A Voice for the Children in the Back Row

By Kathleen Robinson

Through these reflective episodes, the writer draws the reader into the real life of teachers who must move beyond the visible hopelessness and apathy that some students exhibit, and crack that veneer. In so doing, the teachers conjure up the potential that resides in those students. The narratives surrounding Ixora, John, Akeem and Victoria are developed against the backdrop of the evolution of the education system of the country. A Voice for the Children in the Back Row also represents the transformational process that the reflective educator undergoes. The author, Kathleen Robinson, has taken us along an episodic journey in order to arouse our consciousness and conscientiousness as educators. Our society needs texts like A Voice for the Children in the Back Row where the new teacher as well as the seasoned practitioner can identify with authentic experiences and see the hope that still exists in the midst of deep despair.

Lynette T. Noel, reading instructor, University of Trinidad and Tobago
Author, The Night Nopat was Left Out

In an examination-oriented, mass education system, where one size seldom fits all, the ubiquitous drive obsession almost - to complete the syllabus conspires to ensure that some passengers are ultimately left sitting disconsolately in the back row. To get to their destination they must, invariably, either take another taxi or walk. Kathleen Robinsons A Voice for the Children in the Back Row mirrors, in many ways, my own experience in the classroom for more than three decades. The gifted and the disadvantaged suffer equally as the teacher struggles, virtually on his own, to fulfill mainstream societal expectations. In A Voice for the Children in the Back Row, I find solace in the fact that this issue has been so well articulated and documented but more importantly, I feel a renewed sense of hope that, with this latest insightful presentation, some authorized institutional engineers will finally assume the mantle to oversee meaningful, coherent and sustainable change at the systemic level.

J.Baisden, educator

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 19, 2012
• ISBN: 9781469190891

Kathleen Robinson

Kathleen Robinson lives in Texas. Dominic is her first novel.

Book preview

Copyright © 2012 by Kathleen Robinson.

Library of Congress Control Number:             2012905557

ISBN:                      Hardcover                   978-1-4691-9088-4

ISBN:                      Softcover                     978-1-4691-9087-7

ISBN:                      Ebook                           978-1-4691-9089-1

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage

and retrieval system, without permission in writing from

the copyright owner.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

112554

Contents

A Voice For The Children In The Back Row

CAPSULE I

Episode 1:negotiating the security fences

Episode 2:venturing deeper into the psyche

Episode 3:taking root in an eclectic garden

CAPSULE II

Episode 1:upside-down embarrassment

Episode 2:student revolutionary

Episode 3:a history lesson

Episode 4:neutralizing my feelings

Episode 5:valedictorian

CAPSULE III

Episode 1:who?

Episode 2:driving to independence

Episode 3:a voice in the wilderness

CAPSULE IV

Episode 1:the game

Episode 2:training for the game

Episode 3:the imminent harvest

CONCLUSION

Persistent systemic issues

This book is dedicated to James, an educator,

par excellence who encouraged me to relate the

stories on behalf of all the marginalized students.

A Voice For The Children In The Back Row

The children who sit at the back of the class probably do so for any of three main reasons: (1) They are tall and for practical purposes go there voluntarily or are placed there by the teacher. (2) They are shy or lacking confidence and believe that they are less likely to have questions directed at them there. (3) They desire undisturbed freedom from the teacher—they form friendships where talking or surreptitious eating becomes a preferred activity, or they are the class bullies.

Some teachers readily detect these escape mechanisms and make every effort to ensure that no child is deprived of the requisite attention, while others simply limit their focus to those children who demonstrate the greatest willingness to learn. The children at the back of the class are often the ones with psychological scars and, if left unattended, further develop more scars of emotional neglect. In this narrative, the voice relates the story—in distinct episodes—of four different children, each within an almost ten-year span encountered along the pathway of pedagogical development.

The intention is simply to reinforce a connectivity among practicing teachers who continue to reach out to students that may otherwise be inadvertently overlooked despite the former’s training in pedagogy. After a few years, even the most dedicated practitioners experience occasional burnout or wash out. The author hopes that the real-life episodes contained herein will touch the hearts of such practitioners by rekindling the sparks they felt when they first walked down the aisle in graduation regalia, vowing to others and to themselves to make a difference.

The voice speaks variously through a graduate pupil-teacher during the period of the 1950s-1960s, an elementary teacher during the 1970s-1980s, and two secondary school teachers during the 1990s-2000s. Each episodic illumination juxtaposes the parapsychological situation of a particular child to a distinctive historical epoch anecdotally told of a fanciful paradise place in our global village. Teachers recall many stories, sometimes quite identical; therefore, the voice takes no responsibility for any peculiar resemblance to persons known to the readers.

CAPSULE I

1956-1959

THE CHILD IN THE BACK ROW

Children go to school and learn well.

—Dan Is the Man in the Van sung by

Slinger Francisco (Popular calypsonian,1963)

There is ah brown gyul in the ring, tralalala, and she looks like ah sugar and ah plum, plum. Girl show me your motion, tralalala…

That was her final year, 1959, in our school; she had blossomed and was now bravely showing her motion in the ring.

She was sent to the back of the class where there was room. The next term, in her new class, she chose the back seat. She had entered school during that last term—April to July 1956—the beginning of her new term did not reflect much change. I had assisted her former teacher and