I experienced prejudice during the
first few months of high school in France.
The teachers knew I was previously in a school in Saudi Arabia so they
assumed that I was not fluent in French.
They always talked to me in simple words even though I always assured
them that I understood what they meant. That
made me feel terrible especially as a teenager in high school; I felt intellectually
inferior and that I always had to prove to the teachers that I was capable of
completing assignments. I felt that
equity was diminished because I was not treated according to my individual
needs; the teachers could not put their prejudice aside in order to take my
personal needs into consideration.
In order to turn this incident into
an opportunity for greater equity; I think teachers would have to change by
listen to their students more carefully.
I would have probably felt more confident if my teachers put their
prejudices aside and listened to what I needed from them. I believe that teachers need to pay attention
to each one of their students’ individual needs in order to achieve
equity. Each student is unique and comes
from a different background and culture; therefore each student has individual
needs in order to succeed academically.
Hello Ghayna
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your personal experiences. You caused me to think about times where I may have unintentionally underestimated someone's abilities, and the impact that my actions had. Insights such as your stories help us all become better teachers.
I recall sharing a similar incident like this earlier in our discussions, although I was the teacher. I was wrongly informed of a student's capability and approached their learning in an elementary and juvenile due to my understanding that the child did not speak nor understand English.
ReplyDeleteWhat a difference proper communication and approach means to a child's learning environment. Thank you for sharing!
Hi Ghayna,
ReplyDeleteYou were right to feel that the teachers should have listened to you more and took the time to realize you know what you are capable of doing. Miscommunication is one of the worst things that can happen in the educational field. When teachers do not listen to what parents say about their own children or when parents do not hear what teachers are telling them about what they are seeing in their children, lines are blurred and the information is taken out of context. You have made some very important points. Thank you very much for such an interesting post.
Ghayna,
ReplyDeleteYou are not alone in this situation. This has happened to my brother and a few of my friends as well. It was not a supposed language barrier but because they were African American boys the standard their teachers held them to was not the same. One teacher had the audacity to tell my mother that she should get my brother tested because he had trouble sitting still. If the teacher took the time to really figure out what was going on, she would have realized that my brother was bored, not slow. Great post! I can really relate.