WOMANIFESTING STRENGTH THROUGH TEACHING

                

Womanifesting strength in any condition you find yourself isn't always centered around perceived winning, professionalism, and feeling like a macho. For me, it is sometimes being deliberately vulnerable, filled with humility, showing respect, acting proactively, kindness, being compassionate, applying fairness, etc. 

To Womanifest these strengths and enable total inclusion for all, I adopted these theories from Farrell, Fasset &Warren, Freire, and hooks. 

1: Nurturing Tension

Fasset& Warren encouraged nurturing tension with our students as they get all worked up with schoolwork and expectations they are required to meet to succeed in their various courses.

Something with tension is that it is like a force that pulls at us, demands too much from us, leaves us bent, and sometimes broken. And having a person of color as a teacher, maybe their first-time experience is enough to brew tension. 

It's tricky at times because it's not just the students who are left to figure out how to deal with having a person of color stand in front of them; I deal with standing in front of 'white' folks too by nurturing tensions myself.

Now I know that they need some time off, we meet in class, and I ask them to come up with an activity in their various groups, and we'll do each activity in the class.

An activity that best describes the unit we are covering that week. Because of these activities, the student came up within their tense state; I saw positive critical thinking, community building, productive healing that calmed their nerves.

I end my class with affirmations, where they have to say, "I will do my best to succeed in this course" before leaving the class, more like their exit ticket and on my part, I tell them, "I will also do my best to see that we all succeed in the course".

2: Compromise and Commitment (Take a stance of humility)

In a woman's world, we are called upon to make compromises and show commitment in all we do, which is easy to achieve and apply in my classroom. Then comes humility; Mother Theresa once said, "Humility is the mother of all virtues, purity, charity, and obedience. It is in being humble that our love becomes real, devoted, and ardent." I thank Mother Theresa for these words because they ring true and remind me that I don't have to be religious to practice humility in my everyday life. 

Being humble means accepting my limitations and making an effort to make the world a better place without wanting to take all the credit.

I try to put my humility into play when grading and overlooking some bs in the classroom.

Like Fassen and Warren said, to do critical communication pedagogy is to take a stance of humility; it is to listen with an open heart and a willingness to be wrong

3. Pedagogy of Inclusion

According to Farrell (1997), to include all learners in a lesson, it would be helpful if teachers could use behavioral teaching activities such as prompting, reinforcement, and task analysis.

Well, thanks to my supervisor, who had alerted me that some students required accommodation in the class, meaning going extra with them and extending due dates for them where and when necessary. 

I also have students who never talk in class simply because they think they have a strong accent; I did not realize in the first weeks; they came across to me as COLD.

Lo and behold, one of their projects required them to record themselves speaking about the project; that was when I figured what the problem was. I talked to each one of them and assured them we were in this together; I am the mother of THICK accent…. ha-ha

4. Solidarity to the Queer Community

Freire's pedagogies are meant to empower and liberate the oppressed by offering tools to interrogate and deconstruct social structures and transform them. I feared that as a heterosexual woman, I might not know how best to womanisfest strength by showing solidarity to the students who identify with the queer community. But according to Freire (2000), "the essence of education as the practice of freedom; the human world relationship; the awakening of critical consciousness" rests upon us. This awakened and informed me that I need to be conscious when preparing my power points and always remember to address them rightly with their pronouns. I always find a way to put some rainbows in my ppt presentations now.

To conclude, I realized my emotions (pity/sadness) started getting at me when a student misses a class, an OA, or isn't participating actively amongst groups. I realized I have become more vigilant; being a woman came out to play by trying to put myself in their shoes always. 

Learning from other movements in my WGST classes and Pedagogy Classes, I have decided to be fully committed to this teaching task for as long as it lasts while I stay #beYoutiful

We must accept the protracted nature of our struggle and be willing to remain both patient and vigilant.

According to hooks (1994), Our solidarity must be affirmed by a shared belief in a spirit of intellectual openness that celebrates diversity, welcomes dissent, and rejoices in collective dedication to truth." 

Farrell, P. (1997). Teaching pupils with learning difficulties. London: Cassel.

Fassett, D.L., & WARREN, J. T. (2007). Critical communication pedagogy. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Freire, P. (1970/2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed: 30^th Anniversary Edition. 

New York: Continuum.

hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as the practice of freedom. New York: 

Routledge.