Freedom Fighters: Struggles Instituting Black History in K-12 Education captures the ongoing struggle to implement multicultural curricula in schools. It details how African American students, caught in the vicious cycle of territorial fights, low-test scores, and placed at risk for dropping out of school, experienced self-transformation through the study of Black History. Student leaders describe their experiences with a controversial Black history program that led to the removal of a teacher who used a critical pedagogical approach to teaching.
Drawing from the theoretical constructs found in Afrocentric education, critical pedagogy, and multicultural education, this book introduces a new concept for educating African American students, coined critical Black pedagogy in education. Scholars and leaders, such as Elijah Muhammad, Carter G. Woodson, Paulo Freire, James Banks, and others provide compelling arguments that cogently describe the challenge of educating African American students for liberation. Students, teachers, educational leaders, and others will discover compelling reasons why students, educators and prospective educators need to be introduced to Black History. Using real world examples, this is an ideal book for courses on the foundations of education, multicultural education and critical pedagogy among others. Get a glimpse of how a leader like Malcolm X was educated to become a freedom fighter!
Freedom Fighters: Struggles Instituting Black History in K-12 Education:
-Documents the origins of the Black Studies and multicultural education.
-Highlights the need for K-12 schools to institutionalize Black History from an Afrocentered perspective.
-Provides compelling examples of why educators need courses in critical multicultural education.
-Captures the student experiences of being exposed to Black History.
-Incorporates a new approach to Black education coined Critical Black Pedagogy in Education.
-Entails major aspects of multicultural education such as racism, knowledge construction, critical pedagogy, and religion.
-Recommends strategies for implementing Black History in K-12 education.
Abul Pitre (Ph.D., Colorado State University) is an Associate Professor of Educational Leadership and Foundations at Fayetteville State University where he teaches Cultural Diversity in American Schools, Foundations of American Education, and Curriculum and Instructional Leadership. His current research interests explore multicultural education for school leaders and the educational philosophy of Elijah Muhammad. He was appointed as Edinboro University's first named professor for his outstanding work in African American education, holding the distinguished titled of Carter G. Woodson Professor of Education.
