For my movie comparison I watched Stand and Deliver and Lean on Me. I really enjoyed Stand and Deliver, starring Edward James Olmos as Jaime’ Escalante. While I was dually impressed by the story of Joe Clark in Lean on Me, I didn’t find the movie as inspirational as Stand and Deliver.
Jaime’ Escalante’s story begins when he is placed into a remedial high school math class in East Los Angeles, CA. From the movie I gathered that Mr. Escalante began his teaching career after leaving a technology job working with computers during the mid 1980’s. I admire this quality of someone leaving their career and deciding to change the lives of young people through education. I also gave up a career to return to school for a career in teaching.
I found that Mr. Escalante was humorous and confident in his teaching. Jaime’ also set high expectations and showed a lot of dedication for his students. This was evidenced by the rigorous schedule he set for his students to learn calculus in order to pass the AP test. Additionally, Jaime’ showed empathy for his students and gave them the tools to learn how to survive and succeed. By not showing too much sympathy or providing “crutches,” he did not debilitate them to the point of the learned helplessness phenomenon.
Other positive aspects about Mr. Escalante’s teaching methods included the use of movement, real world applications (field trip to the computer company), the establishment of respect, and student dedication through the use of a student contract. Accordingly, his cross-content area example with History in Math demonstrated interest learning when he stated “it was your ancestors, the Mayas who invented the concept of zero.”
One the flip side of my movie watching experience was the story of Eastside High in Patterson, N.J. and teacher-turned-principal Joe Clark portrayed by Morgan Freeman in the movie Lean on Me. As I began watching the movie, I was less excited about Mr. Clark’s teaching methods after he became a principal. Mr. Clark exuded a very authoritarian style of discipline as exhibited by the rule of making students sing the school song on demand, or receive detention. I enjoyed the methods he used in the first scene when they showed him teaching what appeared to be a Social Studies or History class.
On the positive, Mr. Clark was a very passionate man with inspirational speaking abilities. I do feel that his tough love attitude was necessary for the condition of the school at the time. The changes that were made (if portrayed accurately in the movie) were astounding. I feel that as he stressed discipline he was able to achieve a better educational atmosphere for the students at Eastside. It is difficult to learn in a chaotic environment. Controlling the student body was necessary to achieve learning. Eventually he was able to loosen up a bit and become more compassionate when he was confronted by the assistant principal. I do not think he realized the impact of his negative reinforcement until this time.
Both Mr. Escalante, and Mr. Clark exhibited confidence, respect, and in some ways they both utilized tough love. Parental involvement was also demonstrated by both when Jaime’ visited the family restaurant where one of his students worked, and when Joe offered to extend the weekend reading program to parents. Both stories and instructors were very inspiring and I feel that the tactics employed by each were right for the situation. Both succeeded in accomplishing the task they set out to do. It is through success that you realize, the methods and strategies you use in the classroom or school are appropriate.
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