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A review by chloekg
Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy by Gholdy Muhammad
4.0
Overall, I'm jazzed about this book and its lens for the classroom. Simple but shocking is the idea, "Who do you become when you can rely on the power of the word?" Malcolm X was a powerful man, but not because of his ideas. Many folks hold the same ideas. Malcolm was a powerful man for his ideas and his capacity to speak the power of those ideas. Dr. Muhammad's framework asks us to teach skills, but mostly to teach children. Argumentation is a good skill. Yes. Criticality is a good skill. Yes. Basic fluency and word recognition are good skills. Yes. But why? These literary skills are not practiced for mastery or test scores, but so young people can see themselves with love and the world with criticality. It is a goal that speaks to my inner teen, and one that humanizes the classroom.
But, as always in education theory, how do we get there from here?
The two major problems were lack of concrete steps for implementing the ideas and "what about the standards?" There is an okay set of questions for finding good texts (if they are out there/affordable).
There are no guides for how to create the group literary practice. "Teach them to be critical" is easier said than done. There are no recommendations for how to teach rhetoric, debate, close reading, and researching/analyzing context.
Even if I succeed in those aims, a flourishing criticality might detract from "remembering and manipulating specific vocabulary words that are not relevant to you life but will be on a state exam."
My students already know that the system does not want powerful, brilliant "historically disenfranchised" youth to demand their due rights. As such, Cultivating Genius is a difficult text to implement in a data-obsessed world. She asks us to teach beyond the sanctioned norms. She asks administrators to question their "support for equity" while still demanding test scores take priority. The bureaucracy is stacked against our young people.
That observation brings the most compelling takeaway. This book is almost more history than education. It help me see a larger sense of history, and yes, standardized exams are a new Jim Crow. I am encouraged and emboldened by this book to try something different, something that might actually help my students. It's going to take time, but I think it will be fun. As a text, the publishers probably added more than necessary and made it repetitive, but it's slim enough to be good and well interspersed with quotes, context, and images of our recent history.
But, as always in education theory, how do we get there from here?
The two major problems were lack of concrete steps for implementing the ideas and "what about the standards?" There is an okay set of questions for finding good texts (if they are out there/affordable).
There are no guides for how to create the group literary practice. "Teach them to be critical" is easier said than done. There are no recommendations for how to teach rhetoric, debate, close reading, and researching/analyzing context.
Even if I succeed in those aims, a flourishing criticality might detract from "remembering and manipulating specific vocabulary words that are not relevant to you life but will be on a state exam."
My students already know that the system does not want powerful, brilliant "historically disenfranchised" youth to demand their due rights. As such, Cultivating Genius is a difficult text to implement in a data-obsessed world. She asks us to teach beyond the sanctioned norms. She asks administrators to question their "support for equity" while still demanding test scores take priority. The bureaucracy is stacked against our young people.
That observation brings the most compelling takeaway. This book is almost more history than education. It help me see a larger sense of history, and yes, standardized exams are a new Jim Crow. I am encouraged and emboldened by this book to try something different, something that might actually help my students. It's going to take time, but I think it will be fun. As a text, the publishers probably added more than necessary and made it repetitive, but it's slim enough to be good and well interspersed with quotes, context, and images of our recent history.