My Big Box Experience

My Big Box Experience. 

 

Walking into any box store be it Walmart, Ikea, Home Depot or the like can be an over whelming experience based on the sheer scale of these monstrous facilities.  When I approach a Walmart with caution and pass the lack lustre greeter I am, at least momentarily assaulted by the sensory over-load that actually does greets me.  The smells, sounds, colours, the space that goes to infinity along with the vast array of unusual people that frequent the store is all unique.  Walmart is a surreal experience and like a deer in the headlights I really don’t know how or where to proceed.

 

I look at the crumpled ball of paper in my hand that serves as a list and substitutes as my short term memory as I begin to wander the vast labyrinth of aisles in search of the five items of my quest.  Lighting.  Where would that be? No one to ask.  God send me a sign.  HOUSEHOLD.  There is a God.  I proceed. 

 

Variety.  Always too much.  All from China. I’m again over-whelmed.  Therefore, short sentences.  Breath is short.  Do they pump oxygen in like casinos or out?  I don’t know.  I feel dizzy. 

 

All the lamps and every last thing in this store is part of a supply chain that originates in China.  I find the lamp I want, but where are the light bulbs?  Again no one to ask.  But then I peek at my list. I need a coat rack and I see hangers, logic tells me they will flock together, but they don’t.  In my peripheral vision I see a blue blur of a sales clerk.  I stock her .  She is tired and old.  I don’t know if the two facts are related.  She takes me to the coat racks but in truth only returns me to the hangers and says’ Funny I thought they were here.” I thanked her and told her I had the same thought.

 

I looked at my cart with the Chinese lamp and no bulbs, with the absence of a coat rack and four more things on my list. I would try one more thing.  A smart TV.  Entertainment.  Another younger but slower clerk took me down several aisles and showed me two boxes and started to walk away.  Where was the high pressure sales pitch I thought?  I stopped him.

 

“Can you tell me about these TV’s and what’s the difference.  He went quiet and looked long and pensively at the two boxes. He answered about $100.

 

I looked at the mentally challenged clerk and thanked him before leaving the store.  It was difficult since I had lost my orientation and made several wrong turns and was seeing mirages on the horizon when finally I saw the sea of self check out cashier stations.  There were three over worked cashiers of the human variety still employed.  I staggered passed them to the exit and took my first gulps of fresh air.  

 

Looking back at the store from the safety of my car from the vantage point of my handicapped parking spot I thought of the recent advertisement of thrifty shoppers leaving an IKEA store with their bargains as the wife shouts, “DRIVE, DRIVE”  as if they were thieves escaping the scene of a crime.  Relief crept over me as I drove to the IKEA on Jane Street in a further attempt to find the five items on my list.

 

I knew there would be no Smart TV set at Ikea unless I took one of their display cardboard cut out models for which some assembly would be required but I was aiming higher.

 

IKEA also has a greeter at the entrance and although a box store with a similar colour scheme as Walmart it doesn’t look quite so tacky and run down.  The greeter looks well rested probably because she works for a Dutch/Swedish corporation that although a global corporation doesn’t hunt down union organizers like nazi war criminals.  Although, ironically founder Ingvar Kamrad, was once a Nazi sympathizer of sorts until he discovered his true worth marketing semi- fabricated furniture to the masses.  I had all those thoughts flash through my mind before I could even say, “Where is your lighting department?”

 

I was directed to what seemed like a secret door behind the main staircase that served as a short cut to where I wanted to go.  It was magical.  Like finding Oz behind the green curtain.  On the floor before me were large arrows to follow like my own yellow brick road.  It was like another omen. I was meant to be there.  I had new meaning and direction in the marketing world.  Not only did I find my lamp. I found three of them and they were all located with the requisite light bulbs.  It was as if some higher being or power had planned it thus.  Perhaps a Swedish socialist.

 

Yes, even though, like Walmart, Ikea is a giant labyrinth it has arrows on the floor and maps.  There are many friendly healthy looking people with t-shirts that say hej, in the universal language of Swedish, which I think means Hi!. I again found hangers and by God if right beside them there was an array, not just one, but many varieties of coat racks neatly laid out before my very eyes.  It was exhilarating.

 

At the check out sadly there were also the Walmart, and every other store on the planet’s, automatic self check out plus the requisite three live and in person cashiers.  I think three is the critical number.  They provide no wrapping or bags now but you can buy a big tarp like  blue bag large enough to pack a Smart car to carry your goods.  I did that.

 

While leaving I had no difficulty finding the exit but it was still hard leaving because Ikea sells cinnamon buns which is really an unfair marketing ploy preying on the weak.  It took me an extra 15 minutes to leave the store.  I left in frustration because you have to order on a large computer menu board which shows pictures of cinnamon buns and you can see the real ones over the counter in the distance and maybe even smell them if you work at it only to have the system freeze and the order not go through.  I left with my big blue bag and no buns.

 

Sadly, I had to return to IKEA only two days later because my made in China lamp was damaged and I had to join a line in the large concourse away from the madding crowds where few can see who is returning what and why.  One is required without being told to register on another larger computer screen with no anticipation of getting a cinnamon bun only to queue to return a broken product.  I discovered I was seventh in line.  Gauging by the screen Amid was at the counter taking forever, and at a rate of 7 minutes per customer, with three people serving I was going to be there for another 13 minutes. 

 

In Ikea style given my turn and my knew familiarity with the Swedish language my return went smoothly and with my new unbroken Chinese/Swedish lamp under my arm I returned to the well lit parking lot to my designated handicapped parking spot and drove contentedly home thinking at least there are two unionized Ikea stores in Canada and even unionized warehouses in the United States with one manufacturing unionized manufacturing plant in Virginia all this well thinking do I have an Allen wrench at home.

 The Impact of Cultural Erosion on Native Education

 

When going on a walk with my wife, electronically we count our every step as if there is something magical or scientific in the number 10 000, but that is the motivating number, our quest. As a teacher ascending to the next pay grid level also had a satisfying and motivating influence on me.  There are numerous carrots and sticks, large and small that motivate us throughout life.  However, with all candor, I would have to say I enjoy walking with my wife whether I count the steps or not. I honestly enjoy being in the classroom, it is a career not just a job.  Perhaps, I have just outlined some of the differences between extrinsic and intrinsic motivation.

 

Motivation is something we all have in order to move forward in life for what some would consider the trivial and the mundane to the core of what makes us human and everything in between. In other words what motivates one person may be of no relevance to another.  Motivation is the energy that we direct towards achieving a goal and those goals significantly vary from person to person and between cultures.  

 

The reward/punishment system is built into every facet of life from home to the work place, from the monetary allowance we give our kids for jobs done well or not, the use of cell phones, or the withdrawal of their use when situations are abused or boundaries crossed.  Our society largely operates on the premise that human behaviour is driven by the opportunity to receive either a reward or a sanction. 

 

It is a truly simplistic approach however society seems to be programmed to function in this mode. For example, a direct result of an over reliance on extrinsic motivators is a superficial level of learning such as cramming for a exam when pulling the proverbial “late nighter”.  This manner of preparation may get one through the exam but for the most part there is very little long term retention of content.  Teachers have been using threats, detentions, various punishments including the strap at one point, writing lines, grades all only to create fear with very little in the way of positive change. As for myself I know now that I should not throw snowballs in the no snowball zone after the bell rings as that was five stokes on each hand with a leather strap.  That was a lesson learned in fear and pain.

 

Intrinsic motivation operates on a higher plane and is based on the premise that we learn or do something because the learning or the activity is rewarding in and of itself.  The learning process creates a stream of positive emotions which serve as the inherent rewards thereby making any extrinsic reward superfluous. In fact studies do demonstrate that if extrinsic rewards are given to students for an already rewarding activity the net result is to make the activity less intrinsically rewarding.  This is referred to as the over justification effect.  

 

Students’ lives must also be viewed in the context of a highly complex world, both in school and out, and although it should be obvious that teachers who have knowledge and skills make a large difference so does the cultural world surrounding the lives of our students.  We sometimes make the very naive assumption that students actually do live in a vacuum and that school is the ultimate change agent.  I think sometimes at best we are minor players.

 

Common sense reasoning suggests that motivated students will learn faster and better and retain information and concepts more effectively than those who are not motivated it also follows that instruction should be passionate or motivational in nature and rich in meaningful content, these seeds of learning are then cast on a field of students with various abilities, ages, incomes, learning disorders, ethnicity, from educated families to those who are not, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, bilingual, male, female, those with gender identity issues seeking pronouns, indigenous, diverse cultural back grounds and all of these myriad of factors and many more impact on motivation and learning and serve to determine whether a student will persist in learning or simply give up, whether students feel safe, connected and respected all pertaining to learning.  Its complicated. 

 

I have taught in several native communities where many approaches of instruction have been tried and failed where teachers and boards have been fired en masse out of sheer frustration for lack of results.  Often these cases involving rewards to motivate have utterly failed usually because there is a complete mis-reading of cultural factors at play.  When this happens educators are too quick to play the “blame game”.  Students “they” will say lack all ambition, the parents just don’t care, the families are dysfunctional, there is no initiative or self direction.  In this negative feed back loop students feel defeated and quit school, teachers are frustrated and quit their jobs, administrators get fired for lack of results.

 

Had the planning begun with a greater awareness of native culture and awareness of its history and traditions and incorporated a higher degree or any degree of teaching to the culture or culturally relevant teaching instead of perpetually battling against it, indigenous education, in many places, would turn a corner and become more relevant to students as what is taught is more culturally and emotionally significant to them and will therefore serve to cultivate a new level, or maybe germinate the first level of intrinsic motivation and therefore break the negative loop.  Cultural understanding in the native case or for any culture is everything in terms of success and motivation.

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I have lived and worked in several native communities in Canada and in an anecdotal way wish to make the connection between residential schools and their negative impact on native motivation and education.  Native culture and likely most native communities, value the importance of the family.  The role of the elders as a source of knowledge and wisdom is recognized and almost revered in native culture.  However, I discovered that there is a significant disconnect between what is valued and what is practiced.  I was soon to learn that many families with links to residential schools are severely dysfunctional and native traditions were rapidly eroded as a result.

 

Despite the fact that children are valued they are given very loose structure in their lives and little discipline. This type of scenario often translates into students who do not know how to behave in a classroom and don’t want to be in school.  Many students rebel against the authority of the teachers.  They are openly and frequently defiant.  Students   spend a disproportionate amount of time with video games.  I had grade one students tell me about the joys of playing “Grand Theft Auto.” 

 

Many of my native students were several grade levels behind in their literacy and numeracy skills.  I had high school students who could barely read and grade 3 students who did not know the alphabet or the sounds the letters make.  I worked with a grade five student who wished to improve his reading skills only to the point of being able to successfully take his driver’s test.  Grant it that is motivation.  Many of these students were about to give up or already have.  Their anger and frustration quickly translated into acting out behaviour and severe discipline issues.

 

When a typical, if there is such a thing, middle class southern suburban child gets to school he/she has been read to, talked to and exposed to a wide range of vocabulary words and ideas thousands, or tens of thousands of times before entering the classroom.  In the native communities in which I have worked students arrive at school not having the  advantage of the English spoken word, story times and chances at adequate vocabulary development. For many, English is a second language. My students begin the literacy race long after the green flag has gone down and too many of them never see the checkered flag.  

 

The sad thing about many of our students at all ages, but especially in the junior high grades is that they have given up on themselves. They have an unfortunate reverse or negative pride and seem to revere a lack of progress. It is just the opposite of self esteem expressed through a near total lack of achievement. The school in which I worked had no teams, or mottos and very little school spirit.  Motivation was dead because the local native culture was dying.

 

Residential schools were a systematic and sanctioned way of robbing the natives of their culture and whatever vestige of heritage they might have left after they were cheated of land and other rights.  I’m no expert in this, but I know enough that this was a period of shame in our history.

 

I was told one reason for the huge disconnect with cultural values had to do with residential schools.  Because of the harsh treatment experienced by many at Indian Residential Schools many natives lost their connection to families and family values. 

 

The government’s goal, through the school system, was to break down the culture and the family structure, thereby developing a group of people who were institutionalized; then when one throws alcohol into the mix with the dislocation of many communities from their lands that they knew, to poorer lands it eventually creates an entrenched cycle of poverty. Some of the former students of the residential school system where I taught, now adults and parents, attend support groups in order to deal with their horrible experiences as children while at the residential school.

 

After all of the social trauma inflicted on native populations “we” blamed natives for being useless. Due to the reserve system and residential schools  linked with a combination of government and church policies, it resulted in creating a true sense of learned helplessness with little sense of connection to anything, no sense of family, no sense of trust in others, or in themselves, and no sense of trust in authority. In fact the very concept of family was destroyed, but I guess that was the point of the residential school. 

 

Is it no wonder that because of abuse and extreme methods of discipline students who left those schools became parents who didn’t know how to parent and were reluctant to discipline.  Soon a generation developed robbed and devoid of heritage and tradition and seemingly helpless to rectify the situation. The evil of residential schools created more than one monster.  The legacy plays on in families and schools today.

 

 

The reality is that much of the parenting in native homes is done by members of the extended family and more often than not by the grandparents.  In traditional native culture there was good reason for the grandparents to handle child rearing because parents would be “out on the land” making a living and surviving.  In modern society some parents seem to rely too heavily on tradition with the continued expectation that grandparents raise the children.  As contemporary society has developed the traditional roles have not changed and possibly family life has suffered in some ways because parents excused themselves from their parenting role at the great detriment of the family as a whole. 

 

Motivation to learn and achieve is solidly linked to culture but once the culture has been stripped away, as was the case with many Canadian indigenous families through the residential school system, any reasonable semblance of family cohesion or motivation to learn in a systematic organized away has also been damaged.  Extrinsic motivation alone would be unproductive in the long run in regaining educational lost ground for native populations.  Likely, only through greater levels of self governance in educational decision making through control of their own educational goals and curriculum based on local native cultures will they have any chance to develop a true sense of intrinsic motivation to rebuild what has been taken from them.

 

Marty Rempel