​ 
Hooks reflects on her own educational experiences from the perspective of a student in college.  She confesses feeling “estranged from education” as her professors – rulers of a “mini-kingdom” – either ignored her presence or treated her with “contempt”.  She finally found hope in Paulo Freire’s work, as she saw his theories as a way for students to “assume responsibility for their choices” and eliminate the professors as “all-knowing” kings of the classroom. 
Ellsworth educational beliefs are very similar to Hooks, but she begins with a critique in the use of such “code” words as “critical” and “social change” as a failure to the “critical education movement” as it “hide[s] positions and goals of anti-racism, anti-classism, anti-sexism and so forth.”  Ellsworth shares with the reader her experiences as a professor “struggling against…key assumptions and assertions of current literature on critical pedagogy...and com[ing] to grips with crucial issues of classroom practice that critical pedagogy cannot or will not address.” 
Both Hooks and Ellsworth highlighted the professor’s authority over students as limiting the educational experience.  Ellsworth identifies that one of the strategies for dealing with this dictating environment “is to make the teacher more like the student by redefining the teacher as a leaner of the student’s reality and knowledge.”  I found this strategy to be an eye opener for me as I have been interested in doing a robotics or a maker unit with my students, but have held off because I myself do not have a mastery of such skills or knowledge.  Ellsworth’s suggestion eliminates this anxiety with the idea that I could re-learn it along with the students.  The benefit of teaching a unit this way is that it brings the teacher down to the students level of understanding “enable[ing] the teacher to devise more effective strategies for bringing the student “up” to the teacher’s level of understanding.”  To take this a step further I could also utilize Hooks’ philosophy on teachers (professors in her case) being willing to “share confessional narratives” with their students as a way of teaching holistically.  Hooks’ emphasis on “a holistic model of learning” includes not only the growth of the student but also the growth of the teacher, by confessing to my students that I am learning along with them I am collapsing my position as the authoritarian and uplifting the student’s positions as my followers.  These ideas are not far off from current trending pedagogies such as, student centred classrooms and place based education. 
While sharing confessions with my students and eliminating my position as authoritarian may have its benefits, I wonder if there are any classroom management repercussions to this, and if there are, how a teacher would address these issues while maintaining student’s empowerment.

Both articles identified the school as a prime location to prevent, identify, diagnose and treat student’s mental illnesses.  The Canadian Teacher’s Federation manual on ‘Understanding Teacher’s Perspectives on Student Mental Health’ stated that “the school environment is an ideal place to begin the work of addressing mental health.  Not only does the school offer a simple and cost-effective way of reaching youth, it is also a place where mental health can be linked with other aspects of health, such as physical health and nutrition, and with learning.”  Their findings from a National Survey identified that students with mental illnesses are less likely to achieve academic success, which they conclude as evidence that schools should play a critical role in “promoting and protecting the metal health of all students.”   McLoone et al. acknowledge the demands that schools and teachers are already faced with, but still argue that the advantages are greater, “school staff are in an excellent positon to monitor children, especially those at risk, and intervene with prevention and early intervention programs prior to the development of major dysfunction.”  While I am inclined to agree with the unique advantage that schools could play as sites for identification, diagnoses and treatment of student’s mental illnesses I do not see it working.  From the perspective of a teacher, taking on the additional responsibility is overwhelming, in order to make this a priority something else in the busy teacher schedule would have to give.  What current teacher roles would suffer to take on mental illnesses in schools?  What would the training for teachers look like?  How would it be funded?  Where funding would be cut in order to support it?  Would rural schools share personnel who are trained in the diagnoses?  If so, what would the wait time look like for an individual?  What would the reporting process look like?  How many reports would be required to be considered priority?  While diagnosis and treatment would be very difficult to integrate into a school setting, streamlining identification and promoting prevention could be a real possibility.  I am definitely on board with opening up the dialogue on mental health with my students. 

​The concept of reconceptualizing the curriculum has me stumped, as I read I kept searching for a singular definition, but as I read through William F. Pinar’s article, the only thing I understood about reconceptualizing the curriculum was what it is not.  After reading Pacini-Ketchawbaw and Pence’s article I realized that I would not find this singular definition, because the whole theory in itself focuses on the criticism of a singular truth, as Pacini-Ketchawbaw and Pence put it “reconceptualist...scholars question the existence of a singular truth…they have problematized the fact that the field of ECEC has constructed a true child…”.  Unlike some of the other models we’ve looked at so far, the reconceptualized approach is not a prescribed method of curriculum design rather it is a viewpoint from which to address curriculum.  This viewpoint reflects an existentialist position, as Pinar puts it “reconceptualization…is fundamentally an intellectual phenomenon, not an interpersonal-affiliative one”.  While there is no definitive definition to reconceptualizing curriculum, there are overarching themes, such as the promotion of social justice.  While it is clear that Pinar was at the forefront of the reconceptualist movement (Flinders and Thornton 2013), others, such as Maxine Greene, were on the track before.  As I come to understand this theory, I ask, is enough being done to reconceptualize the curriculum and are the movements of change happening fast enough?  

​Paulo Freire identified the importance and delicacy of dialogue, he cautioned readers that dialogue must find its balance between both action and reflection; too much action and dialogue turns into activism; too much reflection and it turns into verbalism.  He also valued a love for the world and man, he desired a dialogue that opened the possibility for a pedagogy of the oppressed.  “Founding itself upon love, humility, and faith, dialogue becomes a horizontal relationship of which mutual trust between the dialoguers is the logical consequence.”  Freire argues that without this mutual trust, authentic dialogue cannot take place.  It is obvious that Sandy Grande was deeply influenced by Freire’s work, her focus in ‘Red Pedagogy’ was on the importance for citizens to engage in decolonization and rethinking democracy.  Her proposed method for achieving this directly reflects Freire’s ideas, she says “for teachers and students this means that we must be willing to act as agents of transgression, positing critical questions and engaging dangerous discourse.”  In addition to identifying her desire for decolonizing pedagogy, she also outlines seven precepts as a starting point.   Since Paulo Freire’s work was published in 1994 and Sandy Grande’s work in 2004, I find myself wondering what influence did their work have on our newly designed BC curriculum, as many of its ideas are reminiscent of their work?  I also find myself wondering each week, who writes the curriculum and what is their process?