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LONG TONE
GARY This is just kind of studio recording, so we'll just um, keep it rolling. Um,
maybe I should start out, um, where did you meet Lettie Battle and um, ah what were
some of your first impressions of her and how did your um, relationship develop wi-
what, what brought the two of you together into discussion and wh- if you're - when
you're answering these things if you can generally give me, sort of fold back the, the
names and places and things so that if I ask you about Lettie Battle, you can say I met
Lettie Battle at, so that ah, y-you will help me introduce them, as well on the film.
LORNA Okay. I met Lettie Battle in Washi- no, I met Lettie Battle in ah, Jerusalem,
Israel in the summer of 1992. Um, we attended ah, the International Association of
Cognitive Education and um, I, that's where I first met her and had some opportunities
to um, talk with her about her work in Washington and I think it was probably in that
week, that um, in early July, that um, I was hearing some stories about ah, about the
students she was working with in, at the Options School in Washington, D.C. And alot
of the things that she was telling me, um, or sa- um, were um - The stories were very
similar ah, to other students that she was working with, to the ones that, that I work with
in Vancouver and in other parts of British Columbia.
I think o- probably the main um, where we were coming from, which I think
is different from where other people are coming from and that is um, what
is foremost in our minds is to be able to work with um, with our students
um, so that they would be perceived differently by themselves and by
other teachers and other people who are involved with them, because I
think for African-Americans, the we- the students she was working with
and for my students, the First Nations students, our students are always
perceived as though they're not able, they're not capable of um, of
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demanding academic work and so that the institution of education, itself
then um, makes students believe that they're not able and so that they, so
that they begin, then, to tune out.
The other thing is that our students are in - another way that they're similar
is that for, for our students, they de- they develop really strong survival
skills to survive on the street, to survive in um, in homes that are, that are
not always safe and home situations that are not always safe and so they
develop all of these skills outside of school but when they come to school,
because schools tends to devalue the skills that they develop on the street
as being not the skills that are ne- required for school, that um, so that it
gets left outside and they come into the school and and there's um - and if
they look like they don't have any skills, but it's because the school is not
allowing them to bring what they ha- what the, their ability from outside,
inside.
So, for example, on the street today, they learn really um, they have really
highly developed problem solving skills. They have really highly
developed um, ah, decision making ability. They have - they can plan,
they can organize, they can analyze situations, they can in- um, they can
interpret um, situations, they can think hypothetically, they can think
inferentially. So all of those are, are ones that w-we say that we're trying
to teach in school, but yet we don't allow students who learn those on the
street to bring them into the school.
GARY Could you give me ah, an example of the um, the kinds of things that kids
are doing on the street that would have some of those qualities and sort of point out as
you do, where they're using those kinds of skills, so people can see this clearly. I think
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it's a really in-interesting, kind of important point. Um, hang on just a sec, um.
I'll just take a head slate on this one. D-does that ah, a good question?
[Lorna: Uh huh.] Okay.
[off-mic discussion]
Beep. Head slate no: 278
beep.
LORNA For example, um, say a child is um, I'll use ah, an example from one of
our, from one of our students. Um, in Vancouver, one of the students who was in one of
my instrumental enrichment classes, at um, when I read this boy's um, school reports,
they concentrated on his lack of ability to pay attention, his lack of ability to focus, his
um, and that he was coming to school every day really tired and um, and often late and
that he was passive, that he'd very seldom engaged in um, interaction with ah, with ah,
his classmates and his teacher. And so basically what they were saying was if there
was, that there were so many things that were not right about this student that um, and
that he's had so many um, deficiencies that um, it was impossible, in a way, to teach
him in the- in this, in the school setting.
But um, as I got to know him I realized that um, I found out and this - It
took me, it must have been two or three months for me to find out why he
was coming to school in this way. And so, I um, and over the next few
months I found out that um, the times that he was late were the times
when his father, who was a longshoreman, um, went on a binge. And um,
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a during pay- ah, usually tra- during, you know, when he would get his
pay. And so this, this young man who was fifteen would take over his, his
dad's job as a longshoreman and he'd work for most of the night. He'd go
home and um, and have a couple of hours sleep, and then he'd get up and
get his ah, seven siblings ready for school and he'd bring them to - feed
them - bring them to school, then he'd come to school.
And so, in order for somebody to be able to do that, he would need all of
those, those ah, those skills that I said that he'd need. He'd had incredible
organizational ability. He had an ability to plan because he had to plan
that, his time really well. He had to um, plan um, schedules so that um, so
that his siblings would be cared for and so he took over adult
responsibilities and yet, none of those skills were ones that um, that
showed up in the schools, and those are the exact same skills that, that
one needs in order to be able to um, to do the tasks that are required
from, from school subject to learning.
And um, so, instrumental enrichment helps us to do that. It helps us to be
able to have students call from their own abilities that they've developed
and to see how they're related to, to the ones that are necessary in order
to be successful at school, because it's often thought that for these
children, because of their life situations, that life in the school and life for
them outside of the school, are entirely um, separate and that there, that
one is not relevant to the other and so instrumental enrichment in the
process of bridging and developing um, the ability to reflect on and to
generalize what is being learned so that you can see how it relates to
many situations.
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GARY Why is it that there's such a gap for one group of kids and not for another?
Why for this group of kids is there such a gap?
LORNA I'd just like to tell one more story [Gary: Yeah, just -] and then I think that
will illustrate, probably will lead into that.
GARY Okay, this is gonna be about a, a story about a kid? [Lorna: Yeah.] Okay,
let's r-roll on this. Could we take another head slate, please?
[off-mic discussion]
Beep. Head slate no. 279
LETTIE This one is an- is separate from instrumental enrichment but I think it
might be even a better story. Um, there was um, a number of years ago, it must have
been, now, about six years ago, and um, I was quite new, um, quite new to my job and I
didn't really have an experience of having to deal with children who survive on the
street. Anyway, we, we began to experiment um, with um, with some programs in the,
in from one of our pr- one of our alternate education programs, and this alternate ca-
education program deals with kids who really are street-smart and um, I had found out
that um, children as young as um nine years old were basically living on the street or
they lived on the street for, for um, for time, for you know, certain times, not fully, but
sometimes they would be out there for say, from um May 'til October.
And so we began to try to find ways in which we could reconnect alot of
those kids back to the school because once they've had the freedom of
living on the street and adults are perceived to be, in a way, the enemy,
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and um, so they don't um - they have a very difficult time with adult
authority and um, so, in order for a child to live that long in, on the street,
they have to be able to organize and to plan. And there was this one boy
who -
GARY C-can you hold just there? I just ran out of film, so I just want to -
Beep. Slate no: 280
There was a boy who was um, we were working with um, trying out some
new ideas of how to draw street kids back towards the school and so we
developed a program where a child care worker went out and um, and did,
we um, and began to work with some boys. And so this one day they
were gonna go out for, I think it was to go roller skating. He was going to
take him out roller skating and they had agreed to meet um, at a certain
place um, downtown and um, so he got there with the van and five of the
boys were there and so he waited for a while and he thought in his head,
well, this - the last one I guess isn't gonna show up.
And then the boys who were waiting said, no, just wait, um, he'll be
coming along pretty soon, and so he was um, so he was waiting and
waiting and then he saw, then he saw the boy that they were waiting for
and he came into his view and um, on a bicycle, and he went and then all
of a sudden he appeared again and he didn't have a bi- the bicycle and he
ran across this field to where the woman was waiting at a picnic table, and
she was sitting there and he, he went over and he gave her something
and so then he, ah, so this child care worker asked, you know, what um,
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what do you think he's doing? And um, one of the other, one of the other
boys told him that um, that he was stealing a- he had stolen a bicycle and
that he had um, and he went to sell the bicycle so he could buy drugs for
his mom. And um, and so he went o- and so that was what he was
bringing to his mom.
And um, I mean, this kid is ten years old and so, when you will hear a
story like that, you think about the wrong thing that is happening, that this
boy is stealing, that he's getting drugs and the horrible way that this
mother is behaving in that she's relying on her son to get her drugs, but
we never think about all the things that this child already has, has to know,
some really highly developed um, problem solving skills, to do all those
things that he had to do to care for his mother.
And so we, in the schools, in our righteous way, we don't think about all of
those, and so then we think, well, you know, those are all illegal acts, um,
against society's rules and therefore they can't come into the school and
so we, we then devise really, we devise ways of never having, giving
children an opportunity to begin to appreciate what they do know and what
they're able to do. Uh huh, it's -
GARY And if you, if you do recognize those things and you bring that knowledge
into the classroom with the kid, then what happens?
LORNA Uh huh. [cough] Well it works, um, well they bring it into the classroom
and we bring it in and I guess instrumental enrichment gives us a vehicle to bring it in
and, and so that the student knows that they have the ability, they have the capacity to
be able to um, to do school, that it, that they're not um, mutually exclusive parts of his
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life.
GARY So if the kid has this ability [Lorna: Uh huh.] out on the street [Lorna: Uh
huh.] why don't they have it in the classroom? How come they don't know it there?
LORNA Because they're never al- never allowed to bring it in. They don't, they
can't, they don't use it for say, um, they don't, they think that they need to le- that those
are the ability to survive on the street and they're not the what they need in order to be
able to say, do um, um, lessons in, in um, mathematics or um, because they way that
we teach mathematics is um, is that we cut it off from somebody's experience and we
can learn things in ah, an abstract way, in a way that's representationally
representational but in order for us to be able to do that we need to be able to help
students to see that what they've, the, what they can take from their street reality can
be, can be, the principles are very similar to what they're learning in school subjects,
and so, um -
And in schools, the teacher is i- is the one in control of the, of what is to be
learned and the teacher is in control of how things are going to be learned
and they, they very seldom um, illicit from the student how that student
um, is relating to the world, 'kay so they don't bring their re- their reality
into a situation. And the way that we learn is when we can see a direct
connection to what we already know to something that is new, 'kay so, if
the teacher do- leaves that re- reality out there, then they're not helping
students to make that connection. Uh huh.
GARY Kids seem to be able to learn without making that connection each time.
Is it ah - [Lorna: Um.] I mean, I, I guess alot of people would think, well, I mean you,
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you can't make every problem in math relevant to something; truly math is a subject in
itself.
LORNA And I'm not saying that it's relevant. I'm not saying, like, one of the things
that people ha- people tend to do in a very paternalistic way, is they say, okay, so we're
gonna, we'll, I'll set up my math problem then, so that I can say that um, somebody had
to steal one bike and how - so therefore how much ah, dope are they gonna be able to
buy, okay, so that's not the relevancy that um, that we want, it's that um, it's, it's um,
what we're wanting to be able to do is to um - hm, how am I gonna say this?
So, the teacher doesn't have to know, but they have to set up the situation
so that they make it safe and acceptable and valuable for students to say,
to be able to bring their experience into the classroom, so that the student,
also, isn- is a participate and in control of the way that they understand
new information based on what they already know.
The way that schools have been set up, they've been set up so that um -
GARY Could you start that thought again? [Lorna: What?] Start the way the
schools have been set up, I just - [Lorna: The - what, why?] I'm sorry, I, I just started
the camera running, there - I I started to interrupt you; do it again.
LORNA The way that schools have been set up is that it acknowledges the way
that people um, that where there's a match between a way a person is brought up, a
way a child is brought up in a home, who- say, where um, there are two parents, where
the- where they, the family is engaged in, in evolving and developing a body of
knowledge within that child, there have lots of opportunities, so there's a match between
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the way that the child has learned to perceive the world and the way the classrooms in
schools are set up, okay? So it works, there. So you don't need then, to um, to pay
attention to um, to thinking about the, the experiences of this child, because that's
already built in.
But when you are working with a group of students who are different in a
major way, um, like where there's a real difference in world view, where
there's a real differ- there's a difference in language, there's a difference in
the way in which people um, share knowledge, there's a difference in the
way that people um, um, regulate and control behaviour, there's a
difference in the way that a child begins to evolve and develop um, an
identity. Like, when those are really different, then it's m- it's important for
a teacher to have the ability to be able to bring that experience into the
classroom.
So, not one person, if you're working with say, twenty-five kids, you can
sa- people then can say, well, you know, how can I, one person, one adult,
um, be - how can I possibly learn and know all the, the cultures of those
twenty-five kids and because, you see, they're thinking about it in terms of
I'm in control, me, adult teacher, I, I'm in control of what's - of the
knowledge in this room. 'Kay, so when you turn it over and you say that,
that m- I teacher and all of those twenty-five bo- their bodies are in control
and in charge of their knowledge and that those are, are - we're gonna use
that knowledge to learn something together and so that there's more of
um, um, there's more collaboration and it, and it demands a respect by the
adult for what the children, for the knowledge the children have.
GARY And can you bring this home for me, and talk - [cough] ...running here just
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talking -
[off-mic discussion]
Beep. Tail slate no: 280
GARY ...um, the um, you were talking about how some children really are
different from those who are raised in those two parent families. They have really
different experiences and could you then just bring that home? How, how does that
apply to the children that you and Lettie work with, then?
LORNA Well, the children that Lettie and I work with um, um, they, they, it, their
knowledge is never um, is, is very seldom if ever, um, acknowledged and it's not
acknowledged for a number of reasons. One, is which I talked about already, is that
um, is that their, that these children live on the street, or they live part-time on the street,
or they li- or they engage in illegal activity or they might engage in um, in all kind of
activities that, that um, that usually in the classroom people, the teachers don't have that
kind of - The- they don't live that kind of experience. 'Kay, so that sets them apart.
So, two things sets them apart, because the teacher doesn't exper-
doesn't have any experience with that, secondly, they think well, um, those
children are bad or they come from bad families or bad home situations,
dysfunctional situations and therefore I can't do anything with this child
unless they're fixed out there. 'Kay, so that sets them apart.
And the, the other, I think for what I've talked, um, had discussions with
Lettie and with other um, with other teachers of African-American youth,
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the other thing that I- I'm looking at the history of African-American people
in the United States and the history of aboriginal people, both in the United
States and in Canada. There is another ar- way in which, I think we share
something in common and that is that um, that there has been, there is an
ingrained belief on the part of the educational institution that our children
are not able and that they're not able because we are not as intelligent.
So, when we came into this world, we were born with less intelligence and
people um, in a way, they say that in jest, today, but it's been a belief that's
been there for many, many generations, now and so that if a child, then, is
perceived, even if it's not in the foremost part of a teacher's mind, the child
is perceived as not being able, then I'm not going to invest the same
amount of time and energy in being able to work with that child in the
classroom.
Secondly, um, that because um - Another area I guess that we're, that
there is some commonality is that um, um, is that, I think in both countries
the- where, that our children are not valuable. They're not valued in
society, and um, and that we're, somehow we're, we're disposable, that,
that society can, you know, can just throw us away and I think that that's
another thing. So, if that's what, if that's the, the way that peop- that
children are perceived, then, again, you don't need to invest as much time
and energy into um, meeting their needs, um, educationally.
GARY Can I ask you what kind of evidence that you've experienced ah, of that
kind of attitude, whether it's what people say or what you see happening to children?
LORNA Oh, there're so many examples of it. Um, okay, um. I guess evi- the
evidence of it is that up until very recently um,
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[off-mic discussion]
LORNA Um, when - I think I wanna start a little bit, probably before that. [Gary:
Sure.] Um. When we were in school, um, my brothers and my sisters and our, and our
friends and members of our, our community, when we um, were - before, before we left
our home, before we left our community to go to the public school, we used to have long
conversations about what it was that um, that um, you know, that people want - what
people -we talked about what people planned for their future. They - and um, our house
was um, a meeting place and so alot of young people um, our friends used to meet
there and um, and they, and alot of them, them - alot of the times they spent alot of, alot
of their time outside on the land doing alot of things that um, that our parents and their
parents did um, but at the same time um, we were going to school and I gu- I think that
we were the generation that was probably the first ones to enter public schools in this
area and um, and I remember the conversations although we really spent alot of time in
a traditional lifestyle, but we also knew that we were the ones who were going to have
to really adapt to Euro-Canadian society and as far back as I can remember, my friends
um, ah, had aspirations that they were finding, or we were finding ways in which we
could ah, adapt to a very different lifestyle than our parents and that we felt that we
were able to do that and um, um -
And when our generation went on, then, to public school after grade eight,
I was - I went away - I wa- um, for two years. And when I came back to
school, to high school, with um, with these friends that I grew up with um,
none of them were on a path that would lead toward the making - fulfilling
what their aspirations were. And some of those aspirations were that ah,
to um, you know, to go on to university to study um, to study medicine, to
study um, engineering, to study forest management and so um, and it, and
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it, and so it was quite broad and yet, when I came back not one of them
was then, if it, if it meant college or university, would have been able to do
that because they were streamed into um, general programs. 'Cause I
remember yesterday I was telling you about the - us not um, that only two
people being above the mentally retarded range, and so this justified ah,
placing all of these people on um, a vocational track.
And so there I saw my friends um, put alot of energy into, into physical
sports because the door had closed on them and they knew that it had
closed. And um, and s- and I remember one year that, that um, we were
given some tests and from those tests, in the high school, we were further
streamed and so that um, so that what the stu- the students were learning,
our group was learning, or um, were classes that were not challenging,
were classes in which um, it wa- you know, they weren't really important.
They were modified programs. And -
[off-mic discussion]
Beep. Tail slate no: 281
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Production material centres around an interview conducted with Lorna Wanosts’a7 Williams at the home of Tsínay̓a7 (Georgina Nelson).
In tape 1, Wanosts’a7 talks about meeting Lettie Battle and the parallels between Battle’s work with African American youth and her own with Indigenous youth; using instrumental enrichment to help struggling students apply, recognize, and value knowledge that they have that is seldom acknowledged in classroom settings; and societal biases against indigenous peoples and other marginalized groups about their inherit cognitive abilities.
Tape 2 is unavailable. While the Archives retains the tape intended to have this content, identified as 2017-057-003-017, it appears to have been altered prior to being transferred to the Archives and thus no longer contain this segment of the interview. The content of the missing segments can be found by consulting the audio transcripts.
In tape 3, Wanosts’a7 talks about language immersion and language acquisition in children in relation to the revitalization of the Líl̓wat language, Ucwalmícwts; her initial reaction to Reuven Feuerstein’s work, particularly his characterization of cultural deprivation and its applicability to the Lil̓wat7úl; the effects of racism and prejudice on how Indigenous peoples value themselves and their culture; and mediated learning experience.
In tape 4, Wanosts’a7 talks about instrumental enrichment teaching; Feuerstein’s cognitive functions; her experience working with Indigenous youth in the Vancouver School District; Feuerstein’s Learning Potential Assessment Device; and David Tzuriel.
In tape 5, Wanosts’a7 talks about the role of parents and their beliefs in shaping the education of their children; and her experience visiting the Neve Carmel caravan in Haifa, Israel.
The filmed segments of the interview run from 07:00 on tape 1, and continue until 06:10 on tape 5.
Additional sequences can be found proceeding and following the interview, including Albert and Levi Nelson doing early morning chores, as well as other scenes around the Nelson farm; and scenes of a cemetery with closeups of the graves of Joseph Lester and George Williams.
