t that literally EVERYTHING we’re fighting against?? (Makes subject-verb agreement seem pretty miniscule, right?)

POWWWWW

So yeah, how does one cool down after such explosiveness? OBVIOUSLY by challenging societal expectations and dismantling the patriarchy. How convenient that SCOLT had the epiphany to revive Friday’s most popular sessions! And who else could I trust to make that doable in level 1 BUT Stephanie and LJ??

So first of all, the main message of the day in “Raise a Fist” was anticipation–what hard conversations do you need to think about ahead of time? Steph and LJ are never ones to GIVE you the answer and are so BEATIFICALLY humble–yet firmly supportive–in their journeys as educators, that they armed us with the right QUESTIONS instead. More importantly, they armed us WITH questions and, well, DISarming. Ask questions to explore challenging perspectives but be guileless about where in YOUR journey the questions are coming from.

SNAPCLICK, right into place.

And then the POPBANG when these titans broke out A THREE-POINT SCHEMA for planning a socially forward lesson:

1. Guiding questions
2. Pre-interpretive activity
3. Post-interaction interpersonal/presentational activity

WITH an elegantly deconstructed example AND accessible #authres for us to practice with in groups.

You can bet Laura P and I still had wheels turning in post-SCOLT chats on the way home (and of course she got me right to the precipice of the perfect idea for starting next year. Hint: tying the Laoshi nametags in with self-descriptors and societal beauty and success norms. There will be SO many to-be-continueds from this conference!) I have to say, that brief moment of sandbox time was a glimpse into IDEAL PD.

So the gears, they were a-grinding. If I didn’t cool them down a bit, I would most likely have caused a conflagration, and Joseph and I had chatted a bit about the ongong issues that made me more alert to LGBTQ issues in my current classroom, about how this wasn’t necessarily a session for that. But still, it made a nice end-cap to the explosive morning to be reminded of the importance of acknowledging stories that at best get swept aside and at worst get utterly dehumanized. The stories are where the practices that spark curiosity can start, where the questions from my journey and about my students’ can begin.

All in all, it was a FABULOUS SCOLT, one that reconnected me with who I am, refined the way I understood my practice, and empowered me as a change-maker.

So thank you to all of the colleagues and kindred spirits who uplifted, upheld, and challenged me in new–and familiar–ways last weekend, whether with prepared presentations or casual conversation during and after.

This was just the jolt I needed to do more!