Response Post from Susan

I found last week's reading to be eye-opening. I believed in the "literacy myth." It wasn't that my parents promoted it, but it was an ideal I embraced. Although I was able to secure a job right out of high school and have since worked my way up in a corporation, I always thought (and still do) that individuals with a college degree had an advantage. Even though I make quite a bit more than people I know with college degrees, I actually still tend to rank myself below those I consider to be my educational superiors.

This "literacy myth" is powerful and it is still alive today. I conducted my observation in the classroom last Friday. I followed the same teacher in the same classroom but with five different groups of students. It was refreshing that this teacher took time out of her lesson plan to discuss college with her 7th grade students. But there was a definite difference as to the potential of each group. Community college ranked low, the University a big higher, and then Ivy League on top. And there was discussion as to the potential of each group of students based upon their percentage in the classroom. This teacher is a great teacher - don't get me wrong. She is inspirational and motivational. But when I heard the emphasis or lack thereof (based upon the group of students) it struck me as to what Dr. Boland has been mentioning about the stories we tell and the scripts we circulate based upon perceptions of literacy. It seems to me that some students walked out of class on a cloud while others continued to walk with a cloud over them. I think it illustrates just how much power teachers have and how careful we need to be with the messages we communicate.