The Effects of Poverty on Teaching and Learning

Poverty is an issue that more and more children are coming face to face with. The price that children of poverty must pay is unbelievably high. Each year, increasing numbers of children are entering schools with needs from circumstances, such as poverty, that schools are not prepared to meet.


The Concept of Being At-Risk
The term at-risk refers to children who are likely to fail in school or in life because of their life's social circumstances. It does not appear that any one single factor places a child at-risk. Rather, when more than one factor is present, there is a compounding effect and the likelihood for failure increases significantly. Poverty is considered a major at-risk factor (Leroy & Symes, 2001). Some of the factors related to poverty that may place a child at-risk for academic failure are: very young, single or low educational level parents; unemployment; abuse and neglect; substance abuse; dangerous neighborhoods; homelessness; mobility; and exposure to inadequate or inappropriate educational experiences.

Being able to identify and understand children who are at-risk is critical if we are to support their growth and development. In order to do this, warm and caring relationships need to be developed between teachers and children. This will enable teachers to detect any warning signs that may place children at-risk for failure, interfering with their chances for success in school and life (Leroy & Symes, 2001). Academic and behavioral problems can be indicators of impending failure. Among such behaviors are: delay in language development, delay in reading development, aggression, violence, social withdrawal, substance abuse, irregular attendance, and depression. Teachers may have difficulty reaching a student's parent or guardian. They may also find the student does not complete assignments, does not study for tests, or does not come to school prepared to learn because of poverty related circumstances in the home environment. These children may be unable to concentrate or focus. They may be unwilling or unable to interact with peers and/or adults in school in an effective manner.

Lesson Plan based on The Matrix

THE MATRIX

The movie The Matrix is certainly a science-fiction/action thriller. However, it can also be deeply profound, carrying meaningful threads of thought and truth on intense philosophical and spiritual levels.

 

Click here for more information about the film

 

‘The Matrix’ Activities  

BEFORE WATCHING THE FILM:

1.  Give some background information on “The Matrix”; when it was released; its popularity; who stars in it etc. Analysis of the Film Poster.
2.  Explain the film belongs to the science fiction genre. Introduction of conventions of a science fiction film.


DURING THE FILM:

Make pauses to ask the following questions:

3.  Now look at the opening in more detail. Which conventions clearly belong to the Science fiction genre? Ask students: How is the viewer made aware that this film belongs to the science fiction genre?

4.  Ask students: What are the “narrative hooks” which encourage the viewer to continue watching the film? What do they want to know the answers to?

5.  Make a few pauses during the film to ask questions to check understanding.

AFTER WATCHING THE FILM:

Make sure they understand at first the plot and then the issues, using the study guide as a starting point. It is during discussion that students really start to see connections and understand the levels of complexity that the movie has.

The study guide is meant to get students thinking about aspects of the movie that they might usually miss; the movie is fun just to watch, but is so full of references and symbolism that students usually need to deliberately look for it in order to see it.

6.  Give students the Study Guide. 

7. Get students to work in pairs or teams to work out the meaning of some quotes from the film and ask them to write an essay for homework.

Can We Teach Social Conscience?

Educator Brenda Dyck examines whether social conscience is caught or taught. She shares how a recent project about homelessness helped reshape her students' mental models.

"Children develop not because they are shaped through external reinforcements but because their curiosity is aroused. They become interested in information that does not quite fit into their existing cognitive structures and are thereby motivated to revise their thinking."

W.C. Crain, from Theories of Development

I've often found myself wondering whether social conscience is caught or taught. Is it our job as teachers to stir up students' social consciences and, if it is, how do we do that?

To answer those questions, I pulled out some learning theory from my university days. At that time, Kohlberg's Stages of Moral Development were the irrelevant musings of a psychologist far away. This time around, however, Lawrence Kohlberg's theory was pungent with practical application for me. Using Kohlberg's philosophy of moral development as a lens, I took a critical look at The Eleanor Rigby Project, a tele-collaborative project about homelessness that I created for my language arts students. I considered how effectively the project's activities challenged student thinking about the issue of stereotyping the homeless and I evaluated whether the lessons students learned during the project supported ethical challenge and long-term moral action. As I watched my students get involved in the project, I was able to see many of Kohlberg's principles come to life. I even saw my students' thinking shift!

According to psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg,

-  most adults never get past level three of the moral development stages; and an individual can only progress through those stages one stage at a time -- they cannot "jump" stages.

-  people will come to a comprehension of a moral rationale only one stage above their own.

-  those who deal with children should present them with moral dilemmas for discussion, dilemmas that will help them to see the reasonableness of a "higher stage" of morality.

-  most moral development occurs through social interaction.

-  in order for children to reorganize their thinking they must be active in the process, not just passive listeners. Just listening to adults promote moral judgments will not promote moral development.

The Matrix

The Matrix (1999)

A computer hacker learns from mysterious rebels about the true nature of his reality and his role in the war against its controllers.

 

Directors: Andy Wachowski, Lana Wachowski

 

Writers: Andy Wachowski, Lana Wachowski

 

Stars: Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne and Carrie-Anne Moss

 

 

Storyline

Thomas A. Anderson is a man living two lives. By day he is an average computer programmer and by night a hacker known as Neo. Neo has always questioned his reality, but the truth is far beyond his imagination. Neo finds himself targeted by the police when he is contacted by Morpheus, a legendary computer hacker branded a terrorist by the government. Morpheus awakens Neo to the real world, a ravaged wasteland where most of humanity have been captured by a race of machines that live off of the humans' body heat and electrochemical energy and who imprison their minds within an artificial reality known as the Matrix. As a rebel against the machines, Neo must return to the Matrix and confront the agents: super-powerful computer programs devoted to snuffing out Neo and the entire human rebellion.

The movie The Matrix is certainly a science-fiction/action thriller. However, it is also deeply profound, carrying meaningful threads of thought and truth on the most intense philosophical and spiritual levels. The film is full of allusions, messages, symbolism in the use of names, numbers, characters… and parallelism with our present world we live in.

See Movie Trailer

Click here to see LESSON PLAN based on the film