Week #9 Blog Post Troublemakers Preface & Intro By: Shalaby

Week #9 Blog Post

Troublemakers Preface & Intro By: Shalaby 

Quotes

This reading by Shalaby is largely based on an analogy that children in schools who challenge teachers through their unique, sometimes disobedient, behaviors can be compared to birds kept in a cage, or canaries in a cave protecting miners. The idea of freedom is also emphasized here, and allowing students and young children to is described as the most important things educators can do. I found many quotes here to be worth pointing out. 

The first quote I chose goes as follows “I am concerned instead with what we might learn from him about what to do with, and for, all of our children.” Here, Shalaby refers to Anthony, one of the students he highlights throughout this reading, who was quickly written off as a trouble maker by other teachers. He is redirecting the conversation here. Instead of asking “What’s wrong with this child?” we should be asking “What can this child  teach us about how we treat and support all children?” He argues that teachers need to be more compassionate. Instead of punishing and excluding children like Anthony, their behaviors should be used to guide educators expectations. 

Next, Shalaby says “These children make otherwise invisible harm both visible and audible, and even if noncompliance is a threat to their own well-being, they persist in signaling the danger.” Again, drawing on the Anthony’s of schools, he is arguing that the children labeled as trouble makers are actually exposing harm that would otherwise go unnoticed in schools. Adding to his concept that freedom means children should be testing the boundaries and sometimes breaking the rules. Shalaby is suggesting that students' poor behavior, acting out, resisting, etc, actually brings to light things that are not working in the classroom. He also points out that although this behavior gets them punished, they continue to do it. This behavior may be alluding to something bigger. 

The final quote, my personal favorite, I chose to dissect is “Something toxic is in the air, and these children refuse to inhale it.” Shalaby is using a metaphor here that I mentioned earlier, to describe troublemaking students. Here, the toxic air symbolizes the harmful conditions in a child’s environment, specifically the classroom. These might be unfair rules or expectations, like holding 5 year old kindergartners accountable for not being “mature.” The children who refuse to inhale it, are considered the trouble makers. They are the ones who will not tolerate the harmful environment and refuse to adapt. 

To reflect on what we have read this week, I think about the trouble makers who were in my schools growing up. For me, I never wanted to be in trouble. I always wanted to please my teachers. However, I had many friends who were often kicked out of class or had their desks moved and isolated because of their different behaviors. Even at a young age, I knew most of these students were not bad people, but I wondered why they could not just obey the teacher? After reading this, it makes a lot of sense. The standards in classrooms are not one size fits all. All kids learn differently and calling them troublemakers and treating them as such does more harm than anything.  I found this interesting article called “The Worst Students Make the Best Teachers- Here’s Why” https://www.weareteachers.com/bad-students-make-good-teachers/