Teachers and Reading Books

A Curriculum of Irrelevancy

Another ridiculous Zoom meeting with a school leader on the precipice of deciding no more classroom libraries because "some of the books might make kids question what their parents want them to know" has encouraged me to think that a Bloody Mary, made with tomato juice remember, is an important part of the food pyramid and I should partake right now. And doesn't vodka come from potatoes?

It has also made me so sad. We are so quickly moving down the path of sustaining a curriculum that is focused on the irrelevant ("Show three ways the author created tension in this short story."), as it guards white fragility and continues to deny a history that is a critical part in the country we are today.

Here is the conversation. All knew I was recording it. I promised not to mention school names, district names, size of district, or anything else thing else that could suggest a particular identity if I wrote about the conversation.

Principal: Dr. Beers, thank you for joining us. We've been asked to take a deep look at the books our high school social studies and ELA teachers have in their classrooms to make sure they present more than a single side of an issue. We had a concern raised by one parent because of a book her ninth grade daughter chose to read. This book was in her ELA classroom in a section marked "Autobiographies." Mrs. X, thank you for joining our call. Would you like to tell Dr. Beers what happened?

Mrs. X: Yes. Thank you. My ninth grade daughter is very sweet, very smart, actually an above-level reader. Her teacher has books in her classroom the students can choose to read. My daughter loves autobiographies and so she chose this book called Warriors Don't Cry. Do you know the book?

I told her I did. I refrained from saying that I met Melba Beals, the author, before I actually read Warriors Don't Cry and I sobbed while reading it. I'm no warrior. I didn't tell her I thought this autobiography of one of the Little Rock Nine to integrate their previously all white high school, should be required reading. I just said, "I have read it. Several times." She raised her eyebrows and went on.

Mrs X: Well, I didn't know she was reading it until one evening she read a part aloud to me and she was crying. She was crying! She said it made her sad to see what white people did to Black people and she wanted to know why white people were so mean and is that why when George Floyd got killed Black people were so angry. She said "it was like nothing had changed." The mother paused then went on: It was obvious that this book was making her feel bad for being white. No book should make a child feel bad for being white. Or, I guess, any other race. We didn't even discuss that George Floyd incident. It wasn't about us, so we didn't see any reason to discuss it. And here she was, thinking about it.

Principal: So, we have some new regulations here in [our state] that encourage having books that present the other side of a controversial issue in libraries, especially classroom libraries. We'd like your opinion on that.

At this point, I was wondering why I had agreed to be a part of this conversation, but I took a breath and began. "I think it is very simple. You have to define controversial. There is nothing controversial about what happened to Melba Beals and those other eight Black students. There is nothing to be controverted with her account - we know that because her account is documented by too many confirming stories and the white students who were the most consistently cruel to her have stepped forward, as adults, and recognized their abuse. There is no "good side" to the horrific year in her life and the abuses by many white people during this time of ending segregation in the South. If you want an example of a controversial subject that should show various positions, I suppose there is some controversy over whether people should eat a plant-based diet rather than a meat-based diet. In a health class I'd like to see students read about that issue from multiple doctors including heart specialists, environmentalists, farmers and ranchers, and nutritionists. But this book, this issue, these facts - I think you are asking the wrong question.

Principal: What's the right question?

Me: Mrs. X, what's your real concern?

Mrs. X: My daughter. She was upset. Books at school shouldn't upset anyone and certainly should not upset a young person just because she is white.

Me: Sounds to me as if your daughter has a huge heart.

Mrs. X: Well, yes. She does. Thank you.

Me: It's hard when our children begin to learn certain truths, isn't it? I bet your daughter cried a lot when she learned about Santa Claus.

Mrs. X (smiing): She did. And she said we could not tell her little [sibling] because she wanted that belief to continue.

Me: Yes. Sometimes we want some beliefs to continue. We don't want to know the truth. And sometimes the truth, when we learn it makes us cry. This is a far harder truth than Santa, isn't it. Learning this country's history is hard. I'm proud of her for feeling what Melba Beals was sharing. Have you started reading the book, Mrs. X? (She shakes her head no.) I think when you do - and I think you should - you will be proud of your daughter for crying and you will thank the teacher for having this book the classroom. Think of it this way: From your description, it sounds like she is smart enough to ask some really tough questions. Perhaps questions she hasn't considered before or things that haven't been discussed at home and maybe you aren't ready to discuss those issues. I don't blame you, they are hard ones.

Mrs. X (defensive): That's right. We don't sit around discussing how white people are bad. That's what you are suggesting, right? All white people are racist. Well, we don't believe that and I don't like my child, she's just in ninth grade, wondering that.

Me: Again, I'm deeply impressed with the questions your daughter was asking. I wonder if she'd be interested in reading more about racism and discovering what others have to say about systemic racism in the country. You know, Mrs. X, having compassion for what someone else experienced and trying to see how patterns of behavior have continued is important if we want those patterns to be interrupted. And this isn't about what I think or don't think. It is about the wonderful daughter you have who is thinking. You wouldn't want to discourage that.

Mrs. X: No, of course not. But she just doesn't need to be thinking about that. My word, that was in the previous century. My daughter is not a racist. I am not a racist. And I don't think we need our students reading things that make them feel bad for being who they are.

Me: Yes. I think a lot of people would agree. You know, for the longest time, no children's books had divorced parents in them. None. I wonder if the kids who sat in classrooms with divorced parents felt left out, unseen? I wonder if they felt bad. And for a long time, no books, or almost no books, featured children or teens who were any color other than white. I wonder how those kids felt? And for a long time, in books and on TV, the Indiginous People of this nation were portrayed as savages or simple minded or alcoholics. I wonder how those children felt. Books ought to make us feel something, and sometimes that feeling is regret; other times it is horror; others times it is courage; other times it is relief at finding someone who looks like we look. Your daughter found one of those books - a book that showed her someone, at her grade, living a very different ninth grade year, a horrific ninth grade year. And that hurt her heart. And that led to her questioning if we're treating one other justly now. And that's a great thing. I think you should be proud of her and should be thanking the teacher.

Mrs. X didn't say thank you, but she didn't say I was wrong. She said that she wasn't sure she had made her point exactly right but did see what I was saying. She said she would "certainly" be reading the book. I honestly don't know if that will make things better or not.

And then she left Zoom. And the principal said to me that this is happening almost daily now. "I don't know. Maybe the only way we can get covered what we need to teach for [our state] test is to take out books like this. I just don't know." I liked this principal. He was conflicted and willing to sit in that for a moment before rushing to a bad decision.

So, I'm mailing him a copy of Forged by Reading, which he has promised to read. I've sticky-noted the section I've pasted below which begins on page 30 of the book. I want him to seriously consider what happens when we begin removing books from shelves. What do we remove next? Who - or what - do we become?

From Forged by Reading (Beers and Probst)

Sailing into tomorrow may require us to rethink assumptions

and values so that we act differently in the future. There will

be implications and consequences for considering the new and

reconsidering what we have long thought. The only way to avoid the discomfort is to avoid the issues. If we can avoid talking about and reading about problematic matters, issues that might require us to rethink values and assumptions, then we won’t feel the discomfort that such difficult thought might entail.

If we banish from our minds, our libraries, and our classrooms any examination of politics, religion, race, environment, sex, justice, and the like, we might protect ourselves from the possible discomfort we might experience. All we have to do is trivialize the curriculum to the point that few will be bothered by anything.

If we can make instruction completely insignificant, utterly irrelevant to anyone’s emotional and intellectual life, then absolutely no one should rise up to protest the threat we pose to treasured beliefs, valued affiliations, or well-established habits of thought and action. We can teach kids how viruses are different from bacteria but avoid discussing why the health care system better serves the wealthy than the poor. We can teach what events led up to World War II and which countries fought on which sides and the horrors of the Nazi concentration camps but fail to mention our own concentration camps for American citizens of Japanese ancestry or consider why the 761st Tank Battalion or the 555th Parachute Battalion consisted solely of African American soldiers. We can give the facts of Brown v. Board of Education but never read what happened to the Little Rock Nine, never discuss how the integration of schools caused thousands of well-qualified Black teachers to lose their jobs because white parents refused to let their children be taught by a Black teacher.

We can teach the definitions of “preposition” and “conjunction.”

That will raise few hackles. “Onomatopoeia” and “zeugma” are

unlikely to drive marchers into the streets, even if we require

students to learn both definition and spelling. Better yet, we

can teach penmanship—that will threaten the values of neither

the conservatives nor the progressives, neither Republicans nor

Democrats, neither those drilling for oil nor the sailors on one of the Greenpeace ships.

Total irrelevancy, absolute insignificance, and unwavering stasis are effective strategies for avoiding the discomfort of thought and change.

***

We cannot, dear teachers, ever give in to the demands of irrelevancy. So, Mr. Principal, you must be brave. You must steer the ship into tomorrow. Your teachers will be there with you. And students, they may shudder at past injustices - long past and recent past - and I hope they do. If they don't, we are in more trouble than I thought.

I wish you all bravery. Stamina. And the knowledge that your hard work is the good work; the best work; the needed work. We need you.

Kylene Beers 

reposted from Facebook.