Emerging Philosophy of Education

Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

Michael G. Curran

Boston University Wheelock College of Education and Human Development

Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

The phenotype of a good citizen looks many different ways, varying across all genders,

sexualities, racial, ethnic, religious groups, and more in our country, without ever strictly

adhering to one form. The unifying characteristic that binds these many forms into a good

citizen is patriotism, love for country. I use patriotism here not in the nationalist, America-

centric often conflated meaning of patriotism, but rather love for country by being an active

participant in the micro and macro communities around you. This can be accomplished by

showing empathy to others, promoting equity and inclusion, pushing for social justice, and

through owning your own mistakes by righting your wrongs. Patriotism, either explicitly shown

or implicitly believed in any of the aforementioned forms is what makes a good citizen. My role

as a social studies educator is to develop good citizenship in students through curriculum that

fosters the many forms of patriotism, by instructional techniques focusing on inquiry, project

based learning and effective assessment, and lastly through practicing culturally sustaining

pedagogy that is additive to students diverse cultures and experiences.

Fostering patriotism in our nation’s students can be easily misinterpreted as evoking of a

white male, Euro and America-centric ‘textbook’ view of the American history and the world but

rather, I mean just the opposite. I work to create curriculum that develops my students into good

citizens by encouraging civic engagement whenever possible, from the polling booths to

recycling bins; wherever my students may be able to take knowledge from curriculum and apply

it to their own life through action. As active participants in our nation's future they are patriots in

their own way. I believe this extends to belief systems as well, so I focus my fifth grade students

in on the concept of empathy in a relational sense throughout the entire year’s reading.

Everytime they come across an example of empathy it is underlined, ‘E’ is written next to it, and
Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

then a short explanation is written on how they would show this person empathy. This is

important so that down the road when they dive deeper into American history the concept of

historical empathy is no longer abstract, and they can be critical about our own nation, both past

and present. This is an essential element of being a good citizen, for patriotism is also righting

the many wrongs about our nation’s historic and current issues through action. It is patriotic to

apply knowledge of these issues and work to make America better for all, by means of social

justice and inclusion and equity from the micro world of student’s own classrooms, to the macro,

represented by our nation and world as a whole.

Curriculum extends far beyond the lesson plans and state frameworks documented on

paper. I am curriculum, my personality is curriculum, my modeling of behavior is curriculum,

my students are curriculum to each other, and beyond. These aspects cannot be overlooked, for

at every turn I seek to model a good citizen as a social studies educator. Because curriculum is

so extensive beyond the frameworks, my teachings will never be confined by standardized

testing or the Massachusetts state frameworks but rather bolstered by them. This is possible by

what utilizing what Grant (2007) calls “ambitious teaching” , where teachers “understand deeply

both their subject matter and their students” (253). Grant’s prescription to increasing

standardization of student learning is this very principle that has guided my pedagogy from the

start. The influence of casual conversation and getting to know my students better in every way

guides my instructional methods as much as the frameworks I am wedded to. I seek to utilize

these standards as just one tool of many to create curriculum that resonates with my students

after tailoring all my decisions to their personal learning styles, interests and needs. While the
Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

concepts covered in the state frameworks inherently work to create good citizens of students, it is

my responsibility through curricular and instructional methodology to make them come to life.

The best questions always lead to more questions, so I work to keep students questioning

of content outlined in the frameworks. Too often textbook chapters do not leave students with

the most important question of all, ‘Why?’. Asking ‘Why?’ is an essential characteristic of a

good citizen, for such a person must always weigh what is right or wrong in their surroundings to

assess if action is required. Too often students become disciples of their teachers thinking, and

thus do not get to exercise their critical capacites. This phenomena was summarized by Grant

and Gradwell (2010) who found themselves “teaching too much”, instead of “letting the students

reach their own conclusions” (28), where they found student comprehension was best achieved.

My role as an educator is to foster this critical lense that leads to questioning through the use of

inquiry. By framing entire school years, units, and individual lessons around inquiry questions

and throughlines, students can process content and standardized test material in way that is

meaningful to them. This is the most effective way to get such large breadths of information to

stick. I couple this theory with practice by focusing on project based learning, which are often

student designed in order to cater to the diverse learning styles in my classroom. In order to

assess student comprehension on such projects, it is essential to look into the student’s thought

process by removing the emphasis on the rote memorization focus of social studies’ past. By

replacing fact recall questions for assessment with meaningful questions by tying in prior

learning to new learning, a better understanding of a students long term growth emerges.
Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

As a white male teacher I am extremely aware of the diverse backgrounds of my students,

where currently over thirty percent identify as students of color. Not only am I aware of their

racial and ethnic identities, but I am too of my own. I am not raceless, I am white. I am acutely

aware of how this may influence my own practice as well as student learning so I seek to foster a

classroom that is culturally sustaining. Culturally additive beliefs are inherent to my vision of a

good citizen, as it is patriotic to believe in an America that is inclusive of all. Love for country

also means love for all of our massively diverse opinions by pushing back on the white

dominated narrative of America’s past. Good citizens will construct America’s increasingly

diverse future by fighting for inclusion and equity, which I believe begins in the classroom.

In order to practice my ideology, I do not decorate my classroom walls with anything

before students walk in on the first day. The walls are the students canvas to paint their own

cultures, beliefs and experiences on throughout the year. By both valuing and allowing the class

to explore what Moll, Amanti, Neff and Gonzalez in Banks (2007) refer to as “funds of

knowledge” (373), student engagement and overall learning can dramatically increase. I work to

create a classroom environment that is representative and inclusive of all my students, hailing

from all walks of life to conjure this theory into practice. When sourcing materials for the class,

I do my best to construct text sets that are representative of all my student’s identities. Further, I

will never assign any outside work that needs to be done on a computer unless I am one hundred

percent certain that every student in the class has access to a computer at home. By modeling

such respect and inclusion of all races, cultures, religions, socioeconomic standing, gender and

sexual identity, I hope to plant seeds of inclusion and respect for the unique perspectives we all

inherently hold as Americans.

Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

A good citizen is not someone who can recall specific dates of important events, but

rather one who applies their learning to make a difference in their surroundings in their own

unique way. However small a gesture of kindness, or grand a devotion of patriotism such as

serving in our military, the social studies are special in its ability to directly shape students into

contributing citizens of our nation's future. Through curriculum choices, instructional methods,

and a deliberately constructed learning environment, I will teach students to cherish our

differences. By acknowledging that America’s diverse representation of cultures, genders, races,

sexual identities, religions, ethnicities and more are what unites us, they are all patriots in my

eyes.
Modern Patriots: Creating Good Citizens

References

Banks, J. A. (2017). Failed citizenship and transformative civic education. Educational

researcher, 46(7), 366-377.

Grant, S. G. (2007). High-stakes testing: How are social studies teachers responding? Social
Education, 71(5), 250-254.

Grant, S. G., & Gradwell, J. (2010). Teaching history with big ideas: Cases of ambitious
teachers: R&L Education.