SoFo Final Project

Question: How should teachers as transformative intellectuals navigate through the current
educational system in the age of accountability to pursue equity among in and through
education?

Thesis: As transformative individuals, teachers can navigate through the current educational
system in the age of accountability to pursue equity among in and through the classroom by
introducing learners to ideas from all different beliefs, cultures, and backgrounds; and
continuously working to accommodate every individual student’s learning needs, fostering a
collaborative environment that supports individual thinking by asking questions.

To Teach: The Journey, in Comics, by William Ayers

This book supports my thesis statement, regarding the idea of accommodating for every
student’s learning needs. All students learn in different ways. It is important to realize that
teachers need to make sure every individual is getting the education that best suits them.
Sometimes, teachers tend to give students a label without even trying to see what they can do
to foster an environment that still encourages the learning growth of said student. (Ayers,
2010)
Compassionate Music Teaching, by Karin S. Hendricks
An idea from this book that helped me form my philosophy is the idea on inclusion.
Something that can cause students to feel invisible is lack of representation of marginalized
groups. This is especially prominent in the music world, where our pedagogy is focused
around American and Western European concepts and repertoire. Something teachers can do
and seek content that is inclusive to everybody, no matter their beliefs, culture, or background.
(Hendricks 2018)
Pedagogy of the Oppressed, by Paulo Freire
As a teacher who will foster an environment that encourages individual thinking, it is
important to make sure that no student is feeling oppressed by the teaching methods. Freire
sheds light upon the traditional teaching methods, one of which is the idea that teachers
possess all the knowledge and students do not. In this kind of environment, students are only
learning what teachers teach, and teachers do not question that maybe they should evolve their
teaching habits, or learn something from someone else. Something teachers can do to combat
this traditional teaching tendency is to collaborate and listen to students and all of their
individual perspectives, so they can recognize that they (the teacher), too, have so much to
learn. (Freire, 1970)
Teaching as a Subversive Activity, by Neil Postman & Charles Weingartner
A big takeaway from this book is the inquiry method of learning which, in short, is the idea of
teaching/learning by asking questions. With this method, the student-learning becomes self-
motivated. Instead of telling students what the answer is, the teacher asks the students
questions that lead the students to discovering the correct answer on their own. Additionally,
this fuels the students’ curiosities. In the long-run, this method will foster an environment
where the students will become individual thinkers who think critically, and are set up for a
lifetime of curiosity. (Postman & Weingartner, 1969)

Gettysburg Honor Code: I affirm that I have upheld the highest principles of honesty and
integrity, and have not witnessed a violation of the honor code. -Sally Fetterman
 Ayers, William (2010). To teach: The journey, in comics. Teachers College Press

Freire, Paulo (1970). Chapter 2. Pedagogy of the oppressed (pp. 71-87). Bloomsbury
Publishing Inc.

Hendricks, Karin S. (2018). Compassionate music teaching. Rowman & Littlefield

Publishing Group Inc.

Postman, Neil, & Weingartner, Charles (1969). Teaching as a subversive activity.

Delacorte Press.