Ed 250: Literacies and Education

When I asked our host at the museum how long the exhibition had existed in its original format - she sighed deeply and said a long, long time. This was no surprise at all but reminded me of a book by "journalist and writer Charlayne Hunter-Gault called "New News out of Africa" (2006). The whole idea of the book is to present a more nuanced image of Africa, with updated stories about what was really happening on the ground to subvert the narratives of the "four d's" i.e. death, destruction, disease and despair which dominate media coverage. It struck me on Friday that the high school students were aware of the singularity of the image they held of Africa and were very interested in learning about the experiences of their peers in environments such as school or their interests in things like music or fashion.

The "old"exhibition was dated in that it was from a time when the archeologists and anthropologsts were focusing on Africa as an object of study and not engagement. The new section was well-designed to update the ways in which people want to interact with Africa and represents a symbolic transformation in the approach to representing the continent.

I'm curious to revisit with more leisurely time to really pore over what the choice in artifacts on display is trying to achieve and to think more about what new narrative is possible considering their dated collection.

I had an amazing experience in my field placement on Friday. I'm in a charter school where the special ed program is primarily inclusive. I frequently work with a student named "Jeremy" who often struggles to stay with the lesson, especially in large group instruction. One specific behavior that can be disruptive is when he calls out in the middle of the lecture--it is frequent enough that his classmates are distracted and that it interrupts the flow of the lesson. Throughout my time at this school, the teacher and administrators have been working on various interventions for him, including a paycheck for good behavior, check-ins with the teacher after every subject, and "choice time" when he makes it through a lesson. On Friday during the Writing mini-lesson, when he started to interrupt, the teacher told him to get a piece of paper and write it down. He did! He makes so many connections to the material, and he wants to share it with everyone, but in the middle of the lecture is not the most appropriate time. By writing it down, he got to express himself without requiring anyone's immediate attention. He made it through the rest of the mini-lesson and worked productively and independently throughout Writer's Workshop, specifically answering the prompt from the mini-lesson using appropriate vocabulary and responding to the feedback I gave him.

On our field trip to the Penn Museum I met an Autistic boy. He was incredibly inspiring as while we walked through the museum he could ramble off facts about every exhibition we went to. Esty and I called him the “walking encyclopedia” as there was very little we could bring up that he didn’t know about.

            While we walked around the museum, this students mentor explained to us that he views the world differently than we do. He told us that the student wanted to be social and make friends but he does not know how to interact with people. But at the same time, he is happy where he is. He said that the student loved computers and would sit in front of a computer all day just reading about history. He can’t even convince him to play games. The idea of “distractions” then came up, and the mentor stated that many Autistic people are incredibly focused on what they are interested in; in this student's case, history.

            This made me begin to think about our distractions and how it relates to our education and our literacy. While this student may have many problems that inhibits him from being able to socialize the way we are able to, he also has retained so much information that we haven’t been able to. Could this be because he is FULLY focused on his interests? Were people 200 years ago more able to retain information and knowledge because there weren’t distractions such as Facebook, Tumblr, Youtube, video games, TV, movies, etc…?

In the class presentation about the Ghanaian education system one specific fact stood out to me. The students in the class presenting said that there was an emphasis on reading, writing in math in the colonial education that was used for Ghanaian students. I immediately thought about our own US public school system and what we focus on. Standardized tests question and evaluate our capabilities in math, reading and writing and put great pressure on teachers to have their students achieve high scores. Because of this, many teachers are left with little time to teach social studies, language, culture, art, history, or anything other subjects. What differences exist in ideology towards education between colonial education and post colonial education? Have any changes been made since the end of conquest in colonized countries? I do wonder if it is possible that currenty the education system still does exist in such a manner as to stifle the embracing of culture, history and language that relates the academic to the individual. In my English Language Learners class last semester we read an article called “True American – Language, Identity and the Education of Immigrant Children” by Rosemary C. Salomone. In the article, the author wrote ‘schooling by its very nature is a prime vehicle for indoctrinating the young in a common core of value and political principles.’ The author argued that school systems are supposed to promote good citizenship, our ‘common destiny’ and are the ‘most vital civic institution for the preservation of a democratic system of government.’

                Exploring the exhibit “Image Africa” sparked the realization that I have in fact become an entirely critical academic. On the one hand, I was excited by the nature of exhibit—writing on the walls, participating in a focus group and generally enjoying the hands on experience truly engaged me in the exhibit and made me think far more actively about the content than I would during my typical museum visit. Yet I left “Imagine Africa” deeply confused. Just what they were trying to get at? It seems to me that the creators of the exhibit had failed to develop a clear conception of the purpose of the exhibit.

                To me the title “Imagine Africa” conjures up images of the future, questions of what will Africa become.

I really enjoyed the field trip and the high school students’ incites and reactions to the Imagine Africa Exhibit. The pre-field trip activity was really engaging and I was so impressed by what the high school students had to say in my “Changing” group and in all the groups. It was great to work with the three students in the Changing group because a couple of them have recently come to the Student Success Center where I tutor and have worked with us. I got to get to know the high school students on an intellectual and a social level- some of the things the girls were saying were hilarious and Mia and I enjoyed ourselves talking to them on the bus. The Imagine Africa exhibit was very interesting. It was engaging and I liked a lot of the self-guided area- especially the Healing section. Some positive things that were said in the focus/feedback group is that being able to touch and interact with the exhibit was a plus. Being able to watch clips and listen to people talking about their own current practices added depth to the exhibit. I liked being able to create my own collage with the photos and listening to music. We were a little confused though whether the exhibit was meant to portray historic or current Africa because some of the concepts were current yet the artifacts were historic. I thought that the juxtaposed media was very interesting with the Disney representations of Africa like the Lion King, yet there was no signage asking us to be critical of these representations or to think about stereotypes and representation.

I have three words: What. A. Week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There are so many things that I want to blog about but I will stick to my incredible experience at the Imagine Africa Exhibit at the UPenn Museum.  I’ll do it in two parts:

Part I: I really enjoyed the field trip with the high school teenagers—I don’t think the trip would have been the same without them. My favorite part of the museum was the exhibit that allowed us to “create” Africa or, better yet, to reveal the many “stories” of Africa. Aside from the fact that the exhibit was limiting because you could only “imagine” Africa with the images/words/media clips available, I felt empowered. I felt empowered in the sense that I had the ability to determine whether or not I wanted Africa to be described as “beautiful” vs. “Unique” or “Modern” vs. “Rural.” Of course, Africa can embody both components but having a say in what Africa meant to me instead of having someone impose their views on Africa, particularly in education settings, on me was a powerful moment. My group happened to have the word, “healing.” And although, initially, we thought that there was no healing in the world, or very little, seeing the high school sophomores excited at the chance to define Africa and to make meaning out of her history was healing happening right before my eyes.

“History of Education in Ghana”
http://politicalpola.wetpaint.com/page/HISTORY+OF+EDUCATION+IN+GHANA

“The Educational System of Ghana”
http://ghana.usembassy.gov/education-of-ghana.html

“Higher Education in Ghana”
http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=160902

“A Brief History of the Ghanaian Educational System”
http://www.tobeworldwide.org/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=4

“Ghana Education System”
 http://yfughana.webs.com/ghanaeducationsystem.htm

“Evolution of the Educational System in Ghana Since Independence in 1957”
http://www.uew.edu.gh/index.php/our-offices/office-of-the-vice-chancellor/137-past-vice-chancellors/prof-jophus-anamuah-mensah/prof-jophus-anamuah-mensahs-speeches/83-evolution-of-the-educational-system-in-ghana-since-independence-in-1957

I was recently asked to post about assessing the impact of NGOs in Ghana.  Here are some resources that I found:

Be sure to check out the Institutes, Think Tanks and Reports section of your course guide.  It lists several websites that will have reports from major non-profits in West Africa.

In addition to the general social science article resources (e.g. JSTOR, ProQuest, Google Scholar, etc.) two databases that will have international NGO reports would be:

• Columbia International Affairs Online
• PAIS International

Search these databases for keywords like (NGO or non-governmental organization or intergovernmental organization) and (accountab* or monitor* or evaluat*).  Here are links to two productive searches I ran in Google Scholar's Advanced Search screen: