The Guide to Teaching
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Creating the Classroom Atmosphere
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 1997 11:57:27 -0400 (EDT)
From: christopher malone cmalone@email.gc.cuny.edu
I teach American Government and Politics at Hunter College of the City University of New York, an institution that many will agree is more ethnically diverse than any other in the country. With this comes an extraordinary range in beliefs, attitudes, cultural practices, etc. But also, the students' understanding of (American) politics varies from barely none to somewhat well- developed. Thus, it is hard to keep all the students on the same page, so to speak: how, for instance, do you get the recent immigrants from countries like Vietnam, Ukraine, Columbia, Romania, Puerto Rico and Ireland - who have a vague notion of the political system here - to understand the topics under discussion the way students who were born and raised in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn or the Bronx do? In other words, It is not only a problem of facilitating the free expression of diverse attitudes, but also getting a unified message across to a student body whose worldviews act as a filter to that message.
I think that, as teachers, we must be aware of this two-way street. The first days of class, I ask my students to tell me a little bit about themselves, where they are from, their country of origin, how much they work, etc. This at least gets them talking in class, a problem some have right off the bat. As we proceed, I make it clear to them that anything can be said in my class as long as it is done with civility. But also, I tell them they must justify their comments; the "I believe" or "I feel" answer is not good enough. "I believe" has to be backed up with some type of evidence. This at least gets students thinking about why they believe something, the first step toward critical analysis. Through this, we cannot only accept a diversity of opinion, but also understand where it came from.
But most importantly, I think we teachers have to take that attitude expressed and place it in a context that is accessible to the entire class. This is tricky with a class of great diversity. But if one can create a space where a student is comfortable in expressing his/her viewpoint - no matter how biased or offensive to others - then we have won half the battle.
Christopher J. Malone
Department of Political Science
Graduate School and University Center
The City University of New York
cmalone@email.gc.cuny.edu
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