It's Never as Simple as Black and White

Patty Tucker

In 2001 at the age of 44 I left my job as a Physical Education Director at a private school in a city of 60,000 and moved to a rural area in the mountains of Western Maine to teach Physical Education and Health at the elementary level. This particular district is made up of five towns and with five elementary schools. Four of the schools house grades K-6 and the largest school houses grades K-7. I teach Physical Education to all the grades and teach Health to grades 5 – 7.

I am the only health teacher at this particular level and since the health teacher I was replacing mainly played cooperative games for health, I was given the opportunity to write my own curriculum. The first things that I made clear to my administrators and coworkers was that health class would be an academic class, not an extra physical education class. There was some resistance from a few of my peers; however, the administration was aware their schools were not meeting state mandated standards and were very receptive to getting a health curriculum on board.

When I accepted this teaching position I decided to sell my house and move into my new school district. When the Maine State Slogan of “The Way Life Should Be” was written, they must have been thinking about the area in which I was moving. There are mountains, lakes, ponds, hiking, fishing, and wonderful bicycling terrain. I was 2 ½ hours from Boston, 45 minutes from Portland, and 25 minutes from North Conway, New Hampshire. To me it didn’t get any better than this. Friends in Portland couldn’t believe I was moving “way out there”. To me it was more like going back in time. No fast food restaurants, no 24 hour corner stores, no traffic lights, no condominiums and no apartment complexes. It was peaceful, friendly, and people didn’t seem like they were quite so frazzled and in such a hurry.

I was warned that the “people out there” are closed minded and not very welcoming to new folks, especially those with a different “lifestyle” (I’m gay). Well, being a bullheaded Yankee with Scotch Irish blood, I ignored their warnings, hired a moving company and left the big city behind. I felt like the character on 60’s show “Green Acres.” Goodbye city life!

My gut feelings about those warnings were right - this was a welcoming community. The greeting I got from most of the teachers was humorous. We are glad the system has hired an experienced teacher but what the hell made you want to move way out here! When I told them I had always wanted to live in this area, they welcomed me with open arms.

I immediately wrote a comprehensive health curriculum that included lessons on growth and development in grades 4, 5 & 6. In grade 7 the curriculum covers teen dating, alcohol, drugs, and sexually transmitted diseases. In the old days we called growth and development “sex education” and that was actually very accurate. I guess with the times growth and development is more politically correct and it brings some peace of mind to the parents.

Health education is an important part of our school curriculum. Many parents are concerned that children are learning about their bodies at too young of an age. As a health educator who teaches sex education I have often faced parents who are upset with what we offer their children in school. It is interesting, however, that most of these parents DO NOT show up to information nights offered by the district. During those information sessions we put out our curriculum, lesson plans, materials and video’s for preview.

A very important part of my health unit is a lesson on prejudging and prejudice. During a brainstorming session with 5th graders we list all the different groups of people who are prejudged in our society. We talk about how name calling is a form of prejudice and that one can’t sit by and listen to another name calling without stepping in and telling them that it is wrong.

During my second year, I was finishing up at one school and would soon start traveling to another elementary school to present the health curriculum to the students there. I was contacted by the 5th grade teacher at my next school as well as the guidance counselor, asking me to start with my lesson on prejudice. It seems that some of the boys at lunch and on the playground were calling each other fag. It had started as an occasional thing but was now occurring regularly. The boys had been spoken to by their teacher but the name calling continued. This in itself was upsetting but to add insult to injury, one of the girls in the class has a father who is gay. This girl took things very literally and every time her classmates used the word fag, she would personalize it. She lived with her mother, and although her father was involved in her life, he wasn’t involved in this community or school. No one outside of her family’s immediate circle of friends knew her dad was gay and at this point in her life, she wasn’t ready to tell her classmates.

The day came for me to teach my lesson and it went very well. I have the students look up the words judge, prejudice, prejudging, harass, and harassment. We discuss why people may be prejudged and then who may be prejudged as well as harassed. The students come up with blacks, Jews, Muslims, elderly, gays, disabled, teens, poor, and homeless, just to name a few. We talk about who in our own community might be prejudged and harassed and if they think these people deserve the treatment they are getting. I always share a story from my own childhood.

I grew up in Maine but as a child clearly remember visiting my cousins in Georgia. During those times, segregation was a hot topic in the south, but as a child from Maine, I really didn’t know what it was all about. After a visit to Atlanta in 1970 I had a better idea. In some public buildings they still had water fountains and restrooms labeled white and colored. In class we talked about what it must have felt like to be a black child in the south years ago and have to look for a water fountain, a bathroom, or a place to eat that allowed people of your color to use. We also discussed that these places were often not as well taken care of as the places for whites. When the kids asked why they weren’t taken care of the same way, it pained me to say that for years black people were thought to be (and treated) less than white people.

This story about blacks gave me a great segue into slang terms and how they are hurtful. Children understand that calling a black person a nigger is offensive and extremely inappropriate. At this point I introduced the term fag and explained that it was a slang term used for a homosexual man. In my midst were quite a few faces clearly unfamiliar with the term homosexual. I explained to them the term heterosexual and then homosexual. Some of the students giggled, some gasped and some made no comment at all. One child spoke up and said “My Aunt Hilary is a lesbian and she is my favorite aunt”. I told the kids what a lesbian was and asked the student if Aunt Hilary was her favorite because she was a lesbian or because she was a good person. Thank goodness the answer was “a good person.”

Now I brought up the incident at lunch and on the playground. I told the kids that my friend Scott is gay and how did they think it made him feel when he heard kids using the word fag to be mean to one another. We discussed how in the United States we should all be treated equally and that saying hurtful words can really cause inside pain to a person. It was a terrific lesson and I felt the class really got the message.

The following day the principal of the school got a phone call from an angry parent. She couldn’t believe we were teaching the kids about “gays” in school and that her religion was very much against homosexuality. The principal in turn contacted me and asked how I would like to handle the situation. Being a person of fairly quick wit I responded, “I would handle it by having you make it go away.” With the tension having been eased up, I said we needed to meet with this parent as soon as possible and straighten out what was discussed in class.

The mom and dad, along with two other parents, came to meet with me, the social worker and the principal. After introductions, I told them that the lesson in question was about prejudice and harassment. I explained to the parents that as a class we brainstormed about whom in this community and country might be prejudged and harassed. I said our conversation went in many directions but focused on blacks in the south and how they were historically treated. I then went on to say that gays had come up as a group who were prejudged and we talked about the fairness of that. I then told them that it was at this time I told the students I had been told some of the boys were calling others fag and gave them the definition of a fag. At this point dad, who had sat quietly with his arms crossed and his face in a scowl spoke up. He was clear that “his son had never heard the word fag before my class and that neither I nor the school had the right to discuss this with their son present.”

At this point I had the unfortunate job of telling this dad that his son was one of the students calling others fag. “Oh no,” he said with his voice raised, “We are a good Christian family and we do not talk about homosexuality in our home because it is wrong.” I could feel the tension fill the room at this point and thought the social worker was going to come across the table. I told the parents that although I heard how they felt, that it was still not okay for any child at school to speak in this manner. Mom finally spoke up and agreed with her husband, that this curriculum was simply wrong and that under no circumstances was anyone at school to discuss homosexuality with their son. I was clear that in the 5th grade no form of sexual activity was discussed; we were simply discussing prejudice.

It is often a challenge to tackle issues such as prejudice with children. It is even more frustrating trying to share with a parent the need for tolerance and understanding in everyday life. I explained that I was not saying we have to approve or disapprove of another person’s lifestyle; we simply have to be decent in our treatment of that person. The parents never did quite understand what the lesson was all about. What was interesting, however, was the reaction of the two parents who also attended. One of the mothers was glad I had clarified what went on and although she was a little uncomfortable with her 5th grader growing up and hearing anything sexual in nature, she realized how important this topic was. The other mother was also grateful to hear what had been discussed. She was from Jamaica and her husband from Maine. Her children had dark skin and were at times teased by their classmates.

We debriefed as a staff after the meeting and the social worker and principal were outraged at the parents’ reaction to gays as well as their request to keep their son out of health class. They also commented on how calm I had been during the meeting considering how passionate I am about my subject area. My response was simple. We live in a society where people are allowed to have different feelings and beliefs. We celebrate this freedom and need to embrace it. I personally think the parents are doing their child a great injustice but am grateful to live in a country where we can not only have these differences, but voice them without fear of retribution.

This experience was a real emotional rollercoaster. I surprised myself by staying calm on the outside but there were times that I was an emotional mess inside. Self doubt and reflection always comes to the forefront when I am challenged about my work. When I went home the evening after the parents called school, I went over and over in my mind what had gone on during my prejudice lesson, and whether I had presented the subject matter age appropriately and accurately. I kept coming up with the same answer. Yes. Was I biased because I am gay? I don’t know.

Being professional means making judgment calls in difficult situations. There is no way around it. Hopefully our decisions help our children grow up to be fair and responsible people. That means not being prejudiced.

Discussion Questions:

When overhearing students use put-downs such as “You’re so gay,” or “You’re retarded,” what would you do? What should you do?
How would you handle a parent whose values or religious values conflict what is taught in the curriculum regarding respect for human diversity?
What challenges do you face in teaching students to respect people’s differences? Why is this important in a democratic society?

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