Candid Beauty

Despite coming off a 14 hour work day, a first round NCAA MSU loss and 4 hours of sleep, I really enjoyed the Bright Ideas Conference. I’m an MSU alum, so I also took great pleasure in walking the campus again. Never having been to something like this, I thought it might be a bunch of accomplished people tooting their own horns. I was very happy to find out it wasn’t. From what I gathered, which was only from two sessions plus the keynote speaker, the conference was made up of people who passionately cared about teaching English, and who wanted to share what they thought could positively impact others’ teaching. As I mentioned, I saw the keynote speaker, Ernest Morrell. I also went to a session about teaching social justice that was spearheaded by Dan Baker and Shannon Dannison. And lastly I was a host for Les Burns who talked about asserting professional authority.
Entering the keynote address I was less than enthusiastic. The coffee must have mistakenly been decaf because it wasn’t working. But Ernest Morrell almost immediately captured my attention. His personal story was inspiring, and his ideas for bringing popular culture into the classroom weren’t too bad either. Morrell followed along the same lines of Christensen in that many of the skills he was trying to develop in his students were critical in nature. Although his entire presentation was memorable, two things stick out in my mind. The first is his assignment to compare a classical piece of literature and the lyrics of a hip hop song. The idea has occurred to use contemporary or popular music in the classroom, but never to draw parallels between classic literature and modern musical lyrics. The fact that this can enable students to appreciate classics they would usually never give a chance, and show them poetry isn’t only written by dead white guys is exciting. The other thing that sticks out in my mind was Morrell’s comment about questioning censorship. I’m one to fight gratuitous or meaningless explicit material, but I think it’s extremely important to point out that things parents try to diligently shield their children from in popular mass media and music, (drugs, sex, violence), they’re only too happy expose them to in Shakespeare or Romantic poetry. Morrell definitely shared some things that will resonate in me.
The first session I went to, Beyond the Literacy Canon, was basically about incorporating Critical Pedagogy into teaching. There were a couple good practical ideas shared, but honestly I didn’t think this was presented (at least in comparison). An idea that has continued to echo is to show texts that show two different perspectives on the same topic. For example reading Walt Whitman’s “I Hear America Singing,” which show America in quit a idealistic light, and then reading Langston Hughes “I, Too” which is a kind of parody, or response to Whitman’s poem. I like exercises like this that demonstrate two different perspectives vs. telling children, “There are more ways to look at things than one.” The idea for this session was definitely their, but unfortunately the presentation lacked.
The last session attended I had the pleasure of being the host. I was able to meet and talk a bit with the presenter, Les Burns. His speech was about teachers taking control of their own jobs. Much of the talk was devoted to the inadequacies of No Child Left Behind, but this was only to demonstrate that teachers need to do something about things that are harmful to the effectiveness of their teacher, and their profession. Burns’ speech and the discussion that followed were really engaging. More than anything it made me realize how uninformed I am, and that before I can take an active part in this strive for change I need to know what I’m talking about. So I’ve decided when I have a spare moment (after this semester) that I’m going to research NCLB (No Child Left Behind) and become a student member of NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English). If you are interested the links below will take you to the Michigan Department of Education website, where you can read about NCLB, and NCTE’s site where you can sign up to become a student member.

Michigan Department of Education

NCTE