Literacy With An Attitude:  Educating Working-Class Children in Their Own Self-Interest, Finn

Talking Point #1

     Finn discusses two kinds of education:  empowering education and domesticating education.  Empowering education is the type of education that the rich receive that leads to powerful literacy which in turn leads to positions of power and authority.  Domesticating education is the type of education that predominantly the working class receives that makes a productive and dependable person with functional literacy--the "status quo."  Many scholars over the years have studied the social and cultural mechanisms to try and figure out what has happened to literacy.  Social scientists believe that we can achieve greater equity and justice in education through change so that both the rich and poor will get an empowering education and powerful literacy.  The cycle of ¨status quo¨ must be broken.  

Talking Point #2

     Jean Anyon studied fifth grade students from public schools in northern New Jersey and categorized them according to class:  executive elite, affluent professional, middle class and working class.  Anyon looked at and described the similarities and differences between the classes, teachers, teaching styles, methods, assignments, attitudes and preparation for the future.  Anyon brought to light the differences in classrooms throughout the United States based on the socioeconomic class of the population served. The dominant theme in the executive elite schools was excellence while the dominant theme in the middle class schools was possibility.  Later studies have shown that things have not changed in classrooms throughout the United States and in fact may have gotten worse.  ¨When students begin school in such different systems, the odds are set for them.¨

Talking Point #3

     Paulo Freire was a Brazilian educator, professor of philosophy and education at the University of Recife, who became worldwide renowned for his teaching methods of literacy among the poor.  His goal was for people to see literacy as something that could be part of their culture and not exclusively for the culture of the rich.  By obtaining literacy, one would obtain power.  The heart of Freireś program was to engage in dialogue.  He engaged in dialogue through what he called a culture circle.  Pictures were introduced to the culture circle in order to elicit a discussion and communicate with each other.  His goal was motivation to help the members of the culture circle reflect and think about the culture they created and if they created it, it was something they could change. His objective was ¨conscientization¨; a raising of consciousness with the end goal of closing the gap between rich and poor not only in wealth, but in quality of life. 

Finn argues that their are two types of literacy: functional literacy and powerful literacy.  One must have powerful literacy to institute changing the status quo.