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03-22-2016, 06:11 PM
"Ms. Lauren, I heard that Donald Trump is going to make all Muslims register on a list, and that he's not going to let any Muslims in the country anymore. What if he wins this election? How does this even happen?"
I felt 26 pairs of eyes surveying my face in that moment, searching for an answer that I did not have. A few seconds before the question stopped my United States History class in its tracks, I had called on my student Hana*, whom I assumed wanted to share her thoughts on the most recent homework assignment. My students, well-acquainted enough with me by now to know even what I did or could not say, sensed that their classmate's question had swiftly bulldozed my plan for the hour.
Hana fixed her gaze on me, her petite face framed by a hijab.
Our nation's story -- essentially two-and-a-half centuries of cognitive dissonance regarding the meaning of "all men are created equal" -- is rife with complexity, and teaching this story presents a unique challenge, especially since all of my students are young men and women of color. Simultaneously, I try help them access the truth about their country's substantial failures and systemic oppression, but I also want them to feel the buoyancy of hope, a hope that could propel them to engage in societal change-making as they grow into adulthood.
More than the "who" or "where" of any president or famous battleground, our work focuses on the "why"-- the patterns that leads our people in a familiar spiral from heyday to recession, from war to peace and eventually back again. To that end, my lessons are heavily supplemented with discussion of current events, so that students can draw parallels between that which they read in a textbook, and that which they hear on the news and at the dinner table.
Donald Trump has entered the national conversation in such a forceful way that his name is currently unavoidable in my classroom, and the tenets of his campaign have dispelled the seductive notion that racism and bigotry are relics of the past we study.
When my students studied the immigration boom of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries back in December, they noticed that their textbook depicted the United States as an attractive destination for thousands of people searching for security and freedom. Within twenty-four hours of our first immigration lesson, Donald Trump issued a written statement (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/donald-trumps-call-to-ban-muslim-immigrants/419298) calling for a ban of all Muslim immigrants into the United States for the forseeable future. Six months prior to our lesson, he had publicized his plan to build a wall (http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/donald-trump-i-would-force-mexico-build-border-wall), funded by the Mexican government, that would separate the United States from Mexico.
During our World War I unit, my students studied the words of WEB DuBois, who urged young, black American men to enlist in the military (http://www.amistadresource.org/documents/document_07_02_010_closeranks.pdf) and help fight for a country that did not yet recognize their full citizenship. That month, more than one white Trump supporter would assault (http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/03/02/a_list_of_violent_incidents_at_donald_trump_rallie s_and_events.html) a black protestor at Trump rallies, all while Trump promised to "look into (http://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/trump-will-look-in-to-paying-legal-bills-for-man-who-sucker-punched-protester-220685)"paying the legal bills of the assailants.
In September and October, I made the mistake of underestimating the power of an angry voter base to fuel a presidential candidate's campaign. In an attempt to assuage my students' very real worries of a Trump presidency, I reassured them that Trump would not remain the GOP frontrunner for long, that he would be eliminated after the first few primaries.
Then, Trump emerged victorious from more than a few primary elections, and when I stood wordlessly in front of my class in the wake of Hana's question, my students realized that while I can teach history, I can predict it no more accurately than they can.
In spring, my students will study the rise of Adolf Hitler and World War II. In years past, the question inevitably is asked on the first day: how could a developed nation choose a leader so hateful, so outwardly bigoted? How could a man so angry persuade thousands of ordinary people that he is the best choice for a prosperous future? Each year, my students have incredulously gaped at the fact that Hitler was chosen, that he ran a campaign, that he needed the support of the populace to gain the political power he needed to wage a world war.
My current students have been drawing the necessary parallels all year long, and they know by now that history, for better or for worse, has an immense capacity to repeat itself if we are not careful. They will likely be the first class I ever have that will learn of Hitler and find no need to ask the question.
And in the mean time, I will search for an answer to Hana's.
*name changed -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. (http://start.westnet.ca/newstempch.php?article=terms.html/) It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
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I felt 26 pairs of eyes surveying my face in that moment, searching for an answer that I did not have. A few seconds before the question stopped my United States History class in its tracks, I had called on my student Hana*, whom I assumed wanted to share her thoughts on the most recent homework assignment. My students, well-acquainted enough with me by now to know even what I did or could not say, sensed that their classmate's question had swiftly bulldozed my plan for the hour.
Hana fixed her gaze on me, her petite face framed by a hijab.
Our nation's story -- essentially two-and-a-half centuries of cognitive dissonance regarding the meaning of "all men are created equal" -- is rife with complexity, and teaching this story presents a unique challenge, especially since all of my students are young men and women of color. Simultaneously, I try help them access the truth about their country's substantial failures and systemic oppression, but I also want them to feel the buoyancy of hope, a hope that could propel them to engage in societal change-making as they grow into adulthood.
More than the "who" or "where" of any president or famous battleground, our work focuses on the "why"-- the patterns that leads our people in a familiar spiral from heyday to recession, from war to peace and eventually back again. To that end, my lessons are heavily supplemented with discussion of current events, so that students can draw parallels between that which they read in a textbook, and that which they hear on the news and at the dinner table.
Donald Trump has entered the national conversation in such a forceful way that his name is currently unavoidable in my classroom, and the tenets of his campaign have dispelled the seductive notion that racism and bigotry are relics of the past we study.
When my students studied the immigration boom of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries back in December, they noticed that their textbook depicted the United States as an attractive destination for thousands of people searching for security and freedom. Within twenty-four hours of our first immigration lesson, Donald Trump issued a written statement (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/donald-trumps-call-to-ban-muslim-immigrants/419298) calling for a ban of all Muslim immigrants into the United States for the forseeable future. Six months prior to our lesson, he had publicized his plan to build a wall (http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/donald-trump-i-would-force-mexico-build-border-wall), funded by the Mexican government, that would separate the United States from Mexico.
During our World War I unit, my students studied the words of WEB DuBois, who urged young, black American men to enlist in the military (http://www.amistadresource.org/documents/document_07_02_010_closeranks.pdf) and help fight for a country that did not yet recognize their full citizenship. That month, more than one white Trump supporter would assault (http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/03/02/a_list_of_violent_incidents_at_donald_trump_rallie s_and_events.html) a black protestor at Trump rallies, all while Trump promised to "look into (http://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/trump-will-look-in-to-paying-legal-bills-for-man-who-sucker-punched-protester-220685)"paying the legal bills of the assailants.
In September and October, I made the mistake of underestimating the power of an angry voter base to fuel a presidential candidate's campaign. In an attempt to assuage my students' very real worries of a Trump presidency, I reassured them that Trump would not remain the GOP frontrunner for long, that he would be eliminated after the first few primaries.
Then, Trump emerged victorious from more than a few primary elections, and when I stood wordlessly in front of my class in the wake of Hana's question, my students realized that while I can teach history, I can predict it no more accurately than they can.
In spring, my students will study the rise of Adolf Hitler and World War II. In years past, the question inevitably is asked on the first day: how could a developed nation choose a leader so hateful, so outwardly bigoted? How could a man so angry persuade thousands of ordinary people that he is the best choice for a prosperous future? Each year, my students have incredulously gaped at the fact that Hitler was chosen, that he ran a campaign, that he needed the support of the populace to gain the political power he needed to wage a world war.
My current students have been drawing the necessary parallels all year long, and they know by now that history, for better or for worse, has an immense capacity to repeat itself if we are not careful. They will likely be the first class I ever have that will learn of Hitler and find no need to ask the question.
And in the mean time, I will search for an answer to Hana's.
*name changed -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. (http://start.westnet.ca/newstempch.php?article=terms.html/) It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
http://rc.feedsportal.com/r/247395597822/u/0/f/677045/c/35496/s/4e715b98/sc/7/rc/1/rc.img (http://rc.feedsportal.com/r/247395597822/u/0/f/677045/c/35496/s/4e715b98/sc/7/rc/1/rc.htm)
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