Fear

“The unwillingness to approach teaching from a standpoint that includes awareness of race, sex, and class is often rooted in the fear that classrooms will be uncontrollable, that emotions and passions will not be contained” (p.39).

This quote stands out to me because of the current situation that is happening to me in one of my 1010 sections, specifically, my student from hell.  To pull back a bit, my standpoint in the classroom was one fear that I had when coming into the graduate program as a teaching assistant.  I knew and understood that all the teaching assistants would be coming from a different standpoint than I was, however I was concerned about how my own background of race, sex, and class and how that would be interpreted in the classroom.  For example, during orientation before my first semester, Karen mentioned how some white TA’s feel uncomfortable during the language, culture, and power lesson and how non-white TA’s sometimes sound like they are on a soap box. I definitely related to this because I feared that I would sound like I am on my soap box or that I sound like the “I have a black friend” narrative because I am adopted and my parents are white. What I also feared was how these different background factors would be brought into my classroom by the different students.  I knew then that I needed to be open and willing to embrace the different backgrounds of each of my students.  Recognizing race, sex, and class are just a few of the factors that need to be embraced to get my students to engage in my classroom setting. 

My fear of students being uncontrollable was suppressed during my first semester of teaching which I basically had no big issues with any of my students.  Although the class discussion did encounter certain emotions and rough topics, the students generally embraced the diversity in the classroom.  My fear now has been rekindled within the problem student I have been having.  This makes me feel like I do not have control and the student has expressed his emotions and passions against me.  Despite the extenuating circumstances of the situation I still have to remind myself that his background factors do influence his behavior and that sometimes it is okay for it to be out of my control. This situation has affected my willingness to teach this section of 1010. 

This quote relates to the chapter about confronting class in the classroom.  It reminded me to focus on class difference and to make sure I include as many of the students (or all) if I can.  This also ties back into how I bring my own background into the classroom especially because I come from a minority perspective.  I always want to keep this in mind so it does not come off like I am marginalizing or demeaning any of my students.   I also need to remind myself to pull myself together and finish the semester strong.

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