Trying to humanize my research

            

           Considering the importance of my research and who am I doing the research for brings up a lot of questions. In particular, will I go through the IRB process and also what is the importance of my research. Outside of my personal interests in outdoor education, my research acts in response to David Louv’s book calling attention to the necessity of engaging children with the wilderness and as an act of ecocriticism, hoping to engage children, particularly teens, in the natural world and greater concerns for the environment. For concerns of IRB and conducting human research I am still trying to figure out what level of human research is needed. At the moment I would only be involving interviews of educators involved in outdoor and experiential education. The question that I am facing is including my projected target audience. If I am doing research directing a curriculum at high school teens, isn’t it more important to have their voices heard instead of teachers or should I let the IRB complications influence the silence of that research group based on difficulty of proper approval for minors to participate in research?

 My next question involves the importance of the research. I understand the calling for more youth being engaged in the natural world, but what is the importance of this research and will it better the world by conducting the research. So far I have found a limited selection in this field which gives power to my research. On the other hand am I just pushing against the norms of traditional education in response to many political changes in the current educational process? I do not have any answers to these questions at the moment but as I continue my research I hope to have a better understanding of the importance and for who I am doing this research. 

Thinking About Natural Critical Literacies

Thinking about how critical literacies can be a major impact on all students and can play an even bigger role for marginalized youth, it is becoming more and more apparent that these need to be practiced in schools. In thinking about my own research, the critical literacy that I am focusing on is nature. David Louv talks about a nature deficit disorder which he defines as “the human cost[s] of alienation from nature, among them: diminished use of the senses, attention difficulties, and higher rates of physical and emotional illness” (34). My interest in outdoor education and experiential education hope to better understand the ways in which students can engage in a natural world and make stronger and lasting connections to their own education. I understand that being outdoors is not for everyone, but there is still an element of connecting to the natural world that can help each person in some way or another.

There are many ways in which we can become critically literate of the natural world, some of those ways may not involve physical presence in an outdoor setting. Reading ecorcitical texts is one way in which students can become more aware of the natural world without having to step foot outside. Though this type of reading allows for students to become more aware of the natural world in which they live, it is only the first step towards placing students thinking about being critically literate of their natural surroundings. The second step would need to involve interaction and physical presence in nature. A nature hike with reflection is a possible step towards this but this is too simple of an answer to be effective or cause change. I guess I haven’t come to a complete answer in how to make students more critically aware of their natural surroundings yet, but I hope to find an engaging way in which students are aware of their surroundings, engage with the natural world and take a step towards making change.

Louv, David. (2006). Last Child in the Woods. New York. Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill.

Teaching Critical Literacy With The Consideration of Privilege

                Ernest Morell spells out the many ways in which he has practiced using critical literacy in his classrooms and seminars which have been helpful in the instruction of urban youth. He systematically goes through a wide range of traditional schools of thought and give power to how they are effective, with the intention to give the reader insight to how he has used these schools of thought in his own practices. By laying out the framework for the multiple ways to utilize critical literacies in the classroom, Morell’s focused classrooms were in Los Angeles in which two schools had varying demographics, though the classrooms he worked in act as a representation of lower class demographics that traditionally have lower grades, graduation rates and college acceptance. The practices he uses allow for students to become more connected with the educational process to better their understanding of the importance of critical literacies. Similarly, Patrick Camangian uses critical literacies to teach autoethnography to urban youth.

                Camangian’s teaching engages students through the teaching of autoethnography to develop compassionate classrooms, and promote self and social reflection (179). This form of pedagogy allows his students to build projects that are not only self-reflective and exemplary of issues in their personal society, but also show that these urban youth are able to produce written work and express critical literacy at the college level. This teaching not only empowers the students, but opens up multiple avenues for the students to realize their potential. This pedagogy becomes more experiential as the students become more involved with the research that they do and conduct interviews and work outside of the classroom, allowing students the opportunity to become more critical in the process in which they take while they conduct research. Outside of the research the students conduct, they spend time on reflection to examine how these things have been working to affect them personally in their own lives. This self-reflection allows for the students to take on a more personal approach to think critically and analyze the work that they are doing. This reflection allows for deeper critical literacies on socioeconomic, racial, and class differences that are working with and against the students. Peggy McIntosh writes and essay that follows a similar way of thinking as she unpacks white privilege.

                Though McIntosh studies feminism, she makes a great comparative analysis to the unconscious thinking between men’s privilege and white privilege. This thinking allows her to become critical towards the way in which men think about their own privilege and unconsciously oppress women by means of not giving up privilege but attempting to allow more openness to women in a patriarchal society. She explains that this form of though is unconscious thinking towards the privilege that men have and not realizing the affordances that being male allows. Similarly, she acknowledges that being white leads to this unconscious thinking. McIntosh lists 26 statements that bring attention to the reader of the many affordances they have being white or if they were white. On a macro level she realizes that racism still exists in our society and that we are not all free yet alone treated equally. McIntosh does not give any answer to these problems but offers ideas to restructure thinking towards how we think as a society to make changes. This way of thinking relates to Morell’s thoughts on critical literacy and Camangian’s practices in teaching autoethnography in that we need to think critically about our own affordances as an individual and try to work out how we can make social change for the better.