Week One

The problem of common sense (Introduction; Kumashiro. (2009). Against Common Sense: Teaching and Learning Toward Social Justice, pp. XXIX – XLI).

Kumashiro in this article find himself questioning how oppressive common sense in school can be. He talks in this article about how the American system was deemed as a higher level of education to the one he worked in, in Nepal. His job there was to help Americanize their learning. At one point he talks about how the Peace Corps he worked for was about teaching them how to be more like 'us' as he refers to Americans and their system. This is completing degrading to their way and what they value he found out. But there is a lack of challenging the common sense as to why we teach this and 'this way' and not this Kumashiro experienced. Also, challenging student and teachers to think about that was very difficult as it was almost engrained. By doing this Kumashiro questioned it himself, and how it is in America, and how different minority groups receive different education and different things are questioned depending on the region and also, how oppressive it can be.

At times we will use the phrase, 'use your common sense', which actually means is: to view things how society has traditionally viewed things and wants to continue to view things. Kumashiro says when we look at education we need not use common sense for education and instead question it, dissect it and challenge it; especially do not let common sense shape education. This is a difficult task as these concepts go beyond the classroom and within society but a classroom is a good place to start the anti oppression.