What is social justice? I asked the same question after reading an article that I had to base this post off of. Dictionary.com states that social justice is "the distribution of advantages and disadvantages within a society." Wikipedia defines it as "the concept of a society in which justice is achieved in every aspect of society, rather than merely the administration of law. It is generally thought of as a world which affords individuals and groups fair treatment and an impartial share of the benefits of society. It can also refer to the distribution of advantages and disadvantages within a society."
In the article Teaching for Social Justice, a 30-year veteran of teaching describes ways to incooperate social justice and make it successful in the classroom. Mr. Kohl points out a fact that many people, children and adults, all share and that is that they do not believe justice is worth fighting for. He goes on to say society values personal gain over compassion and the communal good. I tend to agree with this statement because especially in these horrid economic times, people are watching out for themselves and no one else these days.
Everyone is watching what they say or do in fear they are going to be the next victim of a layoff, but Kohl suggests to not just teach something because a textbook, or person says to teach it, and if you have to teach a certain topic to develop a alternative way of teaching to fit your satisfaction. Teaching does not just mean standing in the front of the classroom and reviewing information but to actually engage your students and learn how to teach well so that your teaching reaches out to each student, not just a select few.
This is the first I've heard about social justice in the classroom, so I was wondering if anything had been done to ensure that social justice is being incorporated in new and existing teachers classrooms. One article I found ensured that it was, but it was facing some resistance. A study showed that some college students would put little effort into a social justice class and that they would interupt the classroom. This is partly due to the preconceived notions that students have about social justice becuase of the way their teachers have delievered certain material where they would send messages to students about "who was to blame" for society's inequality. Since this is what students have been taught they are reluctant to be the ones to offer up a way to change the inequalities.
I think social justice is going to be an important part of education because the finger pointing can only go so far. So what if you have found the supposed cause of the problem? What are you going to do to fix it and make it better for generations to come? This is what social justice is being implemented for and for it to be effective, educators should take it on with little resistance.
