Degand’s article discusses his study of two Black teenage male students with different backgrounds, living in two different neighborhoods in New York, and compares how they view social success, their career goals and their media experiences.  The study examines the differences in their community and school demographics, how it is perceived and the impact it has socially.  He evaluates the many social and individual factors that influence social success.  Noble’s writing illustrates the social inequalities embedded in data algorithms designed by Google and companies like Google.  She highlights how technological applications that we engage with online are often thought of as neutral and harmless, but they are designed by people who many times are racist, sexist or who falsely claim meritocracy and these attitudes become part of the online structure and content.  It is not accidental.  It is part of the structural inequalities in our society that needs to be addressed.  Steinkuehler’s video demonstrates how video games can motivate students to read and learn.  She explains how much more motivated students are when they are interested in the material they read, and they choose to read it.  Students will read at a higher level when they are motivated.  The Ted podcast discusses the differences between algorithms and statistics.  It examines how people have their own impressions of statistics which are often inaccurate.  Decision making is impacted by these perceptions.  It is important to delve deeper into statistics to understand what’s behind the data.  If the numbers don’t make sense, ask questions.  But data is important.  Data and statistics have been used to make one of the US cities with the highest crime rates safer.  Statistics can be a beneficial resource, but it needs to be done with the understanding that statistics are biased.   

In one part of the Ted podcast they say that people often don’t see themselves in the statistics which resonated with me.  I’ll hear a stat about something I relate to or a social group I belong to but many times the stat doesn’t accurately represent me.  I learned in one of my stats classes years ago to look underneath the numbers to see what is being measured, how it is determined and by whom.  I also look at who is sponsoring or funding the study or report.  In terms of statistics I don’t trust much of what is published in mainstream media or certain organizations.  

What other media or technology currently thought of as neutral should be examined for bias?   

Preston’s writing explores Nasir Jones’ album Illmatic in depth.  He examines the written and oral aspects of certain songs, unpacking lyrics and how the rap artist’s complex intricate rhymes, symbols and patterns tell his stories.  The video of the song Chris Columbus is the often untold perspective of slavery in colonial expansion of the Americas, the resulting carnage and hypocrisy of its religious justification.  It also expresses how the power of Imperialism exists today.  The Protest Song of the Day article is about the Chris Columbus song and how it represents the oppressed point of view.  It provides a brief background of the song.  The song was included as part of a protest music project.  The organization publishes a song every week in support of protesting systemic social issues.  The First Nation music video is an educational video about the history of the Indigenous population in America, who they were, how they arrived and how they existed prior to colonialism but were treated as non-existent when European explorers arrived.  The video shows the known tribes and where they were located.  It depicts each of their cultures.  Last Emperor’s Secret Wars is a rap song that blends rappers and comic book characters.  It’s different than the usual stories and topics addressed in rap music.  The song has comic heroes go up against rappers.  It illustrates an interesting parallel of the two genres. 

I liked the First Nation music video in terms of educational media.  In my last post I was trying to think of ways to incorporate music into academics and this is the type of media I would like to incorporate when I start teaching, along with other forms of media.  It seems like it would fit a wide range of ages and could be used in certain elementary classes.  I think having a wide range of media and teaching methods for each subject can help connect with students’ varied learning styles.  It also breaks up the monotony of traditional industrial assembly line teaching. Music and music videos can serve many purposes – they can be a buffer for sensitive topics, they can tell a story, they can educate or they can be a mnemonic device, among many others.

Have you ever written a song or poem? What was the process like for you – for example, did it take a long time? did you draw from a personal experience? did you enjoy it?

I created a guild but couldn’t figure out how to do anything with it. I was able to progress a few more levels in the technologies but it didn’t change anything with the guilds. After I created my own I wasn’t able to figure out how to join another. I didn’t progress very far in the game since the time I started. It took a while to understand what I was doing. Even though I learned some basic elements of the game and was able to build and progress somewhat there is so much I don’t understand. I see how the game has many layers to it. It is complex and takes time to figure out. Even though it doesn’t have a simple objective or an end point it does have intricate detail that I can see would be of interest to some. I don’t have interest in the game itself but I like the graphics.

With another player’s guidance I figured out how to reach the technology that allowed me to set up a guild. I set one up and named it PeaceKeeper. I originally was trying to find Armando’s Digital Learner’s guild but after scrolling the available guilds to join I couldn’t find it so that’s when I created my own. I tried to access other activity but all I can do at this point is add medals. I haven’t figured out how to increase my level or other artifacts. In order to participate in a guild vs guild activity I need to reach the Iron Age. In order to reach Iron Age I need to complete other research in the Bronze Age, which requires additional research points. I have to wait for those to accumulate. I’ll let it sit idle for a while to accumulate and see how long it takes to get to the Bronze Age.

My city has grown minimally. I have several types of buildings but I haven’t expanded my land very much. I had no idea what I was doing in the beginning. I didn’t understand the game objective. But now I understand that part of the objective is growth by sitting idle. Many resources are obtained by waiting a specified amount of time, which I’ve only recently come to understand. A player can also spend money on the resources needed for growth. I still have no interest in the game, other than for the assignments. It is not entertaining or engaging to me but I’m not a gamer.

Dunbar’s essay discusses the racial assumptions around rap music and the ways it gets tied to crime.  It’s been offered as evidence in court cases to support criminal claims, unlike other styles of music.  Similar to what was stated by Alexander, Dunbar illustrates how racism has become more subtle and covert.  With “culture-centered racist ideology” negative views of African American culture reinforces a punishment mindset. Connor’s Rap Analysis reviews rap music, how it’s made and how to listen to it.  He breaks down the elements explaining how certain lyrics are selected, modified, placed and emphasized.  It’s like a form of poetry.  I laughed when I read the instruction to tune out the words, but it does make a difference.  When I played the Eminem song it was much more enjoyable not trying to focus on what was being said.  The podcast about American Music History explores how American pop music is rooted in racism.  Morris explains how blackface minstrels formed American pop culture in the 1800s.  As entertainment developed black entertainers performed blackface and minstrels were part of early American film.  As the movie industry grew, black recording artists established the genre of Motown music which also grew.  Morris describes how Motown was the antidote to minstrelsy and an active resistance to racism.  The podcasts about Kanye offer insight to how he began as a rap artist with the challenges he faced.  It demonstrates his perseverance and determination describing how he worked his way to achieve his goal of making it big in music production and being taken serious as a rapper.  The second part explains in depth how he produced Through the Wire with his mouth wired shut.  It also explains how Kanye uses sampling, a less appreciated element of creating rap music.  The podcast describes the complex process of layering different sample tracks which takes skill and talent.

I grew up with disco, R&B and 80s rock.  I didn’t listen to a lot of rap but one of my favorite records was Rapper’s Delight.  Listening to all the music segments in the American Music History podcast brought back a lot of memories.  Some songs were older than my generation but many of them were popular during my upbringing.  Music was a significant part of my high school years, as it is for most teens.  During high school I worked at Baskin Robbins and we always blasted music while we cleaned after closing or while we cruised the El Camino Real.  My friends each had their own preferences or favorite songs and I still relate those songs to those friends.  I haven’t been a big Kanye fan, but after listening to the podcast I have a new respect for him.  His determination and belief in himself are exceptional qualities.

I don’t see music used much in K-12 classrooms, outside of specific classes focused on music, like band and choir.  How might music be integrated in a way to support K-12 learning?

I have not joined a guild yet. I am not far enough along and I have quite figured out how to get to the proper stage that allows me to participate in a guild. I need to work on that this weekend. The pace of this game is slow for me, as it has been a challenge to progress. I’ve never been a big video game player. When I was young I played a few and they were always quick and not dragged out like FoE. Those games had one objective and you either win or lose, like pac man or centipede. The type of video games I would play now are like number puzzles and brain games. I prefer playing in print though.

Ladson-Billings discusses the need for Culturally Relevant Pedagogy to be “fluid” because students and teachers should be growing.  She talks about the varied way her teachings were applied and how elements were lost.  She then uses an example of a class integrating hip hop culture with student teaching and its success in engaging relevant critical concepts.  Winn’s article explains her work with Restorative Justice and how Restorative Justice can be applied in English Education by student’s using the art of writing to express their experiences of marginalization and to find alternatives.  Teachers who integrate Restorative Justice take a personal interest in their students’ well-being and form a trust which supports this practice.  Buechley’s video examines the contradictory nature of Maker magazine, showing how it aims to be an equitable and inclusive resource, but the reality is that it is exclusive.  Their product is produced by, aimed at, and accessible to predominantly white upper-class men.  She demonstrates the inequity by the people that work there, the people who are selected for the cover of the magazine and through the readership and high priced products they sell.  The magazine falls short of representing the brilliancy of making things embodied across cultures.  The podcast talked about restorative justice in two discourses.  The interview with Danielle Sered was about a restorative justice program in the criminal justice system.  She explained how the root of violence can be tied to isolation, shame, exposure to violence or the inability to meet one’s economic needs and prison replicates these experiences which continues the cycle and does nothing to prevent further violence.  There is no healing or reparation in the current system.  Sered describes how a restorative justice approach that takes those impacted by the violence coming together and making agreements on how to repair the harm.  The process reduces the chance of violence reoccurring.  The second part was about using restorative justice to reduce online violence.  They had 3 cases and showed how it is a difficult process and not always successful.  The successful case involved the offender becoming aware of his aggression, but the other cases were not resolved so easily.   

Maisha Winn’s article made me think of the respect that is often lacking in classrooms.  It reminded me of an experience I had in my high school English class, senior year. We had to write an essay that was related to a personal experience and present it to the class.  I shared a little bit about an unhealthy situation that was going on at home and after I was done presenting the teacher’s only comment was that it sounded like a talk to a woman’s group.  There was no acknowledgment of the content of the message I delivered.  It was dismissive and disrespectful.  It is the opposite of what I understand a restorative justice English teacher to be and makes me aware of the approach I want to use and don’t want to use when I begin teaching.

Have you experienced restorative justice circles in K-12 school?

I have a variety of buildings in my city. I have several huts, a long house, barracks, a couple memorials, a pottery barn, a stone circle, a stilt house and a hunter house. I planted a few trees and there are roads. Adding trees made the people happy. I was able to increase supplies with the hunter house and I trained spear fighters in their barracks.

I battled on the continent map and acquired a region. I had 6 soldiers and the army I fought had 3. So they were outnumbered. My son explained to me why it was good to have certain types of weapons and what the criteria meant on the pop up window. I haven’t battled against any other players that I know of. I was trying to join Armando’s Digital Learners Guild that he created but I am not far enough along. My guild tab says I need to research Smithery and when I tried to research Smithery it said I needed to research Thatched houses and for that I needed Cultivation but when I tried to obtain that it wants more diamonds than I have. In order to get more diamonds it wants real money, which I am not going to do. Maybe I’ll find another way at some point to accumulate more diamonds.

Alexander illustrates how mass incarceration is the way the US has continued a racial caste system or “the New Jim Crow”.  It is legalized discrimination.  Incarceration is a way of excluding a large population of African Americans from a number of rights as a US citizen.  Once convicted as a felon discrimination with employment, housing, education, public assistance and voting is legal.  In Alexander’s writing she walks through the history of slavery, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, Civil Rights then the war on drugs and mass incarceration, show how racialized social control has not ended.  There were brief moments of progress for African Americans but each time the dominant white class saw it as a threat to white supremacy and a new paradigm of social control of African Americans was instigated.  The dominant class became more discrete with designating “cracking down on crime” and mass incarceration as racial order.  Before the end of the Civil Rights Movement those in power shifted language from segregation to law and order, forming a race neutral language attempting to hide racial bias.  Rather than approach drug abuse as a medical condition and help users find treatment options the US chose to criminalize it with progressively increasing penalties.  In this way racial order continues to be asserted.

I have not personally experienced racism in the way described by Alexander.  But my daughter’s friend and her boyfriend are currently grappling with the criminal justice system.  They are a young Latin couple who just had a baby and they have not been able to find decent jobs, so they struggle financially.  This led the boyfriend to steal laundry detergent.  It is not his first offense, so he is facing jail time.  The individualist view would see it as his own fault.  But it’s a racial and social problem, with employment and pay discrimination as part of the problem, as well as a biased criminal justice system.  

How would you envision a reformation of the criminal justice system? Should the current method of incarceration be eliminated?

The storyline was very helpful in the beginning of the game and when I set up a new world. I had no idea what to do when I started and it helped me figure out what to do. The instructions were pretty clear. The daily task of clicking on each building to give me coins is the only obvious daily task that I’m aware of. I’m not sure what the archaeology event is, unless its the activities in the research new technologies tab. I don’t have enough diamonds to get past the wheel and it wants me to buy more diamonds, which I have no intention of doing. So I’m stuck in the Bronze Age until I can collect more diamonds.