Social Justice in the Classroom

Social Justice in the Classroom For one of my classes at UT, we discussed the idea of Social Justice, a revolutionary way of approaching Social Studies. Social justice is the view that everyone deserves equal economic, political and social rights and opportunities.It is often difficult to understand how young children perceive social issues and their personal opinions on these ideas. In my class, I was able to interview some Kindergarten students on what they thought about some Social Justice issues. In these interviews, I discuss the students’ responses to my questions concerning racial equality in the perspective of both the individual and the public. In general, all three students had a solid idea of race and an understanding of equality between different races to some extent.The first student I interviewed (who will be referred to as “Amber” to protect her identity) is very advanced in Reading and Writing and Math for a Kindergartener. She is already reading independently on a First Grade level and starti ng Subtraction soon. Amber is very outgoing and amicable with her classmates, socializing with both males and females from all races. The next student I interviewed is a diligent worker with a kind and caring heart. (who will be referred to as “Karen”). Karen is always looking after other students and a generally sweet girl. Lastly, I spoke with a young boy (who will be referred to as “Brandon”). Brandon seldom gets into trouble, has little behavior issues, and works well with all of the other students. He is also a hard worker and has no trouble focusing on his schoolwork.First, I asked the students about their personal experiences with racial equality by asking, “Does your skin color make you feel different”. Amber noted that she is different from other people, but did not explain why or how. When I inquired further, she did not really understand what I meant by the question, saying that she knew she was different “from her brain”. It seems what she gathered from t he question was that she did not know why she was different racially, but it was just understood. Karen agreed that people are indeed different; however, she “[doesn’t] feel different, just look[s] different”. I thought this was an extremely powerful statement for a Kindergartener. Brandon had the same idea as Karen. He mentioned that regardless of skin color, he was still the same person. In his terms, Brandon said, “you don’t have the same body, but you have the same inside”. The consensus seems to be that everyone’s appearance can be different, and a popular idea is that the individual’s personality is not affected by their race. In other words, the children do not seem to use their race as an identifier, or at least they have not personally experienced racial inequality.Next, I asked the students, “do you think it’s okay to treat people differently because they look different”. Amber’s response was a simple, “Nope”. Her reasoning was “because they a re my friends”. Brandon also had a similar idea, his reasoning being “because you’re supposed to make sure you’re nice”. However, Karen seemed to have taken a different approach to the question. It was interesting to see that Karen did not think of treating people differently to mean something detrimental, but she took it as accommodating for others instead. This was such creative and out of the box thinking on Social issues from a five year old child. Karen mentioned that “we’re different and we don’t feel the same”, so we have to be conscious about each other’s ideas and respect it. This was her way of treating people differently. All three students seemed to believe in racial equality and even emphasize respecting others.Lastly, I asked the students if they were interested in learning more about people with different skin color than theirs, a question I was curious about. Amber shrugged her shoulders and seemed disinterested in the question itself. Since it wa s Black History month, I asked if she liked learning about Martin Luther King Jr., and she told me that it was not interesting to her. This was shocking to me, since she was such a scholar in other academic areas. However, Karen and Brandon were more than enthusiastic to learn more about others. When I asked Karen what she wanted to learn about, she said, “the whole world”. Brandon mentioned that he wanted to know more about everyone as well because he “[doesn’t] know about the people” and was interested in them. I could make an inference and say that Karen and Brandon enjoy learning about other races because they already know a little about their own culture from studying Black History month in class. Amber still does not see the value in learning about other peoples, especially in the classroom, since her race has not been a topic of interest in school.Karen and Brandon even went on to tell me more about what they thought after they answered my questions. Karen made it c lear that she was a different race than others, eyeing me, an Asian American, and saying, “everybody has a different skin color than me, but I’m different. I have brown [skin], but they’re different”. Brandon also stressed that “some people are different colors cause God made them like that”. I asked if it was okay to be different colors, and he gladly agreed, nodding frantically.In light of these revelations, I would definitely change the way I present this topic in my classroom in order to engage all students. Instead of having the entire class focus on one race together, I would want students to research a culture of their choice on their own, gathering their information from primary sources like their family members, or looking things up elsewhere. This way, all of the students are interested in the people and culture that they are studying. In addition, the students would present their findings to the entire class, and ideally, the students will be more engaged when learning from their peers than learning from a book.