Black Ants and Buddhists
Thinking Critically and Teaching Differently in the Primary Grades
Mary CowheyIf you were inspired to become a teacher because you wanted to change the world, and instead find yourself limited by teach-to-the-test pressures, Black Ants and Buddhists will make you think. Mary Cowhey gives readers insight into her Peace Class in Northampton, MA, where first and second graders view the entire curriculum through the framework of understanding the world, and trying to do their part to make it a better place. Her students learn to make connections between their lives, the books they read, and the larger world.
Black Ants and Buddhists received a 2007 Skipping Stones Honor Award.
Foreword by Sonia Nieto
Product Details
- Author: Mary Cowhey
- Year: 2006
- Grade Range: K-3
- Media: 256 pp/paper
- ISBN: 978-157110-418-2
- Item No.: WSB-0418
What would a classroom look like if understanding and respecting differences in race, culture, beliefs, and opinions were at its heart? Welcome to Mary Cowhey's Peace Class in Northampton, MA, where first and second graders view the entire curriculum through the framework of understanding the world, and trying to do their part to make it a better place.
Woven through the book is Mary's unflinching and humorous account of her own roots in a struggling large Irish Catholic family and her early career as a community activist. Mary's teaching is infused with lessons of her heroes: Gandhi, Eleanor Roosevelt, Helen Keller, Martin Luther King, and others. Her students learn to make connections between their lives, the books they read, the community leaders they meet, and the larger world.
If you were inspired to become a teacher because you wanted to change the world, and instead find yourself limited by teach-to-the-test pressures, this is the book that will make you think hard about how you spend your time with students. It offers no easy answers, just a wealth of insight into the challenges of helping students think critically about the world, and starting points for conversations about diversity and controversy in your classroom, as well as in the larger community.
Table of Contents
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Contents
Foreword by Sonia Nieto
Acknowledgments
Prologue
1. Introduction
2. Compassion, Action, and Change
3. Routines: A Day in the Life of the Peace Class
4. It Takes a Village to Teach First Grade
5. Talking About Peace
6. Learning Through Activism
7. Teaching History So Children Will Care
8. Nurturing History Detectives
9. Seeing Ourselves and Our Families Through Students' Eyes
10. Responding When Tragedy Enters the Classroom
11. Building Trust with Families and Weathering Controversy
12. Going Against the Grain
Afterword: "Take This Hammer"
Appendix
References
Mary Cowhey
Mary Cowhey has been teaching first and second grade at Jackson St. School in Northampton, MA for nine years.
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