Learning From Rural Mexican Schools About Commitment and Work

Abstract

During the last 3 years we have made many visitsto two rural Mexican primary schools. As a resultof our experiences there, we believe that students'sense of responsibility in a school setting dependson the nature of the commitments they make andthe work they do in and for the school. We havealso learned that certain educational and socialconcepts expressed in Spanish can enrich our thinkingabout the social curriculum that teachers andstudents create in classrooms. In this article weexplore the idea of students' "social work" by explainingwhat we are learning in these Mexicanschools and providing examples from selected writingsabout life in U.S. classrooms.