1950's or 2018?

Not too long ago our country found itself in a pickle trying to better its future. It’s normal to want to
see a brighter future, just like a mother gives birth to a child as hopes that their teachings will grant the
child power and strive to have a more successful life. In the early 1900’s and 1950’s these values
became apparent as the school system had not developed common standards so many things seemed
out of place. Some students were assumed to be less intelligent based on their inability to speak or
write English properly, yes these were times when immigration was as big a deal than as it is today.
Schools became a spectacle of experimentation, trying to find what works and what does not. It wasn’t
until they took John Dewey’s idea of a “whole child” and really put things to play. This idea
challenged what it meant to be truly academic. Children were stuck in classrooms for 4-5 hours a day,
the “whole child” idea would mean that they get to go outside and enriched their sun deprived skins
by playing and exploring the world as it should be!

 

The idea made it so that children had a chance to explore what they’re good at and roam around
looking to feed their hunger for knowledge. Unfortunately this idea did not last very long as many
parents were concerned with how their kids were learning, they felt as though the kids did more
playing than actual learning. As a result Gary schools became a bit more serious and had children
get back to picking up their pencils and learning once more. As soon as the Russians launched
Sputnik, the first satellite, America felt that they were behind as a nation. This led to the desire to
really better the school system as it would mean that this nation would be ahead of the competition.
How did America go about it? Simple. They decided to adopt the French IQ testing as a means of
determining who goes where in life. That’s not the craziest part! The crazy part is that they would test
kids at the age of 5 and once they turn 10 their IQ score permanently determines whether they get high
paying jobs and can acquire better academic advantages or work in sweatshops and risk being placed
in the most dangerous positions in the military because they are looked upon as being too illiterate to
understand their lives are at risk. Taking Thomas Jefferson at his words when he said
“...rake the geniuses from the rubbish.” Of course we can’t argue with this logic when it comes to
achieving a brighter path for our future generations, but it still stands that testing children
(especially those who just came into the country and do not speak the language or have not assimilated)
is not effective as they haven’t developed enough wisdom to be able to know exactly what they’re
meant to do in their lives. For example, from a young age I knew I wanted to teach but it wasn’t until
I got to high school that I realized I wanted to teach Earth and Space science.

So how can we be so sure that a kid that’s 10 and has the reading ability of a 5 year old is only capable
of working in a factory? It’s impossible, as we get older and mature, that’s when we know what we
can or can’t do and so it became clear that testing children in this fashion was not the way to go.

Oops and I almost forgot...

As an aspiring high school science teacher I can see many changes, not just in the environment,
but in the education system. Many people believe that teachers should not keep themselves updated
on politics. This is for the simple fact that they refuse to make a difference. Being a teacher means
constantly learning to be able to feed this information to more younger, hungry minds. The
information given to these hungry minds later translates to the teacher giving back to society as the
hands of said hungry minds now have the power to shape and build a better future! Looking at how
our present days are turning out, there’s not much being done. We have every group of people we can
think of protesting on every corner, voicing the injustice they feel because of a president who isn’t as
bright as his hair color, to make matters worse, this president refuses to learn. It’s as though we haven’t
seen the bigger picture, WE CREATED THIS MONSTER THROUGH OUR IGNORANCE! America
as a whole has neglected most of its important values because of greed. To start a successful future we
have to agree to finding the best possible education methods. As the book “School: The Story of
America Public Education” words things, the “common school” was created to provide education to
their respective communities just like public schools do today, so what is the difference? The
difference between then and now is the fact children no longer get beat up by teachers for not knowing
an answer to a question, a good majority of schools today are no longer segregated, and teachers are
now unappreciated. YEAH, NOT MUCH HAS CHANGED! It’s hard to believe that many of the
problems we face today with trying to fix the education system stems from a past filled with division
of all sorts, separation by race, religion, gender and even net worth. If we take a moment to think about
it, we’re still facing some sort of segregation without even realizing it, if an average hard working high
school graduate decides they want to go to a specific school but they are turned down because their
parents combined make “enough money” what does that tell you? This was the case with me, I wanted
to go to a school that would provide me with the knowledge I need to do my dream job as efficiently as
possible but I do not have the resources to do so regardless if my parents make over $70,000 a year,
the government does not take into account that my dad works his butt off in a factory 12 hours away
from his family to make sure the lights stay on as I type this blog and my mom sacrifices her free
speech to ensure that food is on the table to nourish the mind on the other side of the screen, the tired
soul that wakes up everyday, takes a train to get to school through rain or shine at the same time
thinking about the future as the first female scientist in the Ramos family, yea, the government decided
that I wasn’t important enough to be granted full aid so every year I’m in college I’m racking up loans
that keep me awake at night while others in the same field don’t pay a dime!

To really fix the issue in our schools we need to attack the main source of the problem. Now I can’t say what that source is because I have not learned it yet but I would imagine that it starts with the people not understanding how powerful education is on this economy. It took knowledge to create many of things we use today such as the cell phone you have laying around as you read this and anxiously wait for someone to call or text you. It took geniuses to make these dreams a reality, why does it take a rocket scientist to explain that to the public? Most of it is from ignorance, as I mentioned before, there are people who don’t believe that teachers should be informed about what goes on outside of their classrooms, there are people who dream of eating sandwiches without the crust, and while some of us live in the reality where we must cut the crust off ourselves those who dream it simply want it done for them. NO! THAT’S NOT HOW LIFE WORKS! This is why we still hurt our kids by giving them false hopes/dreams, giving them standardized tests, then telling them that they’re not good enough to be what they want to be just because they didn’t meet the mark! Everyone wants the best education for their children but how many have done something about it? It’s not just teachers that need to voice these concerns, it should be anyone with a hunger to learn and create a better future! We can no longer afford to sit on our butts and do absolutely nothing, this affects us all as a nation!

Walk, Run, and Fly

Hello everyone my name is Madeline Ramos and welcome. To start this blog I want to dive into what drove me to follow the career path that I chose. For those of you that don’t know what my career choice is, I chose to become a high school science teacher. If everything works out I would be the first female scientist in my family. As a child I questioned EVERYTHING. Sometimes my parents would introduce me to their friends and their children so I can annoy them with my questions. After a while they figured out how to satisfy my hunger for knowledge, what they did was subscribe to an encyclopedia company. Every year came a new edition and I remember how my parents would order them from 0-101 and A-Z, this was the start of me learning how to put numbers and letters in order but I was still too small to reach for these heavy textbooks from off the shelf, so I would simply point to what number or letter, mom or dad sometimes my older brother would get me the book, I would then take it and sit on the cold floor to turn the pages and look at the words but mostly the pictures that were so detailed, sometimes I would run to my room and show my stuffed animals trying to teach them what I learned. Coming from a dysfunctional family that struggled to learn English, I also struggled to be confident in everything I did. I grew shy, trying to hide myself from the world so that no one can hurt me. Most of my early childhood days consisted of watching shows on PBS, one of my favorite shows was “Between the Lions” which taught kids to read by sounding out words and explore the world around us, another was “Sesame Street” which included much of the same literary concepts. When I got to Kindergarten some kids thought I was crazy because I didn’t like watching “Barney” that was my first encounter with someone else’s opinion. Of course it didn’t stop me from asking why their view was different but by then it was time to go to recess and suddenly it didn’t matter anymore because I was free to run, scream and play tag while feeling the warmth of the sun on my skin which felt like the kisses my mother never gave me. After school my mom would take me to the library where I reunited with some of my friends but I went from being able to speak freely to then entering a place where speaking of any sort was not allowed. At that point I felt like the library was a prison but with books containing colorful pictures of animals that my mom would eventually ask me about, the typical phrases my mom would use are “look, what is that? Can you tell me what it is? What is it doing? Look how pretty!” but she would ask me in Spanish, sometimes she would ask me in English just to practice her tongue but she encouraged me to answer these questions in English so that I can be ahead of my class. To her disappointment, I did not turn out to love reading as much as she wanted me to, I even lost my library card and even to this very day I have not gotten a new one. What my mom didn’t understand is that I didn’t want to be told to look at something, I wanted to be the one pointing it out and talking about it freely, I didn’t care about being number one, I just wanted to enjoy my reading experience but I was constantly compared to other kids and to my older brother who seemed to be the perfect straight A student.From the many memories I have as a child, I remember how a teacher’s assistant would lay out a circular rug and call over all of the children on that same floor of the library to sit and  read with her, sometimes she would give us a copy of the book she was reading that day to read along. She had a good eye, she would help those who had trouble keeping up by pointing to each word and sounding them out, she would not move on until the child in need of assistance was caught up with the rest of the circle, I would know because sometimes I had trouble keeping up! At that age I was more interested in the colorful pictures rather than the words on each page. As I got older I realized that words can be just as colorful as pictures, if used correctly! I used to love reading along with the teacher’s assistant then breaking into smaller groups to color and learn more about what we read. My ears would perk to stories of love and magic! I was a dreamer, always with my head in the clouds somewhere, above anyone’s reach. The second anyone would try to shoot me out of the sky I would cry, running to my mom to seek comfort but to her it was nonsense she would throw me back into what I didn’t want to face, not alone at least. What was that monster? A page of questions regarding the book! I wish I could’ve enjoyed reading a book the way the other kids did, they would check out three books at a time while I had trouble choosing one! My sad yellow library card with a big blue circular sticker only got to be used a couple of times before I lost it intentionally. I was never really inspired to pick up a book and read it cover to cover out of free will. The drive for wanting to be as great as my older brother or even better is what kept me in school. Once I graduated from high school, my dream of becoming a teacher became clear as day. I wanted to be a music teacher, music was always a passion of mine and not many people know that, as a little girl I would grab the broom stick and sing along to the songs on the radio, when I was old enough to read music I knew I was destined to do something with it. The moment I stepped foot into New Jersey City University my dreams of becoming a music teacher died as I knew I would be putting myself in competition with others far talented than me, I remembered how my high school band director would scoff and laugh at me for even thinking about music as a career. What was next as a passion? Science! Right away my instincts adjusted to that new dream and the drive to pursue it because science awakes the little girl inside me that wants nothing more but to learn about the world around me. So did the music inside of me die as well? HECK NO! Today you’ll find me singing in my church’s choir as a soprano voice. Even though I’m not singing in English all the time I am still required to read the lyrics to every song I encounter whether it’d be in Spanish or Latin/ Greek!