Entry #2

Hello again,

I've been thinking hard over the last few days, unsure of what to write about in this entry. This last week, I've read empirical study after empirical study assessing the ways that poverty impacts literacy, and with so much information, it can be difficult to narrow down what's important. That being said, I've had one thought that's stuck out to me lately, and that is the question of why. Why do students who experience poverty tend to have a harder time in school? What is it exactly that hinders their success, and what in the world can we do about it? I think answering this question will help us broaden the way we think about students who experience poverty, and may provide some helpful insights.

Let me start by telling you a story.

When I was in elementary school, I struggled with reading. In first or second grade, our teacher gave each of us a "word box," a small plastic container with about 50 slips of paper inside. On these slips of paper were, you guessed it, words - a combination of simple pronouns and short words that we had to be able to recognize when we were reading. I hated that box with every fiber of my being. I remember, clear as day, sitting with my dad at the kitchen table practicing the words in that stupid box. He would hold up one for me to read, and I would stare it, knowing fully well that I had no idea what I was looking at. I felt stupid. I'd get frustrated and start crying while he patiently went over the word with me, and moved on to the next one. I had a really hard time, but despite my struggles, my parents helped me through it. Both of them motivated me to practice, they comforted me when I was frustrated, and they made me a better reader. But, what if I hadn't had their help? What if, when I came home from school, there was no one there to help me. What if my my parents couldn't read themselves, and when they tried to help, became frustrated and upset themselves? Would I be able to read today? Would I be in university, or be pursuing this career?

According to Fiester (2011), reading proficiently by the end of Grade 3 can "make-or-break" a child's educational development as it marks the turning point between "learning to read" and "reading to learn" (p. 9). This becomes even more complicated when a child experiences poverty. The relationship between poverty and academic challenges is often attributed to the structures of students' family lives, particularly "the extent to which parents read and engage their children cognitively", and their ability to assist children with schoolwork at home (Milner, 2013, p. 44). To make matters worse, poverty often means that a child's family is restricted in their ability to purchase "resources and goods, food, housing, and safe environments necessary for development" (Yoshikawa, 2012, p. 275). These influences can make an already challenging period of learning seem impossible — without access to food and home security, it's hard to make school a priority. 

My family! My sister is the red-headed kiddo, and
I'm the other, less adorable one.

If I'm honest, I've always thought of my childhood experience with reading as being kind of funny. After all, what's more paradoxical than an English teacher who at one point couldn't read? Now though, I don't know. Reading these statistics and studies has been something of a double-edged sword. On one hand, I understand the struggle. I remember it very well, I've seen it in the students I met during practicum, and I'm eager to learn how I can be of help. But, on the other, how could I possibly really understand it? My personal understanding happened over the span of, what, a year? Maybe two? Students who experience poverty usually struggle for their entire academic careers, so what do I know, if anything at all? The story just isn't as funny when it doesn't have a punchline.

Chances are, if my parents weren't around to help me learn to read before the "make-or-break" 3rd Grade, I wouldn't be able to read today, and  wouldn't be pursuing a teaching career. I can picture myself in Grade 1 sitting at the kitchen table, alone, stuttering and unable to decipher the words in that dumb box, but if we're being realistic, that's a likely scenario for children experiencing poverty. Those children's parents are at work, doing their best to pay their bills and keep food in the fridge, and try as they might to help their kids with getting their schoolwork done, making ends meet is just more important. Plain and simple.  

I'm throwing a lot of information at you, I know, but there's a lot to think about here, because while I've been talking mostly about literacy and poverty for young children, the research I'm focusing on this summer is about high school students. There's been plenty of research assessing poverty's influence on elementary students' academic achievement, as I've laid out, but there is very little that examines how poverty impacts the learning achievement of high school adolescents, particularly those who have been struggling to read and write proficiently for more than 10 years. I don't think that's fair, because when I think about high school and how much I hated it (and trust me, I hated high school with great passion), I can't even begin to imagine how much worse it would have been to sit through if I wasn't about to read and write proficiently. So, why don't we know more about helping adolescents who struggle to read? Why don't we have more strategies for helping high school students who experience poverty? What do those students need in their classrooms, and what do they value about their educational journey? What's the keystone to their success?

My hope is that by thinking about the question of why, we can be better people, and better teachers. It's so easy to make assumptions, and shrug off the things that make us uncomfortable, but that's not the way to help our students. "Then what is the way, fearless leader?" In my non-expert opinion, one of the best things we can do is simply be cognizant. We need to remember that not all students are as blessed as I was to have parents at home who could help me, or have the resources to teach themselves. It's not the fault of these students for lacking those resources, and it's not their parents' fault either. It's no one's fault. Living in poverty is complex, unimaginably difficult, and different for everyone who experiences it. To assume that the inability to read or write is about laziness or stupidity isn't fair, and it isn't supported by research literature (for all you skeptics out there), so I think it's time we all think long and hard about what we can do to be a little more open-minded, a little more aware of our surroundings, and a little more reflective about our own privilege.  

If you've made it this far through my ramblings, thank you for sticking around! Though this blogging thing is fairly new, I'm having a lot of fun writing it. If I could ask anything of you wonderful people, it's you drop a comment or start a discussion - part of the purpose of this blog is to engage with other B. Ed students and teachers about the subject, and I want to chat with you anyway! I've also started an Instagram (savannah_research) and Twitter (@savsresearch), as another way to get the word out. Please, comment, follow, ask me anything!

Until next time,

Savannah MacDonald

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Fiester, L. (2010). Early Warning! Why Reading by the End of Third Grade Matters. KIDS COUNT Special Report. Annie E. Casey Foundation.

Milner IV, H. R. (2013). Analyzing poverty, learning, and teaching through a critical race theory lens. Review of Research in Education, 37(1), 1-53.

Yoshikawa, H., Aber, J. L., & Beardslee, W. R. (2012). The effects of poverty on the mental, emotional, and behavioral health of children and youth: implications for prevention. American Psychologist, 67(4), 272.