Breaking With the Past, Imagining Schooling Anew: Fighting for Justice in Education

• In Event: The Pandemic as a Portal: On Transformative Ruptures and (Im)Possible Futures for Education

Abstract

Classroom teachers have spent a great deal of time learning techniques and acquiring skills to meet the social-emotional needs of their students and provide a space of inclusivity. However, during the mandated quarantine resulting from COVID 19, many children found themselves feeling safer in their new learning environments – their homes. The very skills acquired through social-emotional trainings, professional development, and published texts can be culturally irrelevant, excluding BICOC and disregarding their social-emotional needs. Before school buildings reopen, teachers must question practices that exclude children in curriculum and teaching, and unpack “mindfulness” and “trauma-informed” practices that normalize trauma.

Author

• Jessica Martell, Teachers College, Columbia University