Autobiographical/Teacher Identity Entry #5
“Social Class Identity”
In this assignment you are expected to examine your early and adult experiences with social class. Incorporate into your paper:
- Recall and describe your early experiences in which you were made aware of your socio-economic class identification.
- In The Trouble with Diversity, Walter Benn Michaels states,
As survey after survey has shown, Americans are very reluctant to identify themselves as belonging to the lower class and even more reluctant to identify themselves as belonging to the upper class. The class we like is the middle class. But the fact that we all like to think of ourselves as belonging to the same class doesn’t, of course, mean that we actually do belong to the same class. In reality, we obviously and increasingly don’t. (2006, p. 6)
Has your social class made it difficult for you to accurately identify your social class status?
- How has your social class helped or hindered your ability to see the realities of a stratified class system in the US?
- In what ways did your K-12 schooling directly or indirectly influence your socio-economic class identification?
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- Based on your socio-economic class identification, how were you treated differently from individuals with a different identification in your K-12 schooling? in your adult experiences?
- In regards to items 2-4 above, to what extent did you experience instructional materials and the informal curriculum that were “class blind” (Knapp & Woolverton, 2004, p. 672)?
- In what ways has the ideology of “meritocracy” (see, for example Spring, 2005) been an influence in interpreting and making sense of your socio-economic class experiences while a K-12 student and an adult?
- How does your socio-economic class identification help explain your connection/disconnection with individuals who are low-income?
- Based on your responses to these questions, now consider specifically the following prompts in relation to your developing teacher identity:
- How have your experiences of socio-economic class affected your identity formation as a teacher?
- Related to your pedagogical practices, address your strengths & challenges for being a teacher who is mindful of the socio-economic class identities and values that students, parents/guardians, and curricular materials bring into the classroom.
- To what extent does your socio-economic class identity factor into your career aspirations as to geographical location (including urban, suburban, rural distinctions along with regards to regions of U.S./world) where you would like to live and where you would like to teach?
Due: Tuesday, February 27, 2007 to your seminar leader