Blog Post 13

Shane Koyczan: "To This Day ... for the bullied and beautiful," by: Tarcela Kohn

In this video by Shane Koyczan “To This Day… for the bullied and the beautiful,” he shares his own experiences in a beautiful poem. This video was very moving, funny, and relatable. The way he opens the floor with “I’ve been shot down so many times I get altitude sickness just from standing up for myself,” was just a part of his poetic journey in his video. Shane express that this is what we are told- “to stand for yourself, but it is hard to do if you don’t know who you are.” However, to do this, he explained that “we are expected to define ourselves at an early age, and if we don’t, others will do it for us.” Such as nerd, geek, and fatty just to name a few that Shane expressed.

Shane Koyczan goes on to explain his childhood. When Shane was a kid, he wanted to be a man, and he wanted to shave. However now that he is older, he does not want to shave as much. By the time he was eight, Shane had wanted to be a Marine Biologist and at nine, he saw the movie “Jaws,” and he said “No, thank you.” At ten years old, he was told that his parents did not want him, at 11 Shane just wanted to be alone, when he was 12 he wanted to die, at 13 he wanted to kill a kid, and at age 14 he was told to “seriously consider a career path.” Shane replied that he wanted to be a writer, and the response was “Choose something realistic.” So he answered “Professional wrestler,” again the response was “Don’t be stupid.” Shane explained a great point: “We were being told that we somehow must become what we are not, sacrificing what we are to inherit the masquerade of what we will be.” This statement was a beautiful analogy; and is true. We are dismissing children’s dreams, to tell them what they want to dream.

Shane said that “at the age of 15 poetry hit him like a boomerang; the one thing that he loved came back to him.” He remembers the first thing that he wrote “I hated myself for becoming the thing that I loathed: a bully.” This words from Shane: “Standing up for yourself doesn’t have to mean embracing violence,” are very positive and everyone can learn from his statement. Shane Koyczan, then delivers his poem of two kids, one a girl and the other him. The little girl was called names and made fun of only because she had a birthmark on her face. Shane expresses because he was adopted; he went to therapy and had a “personality made up of test and pills.” He was called a “popper,” and because of the cruelty he wanted to end his life and he tried to in the 10th grade. He explains that they are not the only kids that grow up this way being bullied , and that it still goes on today. Another great message that we can received from this video is “I want to tell them that all of this is just debris left over when we finally decide to smash all the things we thought we used to be, and if you can't see anything beautiful about yourself, get a better mirror, look a little closer, stare a little longer, because there's something inside you that made you keep trying despite everyone who told you to quit. You built a cast around your broken heart and sign it yourself. You signed it, They were wrong."

This video would be worth sharing with students to stop bullying and to show kids that are bullied that they are wanted, and there is something special about them!

Shukla Bose’s “Teaching one child at a time” by Katlyn Lusker

In Shukla Bose’s video "Teaching one child at a time" she tells the story of her Parikrma Humanity Foundation that is growing more and more each day. This foundation brings hope to the Indian slums by “looking past the daunting statistics and focusing on treating each child as an individual.” Shukla Bose began her speech in this video by explaining what led to her forming a foundation. She explained that they first walked through the slums of India. Of course, they could not go to all of them, but they tried to cover as many as they could. As they walked through the slums, they tried to identify houses where children would never go to school. They were excited about doing something, to bring them education, and then the numbers finally hit them. She said, “they’re 200 million children between ages 4-14 that should be going to school, but do not, they’re 100 million children who go to school but cannot read, and 125 million who cannot do basic mathematics.” Mrs. Bose also said that one in four teachers in India do not go to school the entire academic year. They have absent teachers, and that is harmful to children's learning. These numbers are overwhelming! She said it is hard not to get worried and scared about them, but instead they should and they want to focus on taking one child at a time. To make sure that child completes the circle of life.

The first Parikrma school was started in a slum where there were 70,000 people living below the poverty line. In this first school, they had 165 children attend. After six years, 4 schools, 1 junior college, and 1,100 children from 28 slums and four orphanages have developed. English was taught, and they adopted one of the best curriculum's possible. The curriculum is tough, some believe it is too tough, but the children actually do very well. Through this foundation, they have also started many programs for the children’s parents, as well. Many of the parents want to learn, and after-school programs have been developed just for them. They have started all kinds of programs just to make sure the kids come to school. Mrs. Shukla Bose started this thinking she wanted to transform the world, however, now she believes she is the one who has been transformed by the impact the children have played in her life. I have learned a lot from Mrs. Bose. She is very inspiring. Her dedication and commitment to helping these children is so moving. “Educating our poor is more than just a number game.” Instead of trying to reach as many children as possible, it may work so much better to help one child at a time, to make sure that what they are being taught is working and it is effective. Many children go to school, but not all of them learn.

Alison Gopnik “What do Babies think?” By: Jake Dukes
In the video "What do Babies think" by Alison Gopnik, she explains how babies think and how they learn. She explains how babies think as if you were in a new place and you're just trying to learn your surroundings for the first time. In an experiment that Alison conducted, she used broccoli and goldfish crackers on a 18 month old child. The first thing she did was ask the baby which one they wanted and of course they wanted the crackers. The next time she did the same experiment but then switched it up. She tried to fool the baby by acting as if the the broccoli was yummy by eating and saying that it tasted good. Then she ate the goldfish and acted as if they were gross and said that it didn’t taste good. This didn’t fool the baby she again asked which one they would like, but the baby still went back to the goldfish. By this experiment she found out that babies already know at 18 months old that not all people like that same things. Alison says that as babies grow, they try to figure out how things work and how the world works. Another experiment she did was done on a five year old boy. This experiment involves a child putting shapes together in a particular order to make a light come on inside of a box. One of the sides of the box was already lit up, to show how it is works. After a couple of tries the kid was able to turn the light on in the other box by just placing the objects through a series of trials.