Thank you, Darnella Frazier. | deutsch29: Mercedes Schneider's Blog

Thank you, Darnella Frazier. | deutsch29: Mercedes Schneider's Blog

Thank you, Darnella Frazier.

After arriving home from school today, I turned on the television to learn that the jury in the Derek Chauvin trial had reached a verdict:

Guilty on all three counts in the death of George Floyd.

I thought of Darnella Frazier, the then-17-year-old who filmed Floyd’s death at the hands of Chauvin.

Darnella Frazier, a 17-year-old with a Smart phone doing what usually aggravates me as a teacher of high school students.

Those kids. Always on their phones. Reliant upon those phones and social media for everything.

Thank God for Darnella Frazier, who filmed a terrible incident and posted it to social media– and whose actions provided the ugly truth of those 10 minutes, placing it front and center for a country that cannot deny the video’s ugliness.

Thank God for Darnella Frazier, who helped our country make a critical, relief-laden shift toward the American Pledge of Liberty and Justice for All.

Thank you, Darnella.

Darnella Frazier

Thank you, Darnella Frazier. | deutsch29: Mercedes Schneider's Blog

How Teachers Handle the Death of George Floyd (Dan Levin) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

How Teachers Handle the Death of George Floyd (Dan Levin) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

How Teachers Handle the Death of George Floyd (Dan Levin)

Dan Levin writes for the New York Times. “He was a foreign correspondent covering Canada from 2016 until 2018. From 2008 to 2015, Mr. Levin was based in Beijing, where he reported on human rights, politics and culture in China and Asia. @globaldan“ This article appeared April 7, 2021.

At this point in the school year, Lacrissha Walton typically focuses her social studies lessons on the 50 U.S. states and their capitals. But last week, the Minneapolis teacher scrawled a question that had nothing to do with geography on her fourth-grade classroom’s whiteboard: “Have you watched the Derek Chauvin trial?”

While the murder trial of Mr. Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer charged with killing George Floyd, might not appear to be age-appropriate instruction for 9-year-old students, Ms. Walton said she felt compelled to use the event as a teachable moment. All of her students had seen their city consumed by protests in the months that followed Mr. Floyd’s fatal arrest, and some had seen the widely circulated video, filmed by a teenager, that captured his violent, slow-motion death.

“No little kid should watch that,” Ms. Walton said. “But when it’s plastered all over the news, they have questions.”

In Minneapolis, educators have grappled over the last few weeks with how to CONTINUE READING: How Teachers Handle the Death of George Floyd (Dan Levin) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice