Teaching to Change the World

Interesting and excellent resource

learn a lot!

The text itself is amazing, and is an invaluable source for all aspiring teachers, as well as current teachers. HOWEVER, trying to cite from the Kindle version has been really frustrating, as the page number stays at 516 even though there are a couple chapters more into the end of the text.

I purchased this book NEW (paper back version) for class, since it starts next week, and this was the only reasonable priced "new" version I found. First of all, the books cover is bent, along with multiple pages, and the book is in overall poor condition. The packaging was a paper package (paper mailer) instead of a box to keep the book secure. Very disappointed in this purchase. As a college student and a single mother $90 is a lot of money. Be cautious if you purchase...

This book is all over the place. The authors know their subject well, but they do not write concentrated chapters. Each chapter just goes into too many directions. It is like each chapter is its own book. This book is definitely not worth $80.

I read this for a class, and it is very long. There is a great deal of information in the book. It based around teaching from a multicultural perspective, as a critically reflective teacher. There are plenty of lesson ideas presented in the chapters, about how to get to know your students, and their funds of knowledge. The book is full of anecdotal evidence of teachers experiences attempting to teach from a social justice perspective. I think every teacher should read this, or a book like it. There is another book called Culturally Responsive Teaching by Geneva Gay, which also talks about teaching to multiple perspectives, and how to be a responsive, aring teacher. Most of the book is history, of education, learning theories, etc. So if you know all this already, you may find yourself skipping some of it.

Well I do give credit to the author for writing a very interesting read, that is well written, and to the point. The book, as a whole leans into a territory teachers need not lean towards in a modern democracy. There is a huge emphasis on disenfranchisement, and teaching differently, for "different" learners. The way the learners are differentiated from one another, is via skin tone, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. This book references mar xist thinkers, and does seem to urge you to re-think wanting to subscribe to living in a democracy, as something thats a bad thing. The truth of the matter is, this is not the perspective teachers need, going forward. The page on the invisible backpack of white privilege is just absurd. First off, anyone with half a brain knows skin tone dictates nothing of your struggle in life. Don't for a minute tell me my Irish ancestors, who took no part in early America, owed no land, suffered racism themselves, and enjoyed no special privilege, are the reason for todays racism. It's utterly ridiculous. Tell that to anyone thats poor working at walmart. Privilege has to do with education level, and money these days not skin. Everyone does have opportunity to take advantage of programs, that help the needy. As a teacher, I am full aware of the opportunities available to everyone. This book, and the kind of thinking behind it, the agenda in many of todays college teacher preparation programs, caused me to actually drop out of a teacher preparation program, due to the high amount of mis-information we were being forced to regurgitate. Thats not why we become teachers, it's ready, writing, arithmetic, and to help them build character. Teaching the truth is at the heart of being a teacher, along with a caring mindset. This book should not be used in college. The truth is most teacher preparation programs have been taken over by C RT. The fact that I already possessed critical thinking skills, I was able to not be brainwashed by the nonsense in this book. If your program requires this book, you might want to find a different one, unless you are ok drinking the kool aid.

There was potential for this to be an interesting book, however Oakes et al were more interested in making ideological points than actually diving into what teaching is about. The inherent flaw in many of these types of books is when the author's goal is to take their "opponents" viewpoint and distort it into a strawman argument.Annette Lareau’s Invisible Inequality is one of the most interesting educational articles I have ever read. When I saw her name pop up on page 13 of TTCW, I was excited to see what their analysis was. I wish that my copy had come with that page ripped out, so great was my disappointment. Oakes wrote that “concerted cultivation prepares children to be a better match with what mainstream schooling looks for in school readiness and success”(pg. 13). So from TTCW it would appear that middle and upper class success is “often a function not of students’ skills or smarts but of the synergy along class lines between their families and their schools”(pg. 13). I am not entirely sure who she is arguing against, as I have yet to hear a single person ever argue that wealth does not provide advantages. Her truism aside, I question if she actually read Invisible Inequality. The key takeaway points that any reader who is not blinded by ideology would takeaway from the article is that there are key differences in the way that different SES raise their children, and it goes far beyond the strawman that TTCW presents of “playdates and extracurriculars.” The far more pertinent findings of Lareau were in areas that middle class parents provide such as amount of time spent reading to children, the general pattern of reasoning and accommodating that developed formidable reasoning skills amongst their children, and a focus on the development of talents and skills. THIS WAS CRUCIAL TO INVISIBLE INEQUALITY. These are intractable areas in which low SES students are starting leagues behind their well-off counterparts. TTCW is blatantly classist and racist to ignore these issues and try to paper them over with drivel about play dates.Oakes et al wrote that “Having the ‘right’ cultural capital-for example, speaking the ’King’s English’ or knowing how to play golf or pick a good red wine-matters quite a bit in terms of the opportunities one receives and what one is able to make of them”(pg. 99). Perhaps the extant of her knowledge of the field of business is watching Mad Men and her worldview is still stuck in the 1960s. Not only do the vast majority of companies NOT select people based on their taste in wine, she spectacularly fails to understand that networking is vital to many industries.Unfortunately none of this is particularly surprising in the field of education anymore. This is a book that seeks easy, single answer explanations to incredibly difficult problems. If you're looking for a book where you can pat yourself on the back and compliment yourself on what a good person you are, this is for you. You'll find plenty of fodder to support your prior believes and don't worry, you'll never have to question anything or leave your comfort zone.