You’ll have read for today James Baldwin’s “A Talk to Teachers.” Take 10-20 minutes and respond to the following questions as a comment on this post:
- What is Baldwin saying in the quote below? What do you think he means when he says “the world is larger?”
I would try to make [the student] know that just as American history is longer, larger, more various, more beautiful and more terrible than anything anyone has ever said about it, so is the world larger, more daring, more beautiful and more terrible, but principally larger – and that it belongs to him. I would teach him that he doesn’t have to be bound by the expediencies of any given administration, any given policy, any given morality; that he has the right and the necessity to examine everything”?
- What do you think you have the “necessity” to examine, or the obligation to learn more about? Why? Alternatively, what do you wish had been taught to you in school that wasn’t? Why do you want to know about these topics?
In the quote below, Baldwin is quoting that just as American history is long, beautiful and horrible, the world itself is much longer, beautiful and horrific. When stating that the world is larger, he means that history and its events does not stop us from learning more. On the contrary, the world has much more time to it and we still have much to learn, create history in it, explore the beautiful and horrible events yet to happen.
I feel the necessity to learn more about law and economics. Continuing to learn such topics provides me with more information that are real wold based and that I will implement into my life as I get older.
In James Baldwin’s quote, I believe he’s trying to say that The world is a beautiful and dangerous place because of the things that are in it. So, that stops us, kids, from reaching our full potential. But the more we’re used to it, the more we don’t let history phase us and are able to create our own history.
When he means “the world is larger,” he said that to make the world seem endless. So students would be intrigued to learn more about it and see more about it.
I feel the necessity to learn more about law, economics, and life science because knowing these subjects will be worth it in the long run. I wish we were taught about thinking, how to manage money, manners, insurance, and self-defense because learning these basic things would help so in the real world if we ready know so much about them.
I think what Baldwin means when he says “the world is larger” is that we still have a lot of things in the world that we have not explored yet. He’s also saying that the word is beautiful and terrible at the same time, but we still have more to discover as well. We shouldn’t be biased by the things around us and we should believe the things we examine using our five senses.
I have the necessity to examine more about the world around me because it is important to know what’s going on in the real world so we can prepare for the future. I wish that in school, we learned more about real life events because it’s difficult nowadays to learn what’s going on with everything being mostly online now.