I have been reflecting on Krashen's theory in second language
acquisition and what he describes as an affect filter - which is
basically that is the emotional tension is too great then a language
can't be learned, and if the emotional tension is not great enough -
i.e., positive anticipation - then a language can't be learned.
The theory resonnated with me particularly because as a classroom
teacher I see where a child's particular affect in the ranges of anxiety,
fear, anger, distress, etc., deeply interfers with the child's learning.
Likewise, if her affect is happy, anticipatory, with some degree of
nervous excitement, there is usually a lot of learning going on.
The ranges of coercion utilized within elementary schools range
from verbal admonitions - sometimes attempting to invoke shame - as in to
a class of fifth graders - "Why are you all talking like a bunch of
first graders? Act your age!" .................. to, "You need to go to
1)a quiet space 2) the corner in the room 3) the hall 4) the principal's
office 5) in house suspension 6) home suspension."
There are other coercive techniques many elementary school
teachers use - no recess, no gym, no music, stay in after school, etc. etc.
And I suspect that, just like Eisenhart's work on retention
practices of teachers - that the primary reason a child was retained was
because of who the teacher was and her pedagogical beliefs - the various
methods of coercion used are a reflection of the teacher, not the student.
And I think this because of watching exemplary teachers, teachers
who teach in inner-city schools that provide education for children who
live in high-crime areas, area primarily populated by racial minorities -
that when watching these teachers I'm deeply impressed that the fact that
they never get into a power struggle with a student, coercion is a
practice of no resort, in other words, and that the teachers fight to
keep the kids in their classes. Yes, there are management issues, of
course. But a primary strength is that the kids identify their teachers
as being _fair_. And in kids' eyes, you can't be fair and be coercive.
As an elementary school teacher I learn again every year during
parent conferences how many parents learned to fear schools and still
feel frightened to walk into them. Some refuse to walk into a school
even now.
I wish that I could master the prose genre of this listserve - I
read Jay's and other's prose and marvel at its eloquence. What Jay last
wrote about coercion struck home deeply. I know of the numbers of kids
who drop out of school. I know what deep emotional difficulties they
bring to school. And I know that schools, often because of terribly
limited resources, utilize coercion in order to attempt to get
compliance.
It doesn't work.
If it worked, obviously our schools would be far more successful
than they are now.
Shirley Brice Heath's description of the practices of schools in
"Ways with words" describes better than I can the unconscious acts of
everyday coercion through privileging white middleclass literacy practices
exerted over children who are 'different'... and the sad results.
Like Jay, I know of the daily coercions one works through just
being a human being in a particular historical-cultural site. But what
I'm talking about here is the placing of the institutional practices
before the individual practices of children, and when they resist to
utilize coercive practices, and then when that doesn't work, to push them
out of the institution, and blame them.
This certainly has an effect on their affect.
Coercion and affect are greatly related. As are the feelings of
shame, anger, sorry, grief and dismay.
phillip
pwhite who-is-at carbon.cudenver.edu