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Excerpt from If Holden Caulfield Were in My Classroom Early in my first year at Paideia, I could see that my kids’ thoughts and feelings in my American History class were largely reorganized and regurgitated from the texts and class discussions. Did they really understand such abstract issues as “justice,” “balance of power,” “law versus freedom,” “conflict of interest,” etc. without concretely and personally experiencing them? Opportunity for enlightenment surfaced when someone unplugged the fish tank. I had only been at Paideia a few months when I walked in my classroom one morning to find my students mourning three gaily-colored fish floating lifelessly in the class fish tank. A kid held up the cord. “Somebody unplugged it,” he screamed. “Who did it?” shouted the kids. Why did they do it? they asked. What should the punishment be? “Who decides?” I asked. “You,” they shouted. “Not me,” I said. “I’m too busy. Besides, why should I care about three dead fish?” “Do you, really,” I said, plunging ahead, “when it seems to me you don’t even care about yourselves? Do you feel safe, fully alive, able to express yourselves in the classroom and at recess or do you tell yourself you do? I see subtle, but devastating put-downs, exclusion, bullying, sucking-up. Popular kids drop a pencil and suck-ups scramble to pick it up for them. I mean, it’s disgusting. There are people who are afraid of speaking up in class because of what a classmate might say.” I saw a few curious, shame-faced grins so I went on. “Lunches are stolen, I’ve seen sandwiches taken outright. Nobody does anything. Is this the way you really want to live? How about people going in your lockers, reading personal notes? Am I right? “Can you really do your work in study periods with all this horse crap going on? The pushing and shoving may satisfy those who are pushing and shoving, but what about the rest of you? Show some courage, tell me the truth—you won’t regret it, I promise—what bothers you more: three dead fish or the people around you?” “Three dead fish,” volunteered Warren Bradley. Warren was the most popular, consequently the most feared member of the classroom at the time. “And what might be Warren’s motive,” I asked the class, “for that particular answer?” Teddy Simpson looked at Warren, then at me, his smile hesitant. “Teddy?” “He’s one of the bullies,” he said. “Is that true?” I asked the class. “No, wait; you tell me first, Warren. What’s the truth? I promise, whatever it is, you’ll feel better afterwards. Okay?” Of course, everyone knew the truth. They waited, curious, as Warren ticked off the pros and cons—fight or surrender—in his head. “All I’m asking for is the truth, Warren. I’ll believe you, whatever you tell me. You won’t regret it... “Yeah,” he said, “I am a bully.” “How do you feel about it?” I asked. He didn’t know. “Embarrassed?” He nodded. “A bit ashamed?” “A little. Yes. But...” “Yes?” He smiled, uncertainly. “Go ahead, Warren, it’ll be all right, whatever it is.” “I feel relieved.” “Good,” I said. “Anything else?” He didn’t want to say anymore, but clearly something was on his mind. “Say it, Warren, whatever it is. You’re doing great.” “Okay. Well I’m mad at you, Teddy, and the rest of you. The whole class...Why didn’t you tell me before? I thought you were my friends. Why didn’t you stop me? I’m mad. I mean, I understand, but some of the things I didn’t even know you minded. When I’d grab your cookie, Hermie, you’d laugh about it. Hell, you were just about offering it to me.” “I was scared,” said Hermie. “I didn’t say anything,” said Teddy, “because I didn’t want you doing it to me.” “You were afraid?” I asked Teddy. “Yes.” “So was I,” said Warren. “That’s why I did it. I didn’t want anyone doing it to me.” “Wow,” said the class. “This is neat,” said Hermie. “Yeah,” said Teddy. “How do you feel about Warren now?” I asked the class. “The same? Different?” “Much different,” said Teddy. He looked at Warren. “I feel like I could talk to you now.” “The rest of you? Hermie?” Hermie gave a thumbs up sign. The class applauded. From the dilemma of the promptly forgotten goldfish emerged a greater sensitivity, on the part of my students, to their own needs for security and freedom within the classroom community. Further discussion fostered the consensus that they could protect themselves only if they had the force of law behind them. It became clear to me that not only did they want to understand themselves and their classmates, but that they had a basic desire to be good; in fact, heroically so. Using the United States Constitution as a guide, but only as a guide, as well as law books and law dictionaries, the kids wrote and ultimately ratified the class constitution in which was established the rights, laws, and procedures of the class government and court system, the same one, almost twenty years later, in which Betsy Robinson would be tried for slander. To safeguard against corruption, exploitation, and favoritism, which already they had suffered without a government, a separation of powers, intentionally balanced, was established. Congress, composed of six members and a chairperson, made laws and proposed them to the class; the class could approve them only with a two thirds majority vote. Court, over which a judge presided, interpreted and enforced the laws; trial was by jury. All public officials campaigned for election; all were subject to impeachment. Formidably abstract ideas such as balance of power, justice, or invasion of privacy were at once more complex and more easily understood because they were personal. Regarding, for example, invasion of privacy, they wanted the thief caught, they said, but they didn’t want some nosy district attorney reading personal notes stuffed away in their cubbies; thus search warrants must be approved by a judge, there must be reason for suspicion, and the owner of the cubby must be present during the search. Because of their stage of development, that age where many sway back and forth with the current from the concrete to the abstract, they would often dissect issues with such a fine and discriminating enthusiasm that I would have to guide them in their return to their original principles. The issues, like the number of crimes to which most of them most of the time readily confessed, seemed infinitesimal, as they do to this day. I devised a semester-long preparatory course, much of which involves expository writing, speech making, debating, and the cultivation of such skills as research and recall. It prepares kids not only for academic and adult life, it enables them to participate in the government and court system of the classroom itself. The text for the course eventually became the class constitution, an intricately detailed, richly complex document which after thirty years is still being revised and amended. All the students do in the class government and court system is constantly subjected to criticism and evaluation, both by the class and by me. A lawyer whose opening statement (an oral essay) lacks sufficient research and evidence may be charged with obstruction of justice, reprimanded or punished by the Class Bar Association, and last and probably least, receive a poor evaluation from me. Sloth is intolerable to me because it’s dumb, to the class because they’re affected. When a kid does great everyone learns and prospers. That, I think, is community. So though I do so in my own fashion, I teach what is conventionally termed English (literature, writing, and grammar), social studies (the class government and court system, U.S. history) and I conduct counseling sessions, which often include the entire class, since all can learn from and even help each other. My classroom consists of thirty seventh and eighth graders—middle school, the most neglected, forgotten age in American education. Seen generally either as an extension of the elementary years or as a lower appendage of the high school, little is known about these years: little has been written about them. Few adults, in fact, are willing to have anything to do with them. Teachers make a beeline for the lower or upper grades. Parents throw up their hands in frustration and fantasize about furloughs and leaves of absences. But if you ignore them, they won’t go away. |
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