Most people do not enjoy filling out an application. There are all these questions which are redundant: name, previous employment, references, race, etc.

Race?

What is race? It's a verb when teaching language arts. I have never thought about it before reading and examining my own views, thoughts, and experiences.

How do I treat my African American students? Do I respect that they come from a different background from me? Do I try to incorporate their own background experiences into my classroom? How do I relate what they know to the current curriculum?

I think that without knowing it, I have done many of these things although I've been ostracised for it. I've taken students home and to church. I've take them out to eat at Red Lobster and Oliver Garden. I've spoken with them candidly about issues in life. One of the most important things that a curriculum coordinator told me after my first year teaching was that the students had to feel that I was on their side and that I really cared about them and understood where they came from and their neighborhood.

I drove through the projects. I stopped and talked to them. I went by the visit them when they were not at school. I bought them shirts, shoes, pantyhose, and ties for church. I was tough, but I loved them all.

This year, some of my favorite students graduated from high school. It was a graduating class where I had taught at least 85% and had been rather mean and tough with them. I loved them so much and have spoken of them often over the years. I went to the rehearsal and walked and they called out my name and came to hug me. I could not believe that those short seventh graders where now taller than me and loved me enough to step out of line to hug me. I made many of them want to cry. That's what a true teacher of African Americans does.

He/she is a mother. They are taught but the students realize the teacher cares about them. They may hate the teacher when they are in the classroom, but many years down the line they will tell you how much they love you.

African American students truly have a rich culture that is under developed in our classrooms. We, as educators, need to look at them as individuals who may never be 'assimilated' into mainstream 'white' culture.

Why should they? White children who spike their hair, have multiple tattoos, or piercing in places that are deemed inappropriate are said to be 'expressing themselves' and it is violation of their rights to tell them or treat them differently. Yet a student with braids or a hair cut that has designs in it is called ghetto or discouraged in our schools and mainstream culture.

"What Does Culture Mean" and "Seeing Culture not Color" are powerful chapters.

I know that I see color when I go to school. We all do. If we say that we don't see color we are lying to ourselves. What we need to do is see the color and respect the differences. Learn about the students and bring their previous knowledge into the classroom. Make them feel as if they are teaching the class, as well as learning. Encourage classroom discussions and utilize wait time, that means they are thinking.

Janet Jackson has a line someone on the album, "Rhythm Nation" where she says that we are all the same in the darkness and that only the light shows us we are different. How beautiful to see the difference in our cultures (even within our own race), embrace them, and learn from them.

In my opinion, African Americans have a rich culture that can only enhance a teacher's educational experiences.