Hi everyone,
While there was a bit in the readings on termination, it was interesting to me that there were so many articles on poverty and its effects on child development in this final class' readings. I found myself wondering why, from a pedagogical perspective.
Talbot in "The Talking Cure" talked about how children from poorer households tend to hear less words and have poorer scholastic outcomes than wealthier children. I appreciated the nuance of wondering why this was and discussing poor nutrition, possibly chaotic living situations, and also the stress and dispiriting nature of poverty itself making play and patience hard for the parents. There was this one line that got me: "...maybe we have the model wrong. Maybe what we need to do is come in and bring dinner and help with laundry and free up a parent to engage in more play with their child," because NO. One agency doing that for some parents is lovely but it won't really change anything if society doesn't change to value lifting people out of poverty.
Shafer and Edin's "A Simple Approach to Ending Extreme Poverty" just added to my sadness and frustration with our culture in that it described how great the child tax credit was, how much it helped people, and how great it would have been long term for poor and middle class families. But as we all know, that tax credit was killed by Congress. The root of the problem remains unchanged. Lowery's article on "The War on Poverty is over. Rich People Won" only added fuel to that fire by addressing how terrible the housing market is for poorer folks and how we could choose to change it, but we don't.
So, back to the pedagogy here. Why are we reading these articles before the last class? What am I supposed to take away from these readings before potentially embarking on a career in social work, perhaps with children and adolescents? These kinds of readings often simply demoralize me and make me feel really sad and frustrated. How do we make change? Because I don't think just doing laundry for a couple of families is the answer, but I appreciate the question of what else is within my power to give? I'm not sure. I'd love all of your thoughts on the matter.
Best,
Melissa