In 1968 Jane Elliot of Ricetown, Iowa was supposed to teach a Sioux Indian lesson to her third grade class with the prayer "Help me not judge a person until I have walked in his shoes." However, the day after Martin Luther King was assassinated, she decided her students needed a life-long lesson. As a result, her brown eyes, blue eyes experiment taught her third graders an influential lesson on discrimination. Hopefully, it was an eye-opening program for you seniors to watch.
Choose one of the following questions and write a one page typed response, citing specific examples from the program. Click here if you need to watch it again.
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
2. How did the negative and positive labels placed on the group become self-fulfilling prophecies? Be sure to discuss the children's body language.
3. How did Jane Elliot's discrimination create no-win situations for those placed in the inferior group? How did she selectively interpret behavior to conform the stereotypes she assigned?
51 comments:
2. How did the negative and positive labels placed on the group become self-fulfilling prophecies? Be sure to discuss the children's body language.
When someone predicts something, according to this theory, the prediction somehow causes itself to become true. These predictions said to be true, when it is actually untrue, might influence people in the wrong way. The influence could be from fear or confusion.
When the kids were told that they were inferior, they were confused. They were also scared because they had never been discriminated against before. They predicted that the day was going to be terrible being in shoes they never thought they had to walk in. Believing that the day was going to be terrible and being put down all the time decreased the inferior group’s cognitive ability.
The negative and positive labels placed on the group became these self-fulfilling prophecies as soon as they heard what their status was. When the brown-eyed kids heard that they were inferior to the blue-eyed kids, their body language changed. They went from showing excitement, to showing dread and angst. Every time they were insulted or put down, they were slumped over and their heads were buried in their hands. The kids’ cognitive abilities changed over the two days: the day they were inferior versus the day they were superior. This demonstrates their self-fulfilling prophecies.
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
This program taught me the seriousness of children’s beliefs. Even though it was only a grade school class and experiment, the children took it as real life. This is why the experiment worked out so well, because the children felt as though the discriminating was actually happening. I was very surprised that the children worked so well with the experiment. They got into it and took it as real. I was also surprised that the children in the “liked” group did better on flashcards then the children who were being discriminated against. I remembered the scenes that showed the children’s faces the most. The children looked so traumatized when Mrs. Elliot discriminated against them. They took it so personally, even though in the end, it was only just an experiment. I also remembered how the children interacted with each other when they where being discriminated against. They would call each other names and bicker between the two groups, the brown eyed and the blue eyed children. There was one incident where one of the children made fun of another for not being the accepted and liked group. I also remember how the adults acted when the man was being yelled at for not taking notes. I was surprised that it took so long for the other adults to step up for the man. Finally when they did stand up, more and more of the adults started to agree that it was unfair.
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
Watching this program has taught me a lot, not only did I not expect that a 3rd grade teacher would come up with a way to teach them about discrimination, but she came up with an idea that had the potential to change the minds of many children everywhere. The scenes that stick with me the most are when some of the children in the inferior groups were out in the playground and huddled together looking sad that they couldn’t play with any of their friends during recess. Another scene that sticks with me is when Miss Elliot took some of the behaviors of the children and used it as a way to make the inferior group seem bad or that it was true that they were worse then the other group. Once she used those behaviors the child she was talking about dropped even more because they felt as if they really were less than the other kids that day. When Miss Elliot preformed this experiment again with adults this time at their workday program I was surprised at how they reacted. The first surprise was that those who were brown eyes and told they were better than the blue eyes never spoke up to her saying that they felt it was wrong that she was going to pick on the blue eyed people, regardless if she explained the point of her experiment, I would expect someone to object to that. The other thing that surprised me was that more adults didn’t stand up to Miss Elliot when they were being accused of being rude, and non productive and less than the brown eye people. Only two or three people talked back to Miss Elliot, most people including myself, assume that when someone is attacking another adult that they will join together in a group and stand up for themselves, however this is the exact opposite of what happened. It almost seemed as if when the people who were standing up to her talked, the other blue eyed people in the group got quieter and stayed still more with each outburst. This experiment teaches me and hopefully other people to be reminded of what you are doing or saying to other people, it should remind us that discriminating against someone for any reason because they are different isn’t right and does have effects on those people, adults or children will be affected. Hopefully this experiment becomes more recognized by others to prevent discrimination or teasing of people for being different because it should stop and should stop now.
What I learned from this program is that both children and adults have the same response to the diversity exorcise. Children are just as exposed to racism as adults, and respond the same. It is easy for humans to turn on others because a superior tells you to, as I learned in the movie. The children were easily influenced that an eye color can make you who you are as a person. To me that was not surprising, but when I saw that adults could be influenced just as easy, was very surprising to me. The part I most remembered was when the adults did not even stand up for themselves because they knew they would put down right when they say it. The adults were starting to believe that they were either better than the other or not as good. The part that surprised me the most out of all was the cognitive ability of the children changed depending on the group that they were in. If they were in the group that got privileges that day they did better cognitively than the week before and a lot better than they did when they were in the wrong group. The better the children felt the better they did cognitively in school. So with this I came to the conclution that if there were no diversity in school that all children would be able to do the same in school pretty much. I think that teachers should learn how to do this to teach their students how everyone is equal. It changed my outlook on how I look at others and I think it could do the same to others.
Jane Elliot, a third grade teacher, knew that children learned best through experience. The day after Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, she decided to take action. Jane Elliot used what some would call “drastic” measures to teach a lesson in racism to her students. Her brown eyes, blue eyes experiment is still studied today, even after 43 years. From the program, I learned that children learn best through experience. During the experiment, children were upset. The discriminated group was visibly shaken, pouting and on the verge of tears. After the experiment was over, Elliot reviewed what had happened for the past two days. She made sure the children realized that the experiment was focused on racism. The children promised to treat everyone equally. She knew that children may just say that, then not do it. Elliot believed that allowing the children to live through discrimination themselves would have a greater impact on their lives. The scene I remember the most was an interview with Jane Elliot. She made it a point to say that “sweet, wonderful children” had turned into nasty people within the course of a day. This displays how people will treat others differently based on status. Many years later, Jane Elliot conducted the same experiment with a group of middle-aged adults. This experiment was extremely surprising to me. All of the brown eyed people were told they were better, and all the blue eyed people were inferior. The surprising part was that people actually began to believe that Elliot was saying. As she verbally attacked blue eyed people, the brown eyed people agreed that the blue eyed people were being “rowdy” and “disruptive.” Instead of sticking up for themselves, the blue eyed people were “getting out of place.” I was surprised that people could so easily turn on their coworkers. The experiment taught people not to judge others based on their appearance, or based on something you were told about them.
Child Psychology
Regan Walsh
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
I learned that discrimination is not just something that is a developing process. I first thought that developing discrimination took time. But this experiment proves that within seconds discrimination can be developed. The most memorable scene is when the children are first told that blue eyes are ready then brown eyes. The brown eyed childrens surprise and dissapointment was very evident. They hid their heads and slumped in their seats. They were very quiet and reserved and watched the other kids. The blue eyed kids were the opposite. They felt empowered and better then the other kids. They immediately started putting the brown eyed kids down and shunning them. They felt smarter and better, because they were being told that they were. The same thing in reverse effected the brown eyed kids. They felt less intelligent and less important because they were being told that they weren’t. I was surprised that it made such a difference in the kids cognitive abilities. I expected that their performance would not be as strong but I didn’t think it would makes such a drastic difference.
2. How did the negative and positive labels placed on the group become self-fulfilling prophecies? Be sure to discuss the children's body language.
The negative labels placed on the kids changed their cognitive performance drastically. They performed a third slower then usual. They slumped their posture and had frowns on their faces. Their eyes were big with sadness and discourage. Many put their heads on their desks and covered their faces with their hands. The positive labels had the opposite effect and grew each childs confidence. They had a much greater performance and were much brighter and energetic then the other group. They had better posture, smiles and laughed a lot. They were a lot more active and excitable.
3. How did Jane Elliot's discrimination create no-win situations for those placed in the inferior group? How did she selectively interpret behavior to conform the stereotypes she assigned?
Jane Elliot turned every comeback into a no win situation. She made each comeback an example of the point she was making. When someone would argue she would say that it was an example of the groups stupidity, stuburness, or argumentative nature. This made the group feel inferior and defenseless.
I learned a lot from Jane Elliot’s experiment with her third graders. Discrimination is a serious issue that the majority of people did not and do not think about very often. I learned that you truly do need to walk in someone else’s shoes in order to know how they feel. Of course with this experiment they only got a taste of what being discriminated against feels like. I learned that even though they don’t have to feel like that every day they know how minority’s feel more than the average person who didn’t undergo this experiment feels. The images that I remember most were that of the kids faces when they were told the things that they weren’t allowed to do or that they weren’t good enough. On the playground the kids looked especially sad and melancholy because they were separated from their friends and forbidden from playing on the equipment. In the classroom you could tell that the kids were upset and shocked at what was happening to them. You could read on the children’s faces that they didn’t like what was happening to them and didn’t want to ever feel like this again. The looks on these children’s faces were absolutely devastating and probably the most memorable and telling part of the experiment for most people. What shocked me the most was that Jane Elliot actually conducted this experiment on her class of third graders. Elliot is not a trained scientist yet she still felt she could conduct this experiment without harming the children. There are so many things that could have gone wrong and the children could have been temporarily scarred. I don’t think that Elliot had the authority to conduct this experiment by her self without any guidance. Luckily the experiment turned out well and taught a good lesson. All in all I think that this was a good experiment and a lot of people can learn from it and will surely remember it.
From this program I learned a lot about discrimination, racism, and
how easily people judge others who are “different” from them. I saw how when people are not the ones being picked on or out casted they don’t stand up for the people being persecuted or try to stop it. As long as they are left alone and not treated unfair they don’t bother helping those who are. I remember the adult study the most from the program. It was really surprising how grown adults who teach their students and children respect and equality weren’t even speaking out while Jane Elliot picked on members of the blue eye group. I thought that they would’ve spoke up and stood up for each other. They sat there in shock and silence for the longest time, knowing that the way the blue eye people were spoken to wasn’t right. I was even more shocked when Jane Elliot asked or consulted members from the brown eye group to side with her and agree with her about the certain behaviors blue eye people had and were showing during the class. It was shocking that the one man agreed with her and said how the woman speaking out showed exactly the behaviors Jane made up about the group. I couldn’t believe that Jane had complete power during that program and was able to persuade a group of brown eye adults that the blue eyed adults were bad or dumb. She was able to completely control their thoughts and views on each other and have them react and discriminate towards them. It definitely showed me how carried away people can become when persuaded to mistreat people of different race and gender. There really isn’t a reason for people to be so judgmental and if people could change then we could cut
down on discrimination. Discriminating against people doesn’t solve anything. Jane
Elliot expressed her thoughts and had an impact on the people in these programs.
From this program I learned the true affects of discrimination. It not only affects those that are discriminated against but it affects the discriminators as well. I also learned it not only affects people and their feelings but it affects their academic achievements and plays a part in their whole persona as well. The first scene I remember the most and learned from is when a boy was upset because another boy called him “brown eyes”. This was shocking because before this whole experiment the boy that called him a name was not mean and was never in trouble for anything of the sorts. I also found it very memorable because just earlier that day when the teacher told them of the blue eyed people being superior they automatically took brown eyes as being bad, and started to use it in the context of a negative/bad word. Another memorable scene in the program for me was the scene when blue-eyed children did better with the flash cards then the brown-eyed kids who were being discriminated. This showed that discrimination could really affect people. Throughout the program I picked up on the emotion of those being discriminated. They were hurt, depressed and just very upset throughout the whole day, however, the brown eyed kids were showing much more positive effects. The fact that because they weren’t being discriminated against made the brown eyed children feel much better and like they were superior to the others. Even though the whole situation wasn’t true they just thought it true because of what they were told. This is how discrimination is today and I believe was a great example to really experience and see the situation from a different side. The whole film managed to surprise me. I never imagined the true side affects of discrimination.
The negative and positive labels that were placed upon the children were determined by the color of their eyes on that particular day. Their eye color gave them the self-fulfilling prophecies of how they were supposed to act based on the segregation by eye color. On the first day of the experiment, the blue-eyed children were the “better” children and the blue-eyed children were given restricted rights. The next day, things were reversed. One of the prime examples where this can be seen clearly is the activity of math flashcards. Jane Elliot, the teacher of these third graders, gave the children flashcards of addition and subtraction and timed them to see how well they knew their facts. The brown-eyed kids were first. They zipped through the flashcards in “record time”, which was approximately two minutes. The previous day, they got through the cards significantly slower, almost four minutes. Jane Elliot then asked the children why they were faster the second day than they were the first day. The children replied that the collars made them slower. The kids were sitting upright in their seats and were happy and eager to answer questions and communicate with their teacher. She then took the blue-eyed kids and tested them on their mathematic flashcards. The first day it took the children around two minutes to finish them. The second day it took them over four minutes to get through them and get them correct. Jane Elliot then asked them the same thing she asked the brown-eyed children. Some of them had said the collars made them slower and some just sat there and didn’t reply at all. They sat quietly in their chairs, depressed almost; some of them slumped over looking bored. Some of them looked scared, afraid to say the wrong thing in front of their teacher. Since the “better” group was given more privileges and praised more often, their academic performance was significantly greater than the other group. The other group, the outcasts you could call them, were not treated the same as the elite group. Their recess was cut short and they weren’t given as much freedom or praise as the others. Therefore, their academic performance suffered. If the kids were not being recognized by their teacher and were looked down upon the entire time, they saw no point in trying in class at all. After the experiments were over and Jane Elliot explained the reasoning behind her study, the children then realized the effect racism can have on their community.
The children taught me that it doesn’t matter how old you are, you can still have long-term effects from the past. Jane Elliott taught the third grade children a lesson that many people still don’t understand today as adults. As young children who were all white, they didn’t understand the reality of discrimination until after the experiment, and even after it wasn’t fully comprehended. The days that the blue eyed people were the superior group, they made fun of the brown eyes and felt better by making them feel inferior. The next day when the brown eyes were superior, they acted the exact same as the blue eye group did the day before. The scene I remember most is when Jane Elliott did the card game with the children. They did it everyday and when they were the inferior group, their time was slower rather than when they were the superior group. I also remember the way the children acted when they were told they were worse than the other group. Saying that to little kids, they begin to believe it and self-esteem becomes an issue. The film surprised me because the day she chose to do it was crucial. She decided that because of the assassination, it was time to teach children from a younger age the truth and reality of the real world. If I was that young in a class where I was told I wasn’t as good as another person, I would probably cry. Hearing that from an adult who usually is so nice and helpful as a teacher, it would be hard to hear and be able to be around people like better than you. In the long run, the lesson was a good help to the kids. They were put in other peoples shoes for the day and began to understand how it felt to be less than someone else.
Mike Whetzel
Child Psych
Eye Color Experiment Paper
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
This was a very interesting lesson from the viewpoint of the study of racism. I am very surprised that an elementary school teacher thought of such an emotionally complex lesson. Jane Elliot discovered that ultimately racism boils down to an unjustified dislike or hatred of a person based on something that does not truly make people different, such as skin color. In trying to explain this to her students, she came up with a simple yet unbelievably effective exercise made to teach a lesson. By separating the students according to eye color, she created artificial segregation and made one group “better” than the other because the students trusted her authority as teacher to give them correct facts. The most memorable scene from the program to me was when Jane Elliot was questioning two boys after they had gotten in a fight on the playground. The boy with the “superior” eye color had tried to make fun of the “inferior” boy, and they then got into a physical altercation. When questioning the boys, Jane stumbled upon one of the most important truths about racism: violence does nothing to help either demographic. The innocent third grade boy admitted that even though he had hit the other student who made him feel inferior, it did nothing to help the problem. This serves as a very important lesson when the concept is applied to racism as we know it in the traditional sense. While those who are oppressed and feeling inferior may want to act out and release their pent-up anger, it does nothing to help the problem itself. Overall, I think this exercise was a very practical way to teach people what it feels like to empathize with the oppressed, and, while it may not perfectly emulate the feelings people may feel when they are discriminated against, it was a valuable tool to teach children and adults alike about racism.
Lauren Hyland
The negative and positive labels that were placed on the children had a great affect on their academic performance, self-esteem, and overall body language. The first day the blue-eyed children were told that they were superior over the brown-eyed children. The teacher influenced this by treating the blue-eyed children as if they were smarter and better than the brown-eyed children, and they even got special privileges such as longer recess time. Then the next day the groups switched and the brown-eyed children were told that they were better than the blue-eyed children. When the children were in the superior group, they performed better in every aspect. For example, during the flashcard activity the children got through all of them much faster when they were told that they were smarter. However, on the day that they were told they weren’t as smart, it took them a lot longer to complete. When the teacher asked them why it took them so much longer on the day they were inferior to the other group, the children concluded that they were too busy thinking about the collars on their neck to complete the flashcards as fast as they could. Therefore, denoting a child’s abilities has a great effect on their overall academic performance. In the same way, telling a child that they are smart helps encourage them to do better. This is because the students believed what the teacher told them and it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. When the students were told they were smart, they were encouraged to do better because the teacher believed in them to do good and therefore, they completed the flashcard activity in record time. However, when the students were told that they weren’t as smart, they believed they couldn’t do as well as the smarter students and this reflected on their abilities.
What I learned from the program was that children could be taught discrimination at a young age. The children were able to understand the comparison between blue eyed and brown-eyed people and whites and blacks. From watching this film I learned that kids in the third grade, which would be around the age of eight and nine can learn things that they will carry with them for the rest of their lives. Another thing that I learned from “A Class Divided” was that kids had to be taught in the 1960s that discrimination was wrong. The way that I grew up it was already automatically known that no one was different based on his or her skin color.
The scene that I remember the most was when the blue eyed boy came in the next day wearing no glasses because he wanted everyone to see his blue eyes. He was told that Tuesday that the blue eyed kids were better and the next day he came in not wearing glasses because he wanted to show off his blue eyes and have it known that he was better then all the brown eyed people.
The part of the film that surprised me was when the kids actually starting making fun of one another and getting into physical fights all because of their eye color. I understand that they are at a young and vulnerable age, but I don’t believe that they were brought up to be raised that someone should be made fun of just because of the way that they look. It surprised me that all the children had gotten along just fine and would always play together and would never even think about discriminating someone based on their color and then one day and an eye color changed everything.
eileen marge
I learned a lot from this program. Through this program I saw the effects of segregation. Along with how the children treated each other. The scenes I remember the most are the ones in the classroom where the teacher is telling the children that blue or brown-eyed children are superior to each other. And the scenes in the class room after recess where the children were fighting after making fun of each other. What surprised me was how quickly the children believed the teacher and how far they took the experiment. Along with this I think that it was a good idea to have the children come back years later to see the tapes. I think that by doing this it reinforced the whole purpose of the study. And even after they saw the video and had a group discussion they views that they had matched what they learned in that third grade class. They were more accepting of everyone and did not have a problem expressing their views. The children quickly took the experiment to a different level when they obeyed the views the teacher implemented when they were at recess. I think that this experiment really shows the effects of segregation and one person’s idea can turn into something huge. This experiment really should be done in all schools to help stop discrimination. Having the children do this experiment puts it on a more personal level and allows them to better understand the issue. It would eventually make everyone more accepting and help everyone to get along better. Which would eventually make the world a better place.
1. I learned from the program that even if the prejudice that people were saying wasn’t true people started to believe in it. This was proven true in both the classroom and the adult group. One of the scenes that were most memorable was when the brown eyed children were being discriminated against. Everyone began to believe in the statement “Blue-eyed children are better than Brown-eyed children.” When the child with brown eyes was called “brown eye” he got very upset and punched one of the children, who used to be one of his good friends, in the stomach. Another one of the scenes that were very memorable was in the adult group when one of the brown-eyed men was saying that blue eyed people shouldn’t even be there but he understood that they had to “put up with them”. What surprised me about this was that the man who said it was black. I thought that maybe for this reason he would have understood what discrimination was like and stood up for the blue eyed people. However, he was sucked right into discrimination and started being prejudice and rude himself. I was very surprised at this whole experiment and how people could seriously believe in the prejudices that they were told. Especially because they were being discriminated against depending on the color of their eyes which everyone knew that they couldn’t change or help. Over all I learned a lot from watching this video and thought it was a good way for others to experience first hand what discrimination was like.
Stine Rybaltowski
Miss Albanese
Psych
Child Divided
I learned fro this movie that everyone is equal. Children need to learn at a young age not to discriminate. They should especially not discriminate against others for things they cannot help, for example color. Children follow their elders, and what they are doing. Adults need to set examples for the young children to learn to be fair. Some of the scenes I remember most are the children talking to their teacher before the experiment. Then when the teacher explained that the children with blue eyes were better then brown-eyed children, the blue eyes thought so well about themselves. The brown-eyed children thought badly about themselves. Some of the children acted out and got angry at their teacher when they were told that they weren’t as good as the others. At the end the teacher explained the experiment, and they all agreed that discrimination is bad and that we are all equal. I was surprised how the children acted. When they were told that their eye color was the better of the two, they really thought they were better then everyone else. The ones with the eye color that was not as good as the others, were upset and were down about themselves. They actually fought and argued about who was better. When I was in third grade I grew p knowing that everyone was equal no matter what.
Michael Mauk
17 May 18, 2011
Child Psych
“A Class Divided”
During the film I was able to learn many things, especially about discrimination. The way Mrs. Elliot taught her lesson really made kids and adults understand how bad it feels to be discriminated against. In the beginning of the film the kids are talking about how black people are known as niggers and how they don’t have the same rights as white people do. Once Mrs. Elliot separated the class by eye color and started to discriminate to a certain color it made the kids feel terrible, that they were treated so badly. One scene that really stuck out to me was when the adults with blue eyes were kept outside for so long that they actually were about to team up and just go into the room without being told to come in. Also I was surprised how well the adults with brown eyes played along with the role. Some of them got so into it to the point where they were yelling at the blue-eyed people. Another thing that really stuck in my mind was when the little kids in the film were brought back for a reunion, several years later; they still remembered the lesson very thoroughly. Some of the people remembered their exact feelings from that lesson. In the end the film really made me realize how discrimination really makes people feel. Everyone thinks, well its not happening to me so I shouldn’t do anything, but after seeing this it made me think about how mad and frustrated it would get me if I were discriminated against. So in the end this made me realize that I should always treat everyone fairly regardless of race or ethnicity.
The movie “A Class Divided” taught me a lot discrimination and how kids don’t truly understand the concept of it. In the beginning when Jane Elliot was talking about African Americans, Asians, Indians and the children’s perspective of these people were atrocious. One of the children said people looked down upon African Americans because they were stupid just like the “yellow and red people”. This scene really shocked me because I never thought once in my life that people of different races were any different then anyone else and the fact that these children’s thoughts were so far from reality was a terrible thing to see. Once Jane Elliot started to get into the experiment by talking about all the good characteristics of blue eyed children is when the movie started to become really interesting. The blue eyed children walked around like they were more superior than the brown eyed children, almost like they were royalty. The scene that sticks in my mind is how the brown eyed children were superior and the one blue eyed boy started to fight him. When asked why he started the fight he said he was being teased (the brown eyed kids were calling him blue eyes as a derogatory term). The kids learned so much from the program and it really showed me how children are impressionable to things like discrimination. At any moment during the experiment children who used to be friends would turn their backs on each other in a second all because of the color of their eyes. It even affected their adult life because all the children when they came back to visit as adults were very open minded people and seemed very non discriminatory. All in all I think this is a great experiment to hold with young children and that it seems to have left a print in the rest of the children’s lives. It taught them how it felt to be discriminated against which is something you cant really understand until it happens to you personally.
This film taught me that discrimination could affect more people than I thought it could. It made me realize how young children can understand that discrimination is not O.K. and can be hurtful. You should not discriminate against people with things that they cannot help, such as color. Scenes that I remember from this film were how upset the children of the group that was discriminated against were. On the playground the little was unhappy because she was not allowed to play with her friends that were in the other group. When the project was over and the teacher let the children take off the collars, one of the little boys was so happy that he ripped his collar in half. This showed that the children understood how it felt to be discriminated. They knew that it was not a good feeling to not be liked and be treated equally too. The film surprised me with the way the children reacted to the teachers project. I did not think that third graders could really understand the feeling of discrimination. I think that what the teacher did was a very smart in useful thing to use for children education.
The program “A Class Divided” showed how discrimination doesn’t need to make sense for people to do it. Jane Elliot’s lesson with blue eyes and brown eyes was really interesting. It was surprising how quickly the kids began acting bad. It was actually kind of sad that those little kids were capable of so much hatred. They probably never thought about eye color until that lesson, so to see how quickly they change their behavior was shocking. I remember the scene when the boys hit the other one for being mean about his eye color. Also, later in the film with the adults was an interesting scene. Jane Elliot seemed like a total loon when she was giving the blue-eyed lady a scolding. It was surprising how the African American man was calling them all rude and selfish considering he has probably encountered discrimination before himself, but maybe he saw it as his chance for revenge or something. The way the adults acted was even more shocking than the children. They behaved like what Jane Elliot said was all true even though at their ages they should know eye color means nothing in regards to who a person is or whether they’re nice or not. When the children were older and at the reunion it was interesting to see what they were saying. It was good to see that they all seemed to have been positively effected by the experience. I would be worried they would be traumatized but they all seemed to understand the importance of the project and why it was important for them to go through it.
Lauren Fowler
A Class Divided
I learned from the experiment that prejudices are formed very easily. Mrs. Elliott influenced the prejudices and she took something simple like eye color and used it to turn the subjects against each other. People naturally, are easily biased but these children instantly changed when told that their brown or blue eyes were dominant of other eye colors. I remember the one part where the little boy punches another kid in the gut because he has a different eye color. The boy was turning against someone he was friends with earlier that day. It was crazy how something like eye color could divide a classroom. I was surprised by how quickly the children started discriminating once the blue collars were on. The children automatically acted like they were better or less equal than the opposing group. I was also surprised that Mrs. Elliott found that the children in the “good” group did better in testing. That showed that the inferior group did worse because they felt like they were inferior. This experiment has made a big impact on those kids in Mrs. Elliott’s class, they group up to be well rounded and their learning of prejudices really stuck with them. I like this experiment because it clearly teaches that prejudices are bad. The children all knew it was wrong and hopefully would live their life based on what they learned. It just proves that small differences set us all apart and nobody deserves to feel inadequate. This experiment should be implemented in most schools because there is still prejudice even today
1. I learned a lot of good information from this program. It really shows how if you actually put yourself in someone else’s shoes you get to know how they really feel and how they go through their daily life. By teaching the kids about discrimination she was hoping to change how they reacted to people different from them. I remember when the kids had to put the collar on they automatically felt less important and smart. Jane even said things to them about what they could and could not do so they knew they were in for a ride right from the start. When they were doing the flashcards it shows how the day before they got more right then the second day. The kids said how they were thinking about the collar more than their work. It was like one of the boys said,” it feels like were in jail.” The other kids even treated their friends differently when they had the collar on, even though they were the same person as before. It really surprised me how quickly the kids separated themselves from each other. They started calling each other names and ignored them at recess. I was also surprised at how much the blue-eyed kids slowed down the second day, when they wore the collar, when they were a lot faster the first day. The brown-eyed kids did better the second day when they did not have the collar on. By doing this activity the kids learned that they show treat everyone the same because everyone is the same on the inside and no one should be left out, everyone should be treated equal.
I learned a lot of things from this program. It was very motivating. It taught me that if you believe that something is wrong, no matter what you can always make a difference. Although this study could be highly controversial today, it makes a difference. This happens in true life. When people act out this study, they are acting out their thoughts and preconceived judgments of others. When judgmental people see how unfair their thoughts and actions are, they will be embarrassed and feel ashamed. Hopefully they now will make an effort to break the trend of discrimination.
I thought this study was very good, and the teacher is very wise. She was right to say her piece, and if anyone would try to disagree they would be in the wrong.
What I remember the most is the children session, and then the adult session. How people would be more confident in themselves when they were the dominant people, and had low self-esteem when they were the underdogs. The same trends existed in both. This is a very real study of how real life discrimination occurs.
This video was eye opening to the inate ability individuals have for hate. A classroom of seemingly friendly children turns hostile with the slightest bit of favortisum. The children instantly turned on each other saying they were better than the other. The program showed me that individuals can have an outward hate if it makes them feel better about themselves. We also are quick to join in on others opinions even if we do not agree ourselves. We find the need to join in with crowd for fear of rejection. The scene that sticks out most in my mind is the scene where the children are wearing the fur collars and they are asked to switch. The children who were previously discriminated against did had a look of revenge. They wanted to get back at the children who had discriminated against them. I was surprised at how easy it was for the teacher to get the children to turn against each other. They appear to be friends at the beginning and towards the end they are not. It is also shocking at how quickly the adults do as well.
“A Class Divided “
The Program displayed how the influence of others can really affect the way people live there lives. For example just because the teacher told the different groups that one was better than the other then the better ones began to degrade the others and they did better with their vocabulary words. Discrimination can affect your daily life. You can fall into the views that others have for you and maybe not strive for goals and have little motivation. They may not try in school or be self conscious about whom they are and what they are good at. The scene I remember the most is when the brown eyed boy punched the other in the gut because he was called a name. the part that surprised me was how the kids became so mean towards eachother and completely turned on their best friends just because of what the teacher told them.
The program showed a new view on discrimination by separating the class by blue and brown eye color. This program taught the children how it feels when you are discriminated against by any means. They were put in the place of someone else’s shoes that are discriminated against all the time based on the color of their skin. The lesson was on Indians so she metaphorically had the children walk for a day in an Indians moccasins.
One scene I remember the most was when one of the brown eyed children punched a blue- eyed child on the playground during recess for calling him “brown eyes.” Because they were told that brown -eyed people were inferior to blue eyed people, the brown -eyed child took that as an offense. If he had not been told by an authority figure (the teacher, Mrs. Elliot) that brown-eyed people were inferior, then he wouldn’t have believed it and being called that any other day, he would not have been offended at all. These kids were also good friends the day before, but just because they had been told one of them was more important than the other, the blue-eyed child started to act mean and insensitive to the brown-eyed child. The blue-eyed child also said that he felt like a king because he was superior and was believed to be more important.
The part I thought was surprising about the movie was the test scores. The kids that were marked as being inferior then the other scored lower than when they had taken the same test the day before and had earned a higher score on (the day they were marked as superior.) This result happened for both groups. Scores also continued to rise after going through the whole program. From the program, the kids had gained a better sense of self realizing they were just as important and capable of doing as well as any other kid whether they had blue eyes, brown eyes or black, white, or red skin.
I learned some important lessons from this program and also learned a little bit more about people, in view of differentials, in certain situations such as being discriminated against. I learned that people, when threatened, turn defensive and ruthless toward the threatening people. I also learned that after this program, the people within the experiment came out with a life lesson learned due to their experiences from walking in another person’s shoes.
The scene I remember most from this program include the little boy tearing his collar with his teeth because he was so mad at being treated badly just because he had to wear it along. I also remember the rude lady who criticized the teacher and became offensive and disrespectful towards her because she felt threatened.
There were very surprising outcomes from this program that I would have never expected to rise from a simple “blue-eyes/brown-eyes” experiment. I was shocked when two kids in the third grade class actually got into a physical fight on the playground due to suspected belief of superiority. I was also surprised by the math quizzes results when the inferior kids did poorly on their quiz while the superior group did significantly better on the same quiz. What surprised me the most was the fact that when the groups switched the next day, the old-inferior group (but now superior) did radically better than the day before and the old-superior/now inferior group drastically worsened.
Julie fowler
After the assassination of MLK Jr., a new outlook on discrimination swept the nation. Discrimination was not in the background and thrown to the side anymore. This issue was becoming larger and being challenged more and more each day. Even teachers were becoming infuriated and decided it was time to teach their students the real hurt and destruction of discrimination, especially a certain teacher in Iowa. Mrs . Jane Elliot, a 3rd grade teacher from a small, all white town, decided to teach her class a lesson the very next day after his death, a life-long lesson that they would never forget.
Mrs. Elliot decided to change up the lesson plan and create an environment that divided the class into blue eyed kids and brown eyed kids. The first day, she told the kids that the blue eyed people would be on the top and vice versa the next. She told them that they were better, smarter, nicer… etc and made the inferior kids wear collars. Throughout the day the superior kids had more privilages and were told that they were better. She created a no-win situation for them. And the same the next day when she switched the roles and had the brown eyed kids better. What happens is that when you discriminate, you create a situation in which no matter what they do, they will not win. Even when they would fight back, the teacher would just say that they were causing problems and more fighting. No matter what they did or said back, she interpreted their response to make them seem to fit the stereotype or the lesser group. This is what throws discrimination into a never ending circle for the inferior group to get out of alone. Without everyone’s help and understanding, it is very hard for the inferior group to get out. They also start to perform poorly, all of the down-talking and ridicule gets to them mentally and they start to break down. Each day it took the inferior group in Mrs. Elliot’s class more time to do the flash cards exercise and the day that they were superior, minutes less. That made it even worse for them and sent them further into their depressing moods and down-spiraling self confidence. It is also shown in the adult workshop done by Mrs. Elliot years later. It was shown on the adults even more clearly when Mrs. Elliot was arguing with the green collared woman. The woman was mad about Mrs. Elliot not using her name, but Mrs. Elliot just turned it right around into it being the woman’s fault. This was the best example of the no-win situation aspect of discrimination. This is what makes it never-ending and so cowardly for the superior group. They have no better argument than to keep reiterating an old one and turning it around to be the others fault.
When we were shown the movie A Class Divided I was shocked. The way the children responded and changed so quickly was insane. Jane Eliot had them completely convinced that they were either superior or inferior due to the color of their eyes in a matter of minutes. First she said the blue-eyed children were superior and those with brown eyes were inferior. Immediately the brown-eyed children began to change their posture, slouching down in their desks ashamed of the color eyes they had. At recess two children got into a fight because a boy was called brown-eyes, which before would not have been an insult but now was considered horrible. The blue-eyed did exceptional on their flash cards having been built up so much by Ms. Eliot, while the brown-eyed children did worse on the flash cards, very slow and somewhat stuttering the answers slowly, unsure of themselves. The next day Eliot switched the roles, stating that she was mistaken the day before and brown-eyed people are really the superior ones. A blue-eyed boy, thinking he would still be superior had purposefully not worn his glasses to better show off his “dominant” eye color. As soon as he learned the roles had switched he became very embarrassed and the way he was acting was the complete opposite now. This changed the attitudes of the children drastically again. On this day the brown-eyed children improved on their flashcards by about 5-10, while the blue-eyed became slower by 5-10. They told their teacher that they couldn’t focus because all they could think about were the collars on their necks and how they would never be as good as the brown-eyed children. The blue-eyed who had been happy and outgoing the day before were now timid and kept to themselves, afraid of being ridiculed by the brown-eyed superior children. This study shows that labeling groups of people a certain way can psychologically trick them into thinking either better or worse about themselves. Those who are put in the inferior group tend to act out more because they are said to be more violent. Without any labels we would all be the same. We’re all equal no matter what your culture, religion or color. If more people could understand that we are the ones causing problems by labeling people the world would be able to get along better.
Alex Kenney
2. How did the negative and positive labels placed on the group become self-fulfilling prophecies? Be sure to discuss the children's body language
The movie “a class divided” shows how Jane Elliot, a teacher in Iowa, taught her third graders about discrimination. She did this by having them walk in the shoes of a discriminated group. One day brown-eyed people were the superior race, and the next day blue-eyed people were the superior race. When the brown eyed people were the inferior race, Mrs. Elliot convinced them they were slower than the blue-eyed people and they were not aloud to interact with the blue-eyed people at recess. When the brown-eyed people were inferior, they acted inferior. They did worse on a test that they had taken the week before. It also took them longer than usual to do an activity withy Mrs. Elliot. The day the blue-eyed people were inferior, the same results were shown. They did worse on tests, and acted inferior to the brown-eyed people. The test results and the way the children acted showed that labels could become self-fulfilling prophecies. When an authority figure, the teacher, told a certain group of people they were worse than another group of people, they acted that way. The days the groups of brown or blue-eyed people were they superior race, they acted that way. They did better on tests, and were quicker at activities that Mrs. Elliot did with them. This activity not only showed the children about discrimination and why it is wrong, it pointed out something important about self-fulfilling prophecies. When someone is told repedetdly by an authority figure that they are stupid, or inadequate, they may start to act in that way regardless what they were like before they were told that. This shows that it is important to encourage small children, and actually all people. No matter what color or race someone is, it does not make him or her stupid or inferior. When you are told that you are something all the time, you start to believe it. Self-fulfilling prophecies can be detrimental to people. This was shown in the third graders when they acted according to the day they were inferior and superior. This is also shown in real life. When the blacks were heavily discriminated against years ago, they probably started to believe they were stupid and whatever the white people and others called them. The truth is that black are not stupid, they can be just as smart as any colored people and it is unfortunate that self-fulfilling prophecies would get in the way of that.
This experiment was an interesting one to watch. I believe it taught the kids a valuable lesson of life. It was an important thing for them to learn and I think Jane Elliot did a good job of teaching her class this lesson. It taught me that people can easily be influenced that they are better or they are worse. In reality the kids didn't discriminate against each other. Once their teacher told though, they believed it. It was amazing to see their reactions to the two scenarios. The kids who had the upper hand for the day,acted better, did better on learning activities, and even began putting the other kids down. Even if they liked the other kids the day before they no longer accepted them when they were placed in opposite groups. The kids who were in the discriminated group did not do as well in class and you could see on their faces that they were upset. The part of the film that surprised me was how easily they could be convinced that these labels were real. That they truly believed it.
Olivia Carlsen
Brown/Blue Eye experiment
This video was very insightful for me. When Jane Elliot discriminated the children by their eye color they full into the characteristics she was pegging them as. The first day the blue eyed children were the best and brown eyed children were lower. The blue eyed children got 5 more minutes at recess and they were allowed to drink out of the water fountain. The brown eyed children had to stay inside and fill up their own water bottles. By telling the brown eyed children that they were not as smart as the blue eyed children they started to believe it and became self-fulfilling prophecies. When she did flash cards with the children the blue eyed children were faster and the brown eyed children performed at slower times. When she asked the brown eyed children why they were slower they hung their heads and said it was because they were dumb. The next day the blue eyed children came in all confident and some children didn’t wear their glasses to show their blue eyes. When Jane Elliot told them that she lied and that the brown eyed children were better the roles started to reverse. The brown eyed children kept their heads up and performed considerably better on their flash cards then the day before. The blue eyed children performed as the brown eyed kids did the day before, slower. In both instances, whoever thought they were “better” showed it in several ways. They used the other children’s eye color as an insult and used it against them. They wouldn’t let the less worthy children play with them at recess either. This showed the children how other races feel when they are discriminated against.
Natalie Pesetsky
What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
From the program, I learned how small differences could have big effects. Children in third grade are too young to understand the concept of empathy in terms of discrimination. They are easily influenced by authority figures, especially parents. It is easy to be affected by the thoughts and opinions of others, especially when the majority of society shares the same ideas. Whether they are selfish or just plain ignorant, people of an older age cannot always express empathy either. At the time, the issue concerned discrimination against blacks and Indians. To allow these younger children to have a better understanding of a morally corrupt happening, Jane Elliot created a mini society. She chose to focus on a lesser characteristic within her own classroom. The students were segregated by the color of their eyes. I remember clearly the moment when a boy hid his face in his arms. The situation was so emotionally overwhelming, he escaped the only way he knew how. It is a shame that blacks and Indians felt that way. The feelings they must have shared in common with the children that day was even more prevalent within the honesty of a young child. Children in third grade are more open with their feelings and emotions. Of course, it surprised me when the children were so upset by just their eye color and took it so seriously.
Natalie Pesetsky
What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
From the program, I learned how small differences could have big effects. Children in third grade are too young to understand the concept of empathy in terms of discrimination. They are easily influenced by authority figures, especially parents. It is easy to be affected by the thoughts and opinions of others, especially when the majority of society shares the same ideas. Whether they are selfish or just plain ignorant, people of an older age cannot always express empathy either. At the time, the issue concerned discrimination against blacks and Indians. To allow these younger children to have a better understanding of a morally corrupt happening, Jane Elliot created a mini society. She chose to focus on a lesser characteristic within her own classroom. The students were segregated by the color of their eyes. I remember clearly the moment when a boy hid his face in his arms. The situation was so emotionally overwhelming, he escaped the only way he knew how. It is a shame that blacks and Indians felt that way. The feelings they must have shared in common with the children that day was even more prevalent within the honesty of a young child. Children in third grade are more open with their feelings and emotions. Of course, it surprised me when the children were so upset by just their eye color and took it so seriously.
I learned that third graders can be taught about discrimination and it being wrong from an early age, not only that they are being taught it but they also understood it. The scene that I remembered the most was when the one girl was really upset at recess because she could not talk to her friends who were in the brown eyed group and how her friends had completely turned against her just because of her eye color and because someone of higher authority told them to. Another scene that I remember the most was when the one boy was talking about how great it felt to be in the better group and to be above them. It surprised me how easily the third graders were susceptible to this project and their opinions could quickly could be changed based on an adult's. I think that third grade was a good age to teach this because it is right around the time that they should be able to understand and gain something from it. It was also surprising to see that none of the third grades that had been in the "lower group" stuck up for themselves or tried to fight back and how their grades were higher when they were in the better group, and how they dropped as soon as the were assigned to the discriminated group. The kids automatically put themselves down when getting told they would be in the group that was bad. I learned from the movie that this experiment just goes to show how discrimination really does affect people’s self-esteem, even if you are only in third grade.
2. The experiment on how labels affect a person’s, not just child’s, life. When Jane Elliot decided to do this experiment after Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination, she was not just helping a small class, but the world. She broke the class into two groups, blue eyed kids and brown eyed kids, and made it so that on day one the blues would be better than the browns. The kids followed suit into their stereotype, whether good or bad.
Since the blue eyed kids were labeled as better people, they behaved as such. They scored higher on tests and accomplished assignments faster than they were doing before. They put themselves before the browns and even called them names. The label “brown eyed” even became a derogatory saying. Browns really started to believe that they were inferior to the blues. They really acted the part. Browned eyed kids started to do poorly in school and really started to feel depressed by the end of the day. Their attitudes were not the only thing that was altered, but also their body language was changed. Blues acted more dominate by standing taller and keeping their heads up. While Browns shrugged, had their arms crossed, and seemed to be quieter.
On the second day, Elliot changed the roles around: the blue eyed were now inferior to the brown eyed. When the blues walked into school that day after a night of being number one, they must have walked in with stride since most of them seemed to dress better than they were before. But when Elliot broke the news that they were in fact inferior, the pride turned to shame. They did worse on tests, slower doing assignments and did not try as hard. While the blues down spiraled, the browns were excelling. They beat the times that the blues set the day before and were acting like they ruled the place, not the other way around like the day before.
This study can help us understand the significance that labeling has on people. This study may explain why minorities are not as successful as majorities most of the time because it is that they expect less from themselves from how people treat them. It can also help in the classroom because it means that if teachers treat all their students as if they were blue eyed on day one of the experiment, than maybe all students would excel.
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
What I learned from this program was that discrimination can be taught to young children and be understood. Jane Elliot taught discrimination in ways that a child could easily and truly understand. Making the children the subjects of discrimination helps them to feel the true hurt from discrimination. The scenes that I remember the most are when the blue eyed boy with glasses did not wear his glasses the next day. He felt that he wanted to show off his blue eyes since his teacher told him blue eyes are better than brown. I also remember when the children were told that no eye color is better than the other and they can take their collars off. The children all put their arms around each other and were so happy the discrimination was over in the classroom. The children all understood that different eye color doesn’t mean you can be treated just as skin color doesn’t mean you can be treated different. The parts of the film that surprised me was when the children got in a fight because of their eye color. One boy told Jane Elliot that another boy called him a rude name. The name the boy called him was brown eyes. This was on the same day that the class was told that blue eyes are better than brown eyes. That was a truly surprising part of the film for me, that in the same day discrimination and rude words were exchanged. It was also surprising that brown eyes became an insult because of the discrimination.
Molly Dunlap
1. I learned most from this program how easily influenced children can be by things. Most racism that people hold is probably learned at a young age. This shows me a lot of why people are racist. It is taught by the parents a lot of times. At a young age children will really believe mostly everything their parents tell them because they are such a big influence and role model in the child’s life. So, if a parent is racist and makes racist remarks around his or her child, the child is most likely to pick that up and believe it to be the truth that he or she is better than someone else just because of skin color. This is very dangerous and makes it even harder to stop racism if we know that a lot of it is taught and learned at an early age. One of the scenes I remember most is the one in the beginning before the experiment even took place. The teacher asked about discrimination and asked the class to tell her what it is. A lot of the third graders said some rude things toward black people and other races as well. They said the “N” word like it wasn’t bad at all and these children are only in third grade. Another scene that sticks out in my memory is when two boys were talking about how one on the playground hit the other boy just because he had different colored eyes. These boys seemed to be friends before this experiment but as soon as you put it in their mind that one was better than the other they turned on each other. The part of the film that surprised me the most is how easily the children seemed to turn on each other. If you tell a blue eyed child he is better than a brown eyed child he started right away acting superior. The brown eyed child started feeling more self conscious and I’m surprised that it even affected them academically. It is so strange how a little experiment like this can have such a huge impact on someone’s life.
A Class Divided was a great way to show racism in the classroom, especially because it was done so differently then just adult African Americans being segregated. Jane Elliot used her third grade class to help show them and the viewers of the video how segregation can affect a person not just emotionally but how they perform in certain tasks. What really surprised me in this video was how much the children’s’ self-esteem was effected just by a simplistic statement of saying you are not as good as blue eyed as someone with blue eyes. Or you are so much smarter than someone with brown eyes. For example when the kids were doing the exercise with their teacher, I can’t remember specifically what subject it was, brown eyed children(who were the ones who were told they were dumb) took so long at first to complete the exercise. But when told the next day that they were the smarter one’s, the kids’ finished the task in almost a minute less. This is very surprising to me because I never really took into account how much racism affects you mentally and makes you think you are actually less smart than someone else just because of their skin tone. I guess after being told that you aren’t as good as someone else so many times day after day you start believing it.
There were a couple scenes I remember vividly from the movie, the first one was at the beginning of the movie and it was when Mrs. Elliot first started telling the brown eyed students they weren’t as smart or capable as the blue eyed students. The expressions on their face just automatically showed the effects of racism. Some students started to get a look of shame, some sad and some even looked very unsure of themselves. While the blue eyed children were so happy, up beat and self confident. They just radiated the emotion of feeling better than someone else, especially when they were told they get more recess or an extra lunch. It was such an eye opening experience to see little kids express the real feelings of racism so openly. The next scene I remember was the one I explained in the first paragraph having to do with the children and the exercise Mrs. Elliot gave them. It was mind blowing that kids would act so differently in a matter of a couple of sentences to pump them up or tear them down. At first brown eyed kids were told they were worse then the blue eyed, so they approached the task of knowing they wouldn’t be able to do it as good or as fast. But the next day they did it so quick and with such confidence, it was like a complete change from the day before. This just seemed so crazy to me that you could manipulate someone’s mind like this to make them feel a certain way. The last scene I remember was at the very end of the movie when Mrs. Elliot told them they were all equal and that no one was better then someone else. The kids jumped for joy and tore those horrible collars that brought them down to shreds. The one boy even chewing at his with so much anger because of how much he hated how it felt.
What I learned from this movie was the many different effects racism has on people. Nobody should be discriminated or seen as a lesser human then someone else with a lighter skin color or different bodily attribute. It’s a horrible thing to do and can really destroy a person mentally and probably never recover from. Those were some dark times for early Americans but hopefully we can put all the racism behind us and live as a happy EQUAL country.
A Class Divided showed a very clear example of the effects of segregation and “racism” in the eyes of young children. This experiment showed how impressionable young children are just by the ideas and views of adults. Through this, we saw that these third graders easily pushed away the group that the adult said was less important. The scene I remember most is when they were discussing the recess incident. When the boy punched the other just because he was using the color of his eyes as an insult. This stood out to me because this seems like something that wouldn’t cause another individual to stand out in society. Another scene I remember is when the children were talking about the experience at the end. They all said that it helped them realize that all people were the same no matter what the color of their skin, or in this case, eye color. Jane Elliott said that she believed they would live with this in mind for the rest of the year and whenever they were in class, but she wasn’t sure how long they would live with it afterwards. This was a good thought of hers because it would be difficult for a 9 year old to live with thoughts about a specific race and equality when their parents have a complete opposite view. The part of the film that surprised me was when they did the experiment on the adults. At that age, it surprised me that they would really think differently of coworkers just because someone “said too.” Another thing with this is the fact that people didn’t speak up when it was all beginning. As we grow up we are always taught to speak up and out if someone was being mistreated. I know that it is difficult to be alone in a crowd and stand up for what’s right, but a group of adults should have enough respect for one another to do so.
Kelly Maguire
The documentary, “A Class Divided” is about a teacher from Ricetown, Iowa named Jane Elliot who decides to teach her class a life-changing lesson about racism after the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968. In her lesson she wants her children to truly understand what racism is and learn what it feels like to be the one who is discriminated against. This lesson took place over the span of two days. On the first day, Jane Elliot split her class into two groups, the “blue eyes,” and the “brown eyes.” On the first day the “blue eyes” were better then the “brown eyes” and therefore they had more privileges. The following day, the roles were switched.
The negative and positive labels that were placed on the groups became self-fulfilling prophecies. Depending on the day, the group that was “better” actually started to believe that they were better and therefore, they treated the other group like they were less important then they were. The students started fights with one another at recess and were insulting each other in class. This was all because of a difference in their eye color. On the second day a “blue eye” boy came to school without wearing his glasses because he was proud to be “blue eyed” and he wanted to show it off, this shows how the children actually started to believe that they were better then someone else based solely on the color of their eyes.
This experiment proves that discrimination does have an affect on a person’s performance. The children that were “better” that day had a tendency to also perform better in school that day whereas the students who were being discriminated against performed poorly. This shows how the students began to truly believe that you could judge a person based on the color of their eyes.
The negative and positive labels placed on the groups became self-fulfilling prophecies because the “better” group actually began to believe that they were more important than the other group. Also, the group that was being discriminated against began to feel poorly about themselves and did not perform as well in school that day.
1. What I learned from this video was that we as a people should not judge or discriminate against someone of a different race. We are all God's children, and He has no favorites, so why should we act like one group of us is superior to another group? It's a huge problem for us right now, and I'm glad Jane Elliot taught her young students early that racism is a horrible thing. I specifically remember a scene from the video where the kids had just gotten back from recess and Mrs. Elliot addressed two boys who had a fight on the playground. The blue-eyed student had taunted the brown-eyed student which instigated the brawl, and Jane did a very good job of explaining that fighting and calling each other names doesn't solve anything and that it's just a lose-lose situation for both parties involved. The fact that 3rd graders could show the same malice and hate towards their fellow classmates and friends that a racist white man could show towards a black man just because they were a little bit different surprised me the most. I had no idea that it could start as early as that grade level, which is why racism should be wiped out in a child's early years. It's the influence of the parents and people around them that sets the bar for how a child will act towards a person of a different color.
1. The video with Jane Elliot’s third grade class brought up an important realization about discrimination. When people face discrimination, they feel they have no voice and fall into the stereotypes connected with them. Jane Elliot’s third grade class teaches viewers a valuable lesson about how discrimination affects people in various ways.
In this video program, one can learn how demeaning discrimination can be for a person. Judgment based on physical appearance can have emotional effects on people. The third grade class learned through experience how terrible it feels to be discriminated based on a physical trait. Students were told people with a certain eye color have certain abilities, whereas students with another eye color have other abilities. Jane Elliot, the teacher, told her students that brown-eyed people are not as intelligent as blue-eyed people. Later she reversed this statement so all the students experienced discrimination. Students discriminated fell into the stereotype because they were emotionally affected by the judgment; therefore, not performing to their full potential in the classroom. Students not facing discrimination performed better because they felt good about themselves. An example of this action would be their mathematics exercise. While the discriminated students slowly completed the flashcards, the non-discriminated students quickly completed the task. This role reversed after the students were told the discrimination was switched. These results can be surprising due to the age of the students and their tendency to fall into the stereotype.
Overall, this video program was a useful tool in describing the effects of discrimination on the individual person and group as a whole. No one appreciates discrimination; therefore, making it a demeaning and ignorant remark for someone to say. Everyone deserves to be treated equally because no one enjoys how emotionally scarring discrimination and be.
Erin Gouge
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
From this film, I learned how kids are easily persuaded and how much they look up to their teachers and parents. In this experiment, I learn that the kids really do not know anything about discrimination but just go off what their elders say to them. The third grade class became easily divided amongst them and started their own microcosm of a world in their own third grade class room. By just being a innocent bystander, I saw that their attitudes all changed and how they interacted with each other. Within a day of this experiment, the kids started to lash out at each other and started fights over what color eyes you had. Kids are easily persuaded into what adults say and it shows me the effect we have on the next generation because they watch what we do and think its okay. Our generation is a huge role model for the next generation. Together the kids were happy and united. When they were separated, the children became hostile towards each other just like the “blacks verse the whites.” The scene I remember the most is when a kid with blue eyes comes in the next day without glasses on because he wanted to show off his blue eyes. He wanted to show off this superiority to the brown eyed children. When his teacher called him out in class, he was embarrassed because they switched the dominating eye color from blue to brown. In the film the only thing that surprised me was the fight on the school grounds. I mean I knew they were not going to be friends with each other but I did not think they would fight over it physically already within a matter of hours. Also the kids doing the flash cards would get better if they were the superior eye color that day. This was a very good video to show every year and I have learned a lot from it.
From this film, I learned that many children back then displayed prejudice behavior without understanding the real meaning behind it. The program showed that the children felt indifferent towards African American people mainly because of how their parents acted towards them. I also learned that children need to be taught at an early age that racial discrimination is wrong. They should be taught that everyone is equal. The impact of this program had a great influence on the children, and it clearly taught them how others felt when they were judged for basically no reason except for how they look. The scene I remember the most is the first time Jane Elliot separated the class between eye color, and she said that the blue-eyed people were superior to brown-eyed people. I noticed that the brown-eyed children really took it to heart and were affected by the entire situation. The blue-eyed children took advantage of their superiority and instantly turned on their friends. Jane Elliot asked a brown-eyed kid about the incident on the playground where he punched a blue-eyed kid in the stomach for mocking him. The brown-eyed kid admitted that punching his classmate did not make him feel better about himself in any way. This showed that the kid understood how making prejudice comments can hurt someone else and he didn’t like being in those shoes. These children tried to follow the rules given, but in the end whoever was in the inferior group could do nothing to prove that they are just as good as the superior group. But I think Jane Elliot’s motive was to try to teach the children about accepting those who are different and hopefully continuing into adulthood. What surprised me was how easily the class could turn their backs on each other. As soon as the superior group was given, those children immediately had self confidence and could perform tasks easily. The inferior group became negative, fearful, and struggled with their activities. It surprised me that both children and adults react in the same way whenever it comes to social status, and also that this exercise had a lasting impact on the children as they carried this lesson into adulthood.
From this film, I learned that many children back then displayed prejudice behavior without understanding the real meaning behind it. The program showed that the children felt indifferent towards African American people mainly because of how their parents acted towards them. I also learned that children need to be taught at an early age that racial discrimination is wrong. They should be taught that everyone is equal. The impact of this program had a great influence on the children, and it clearly taught them how others felt when they were judged for basically no reason except for how they look. The scene I remember the most is the first time Jane Elliot separated the class between eye color, and she said that the blue-eyed people were superior to brown-eyed people. I noticed that the brown-eyed children really took it to heart and were affected by the entire situation. The blue-eyed children took advantage of their superiority and instantly turned on their friends. Jane Elliot asked a brown-eyed kid about the incident on the playground where he punched a blue-eyed kid in the stomach for mocking him. The brown-eyed kid admitted that punching his classmate did not make him feel better about himself in any way. This showed that the kid understood how making prejudice comments can hurt someone else and he didn’t like being in those shoes. These children tried to follow the rules given, but in the end whoever was in the inferior group could do nothing to prove that they are just as good as the superior group. But I think Jane Elliot’s motive was to try to teach the children about accepting those who are different and hopefully continuing into adulthood. What surprised me was how easily the class could turn their backs on each other. As soon as the superior group was given, those children immediately had self confidence and could perform tasks easily. The inferior group became negative, fearful, and struggled with their activities. It surprised me that both children and adults react in the same way whenever it comes to social status, and also that this exercise had a lasting impact on the children as they carried this lesson into adulthood.
I learned that the blue eye brown eye program is a perfect way to teach the lesson on discrimination to a young group of kids. Mrs. Elliot teaches her lesson according to what color eyes you have, one day brown eyes are better then blue eyes. The brown eyes get 5 more minutes of recess, and get special treatment. While the blue eyes don’t get to use the playground equipment and don’t get to drink from the water fountain. Throughout the day the blue-eyed people were constantly being told that they weren’t good enough and this affected their test scores. This goes to show that the works of discrimination affects people in ways we might not be able to tell. If you keep telling people that they are not good enough, they might actually start to believe and this disbelieve effects every aspect of their life. The one part of the film that surprised me was the fact that the children even got into a fight on the playground. For even one day they children being discriminated against could not stand that ridicule they were getting from their fellow student that were so called superior. I could not imagine the fact African Americans had to go through that everyday at one point. The humiliation of being called names and constantly being put down, I do not know how people could do that peacefully. The kids in the class were so easily persuaded that they were better that it was kind of scary. I think in the movie it only took one mourning for the children to believe that they were superior. Hopefully this program teaches these young children that discrimination against someone just because their skin color, race, or religion is not right.
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
From the program, I learned the power of influence that a teacher can hold over his or her students. Especially at a younger age, children are more vulnerable to believing everything that adults say. The scenes that I remember the most are the scenes where the children use the n-word. It is so socially unacceptable to use this word nowadays, except in the hip-hop world. I also remember strongly the scene where Jane Elliott announces to the class that the one child’s father kicked him. Now, family troubles are more confidential, and it is not okay for a teacher to tell the entire class about one kid’s problems. The film surprised me when I saw that, on the second day, the kids completely reversed roles. They gave in entirely to the prejudicial expectations, and they did not even know why they were doing it. I felt sorry for the kids, and I was also embarrassed for them because they were so totally wrong. The negative and positive labels placed on the group became self-fulfilling prophecies because those who treated the “blue eyes” poorly the first day were then treated the same way the next day when the “blue eyes” were superior. The same is true for the opposite group; the “blue eyes,” who were mistreated the first day, got to have a sort of revenge on the “brown eyes” the second day. This surprised me because I did not expect the children to believe so fully what their teacher had just told them.
2. How did the negative and positive labels placed on the group become self-fulfilling prophecies? Be sure to discuss the children's body language.
This experiment was a great way for kids to learn what it is like to walk in other people's shoes. The kids took everything to heart and acted as though this was real life. They acted as if this is really what everyone thought of them. The kids who had positive labels thought and acted as though they were better than the rest of the class. They were more confident and performed better when it came to testing. The kids who had negative labels were ashamed and tormented by the other students. They also didn't perform better when it came to the flashcards. It took students twice as long to finish them compared to when they were the superior half of the class. The part that caught my attention was when they were asked why one day they did better on the flashcards and one day they did worse. They knew exactly why. They really had stepped into another person's shoes for the day. They thought and acted just as if they were really those people that the teacher assigned them the labels too. The kids who looked as better the first day, the "blue eyed" people treated the "brown eyed" people with disrespect. They teased them by called them brown eyes just as a white person would have teased a black person. They know that this is wrong but they continue to do it anyways. One little boy the next day didn't wear his glass because the day before he was in the better part of the class and wanted everyone to see his eyes. He did this not knowing the next day he would have been in the bottom half of the class being looked down upon. This was a great lesson to teach the children. They got a chance to see both perspectives of people and how different each group acted. This is not an example of how only the class acted but how people in real life act even still today sometimes. They now have been taught a lesson on discrimination that would stay with these children for the rest of their lives.
1. What did you learn from the program? What scenes do you remember the most? Did any part of the film surprise you?
I thought this video was very interesting. The division of the class by each other’s eye color was an excellent way to teach kids about discrimination. I learned that children are extremely adaptable in different situations. The class really looked up to their teacher and even though some children disagreed with her in the beginning of the experiment all complied with her directions to divide up based on eye color. This taught me that children’s minds are so malleable and even an experiment that lasts two days can affect them for the rest of their life. This video showed me the true meaning of a “life long lesson”. The scene I specifically remember is when the teacher, Jane Elliot, explained to her students that it is a known fact that blue eyed people are smarter then brown eyed people because the whole atmosphere in the room changed in about a split second. The camera shot the children in their desks and you could tell who had blue or brown eyes. The blue-eyed students immediately sat up straight in their desks and listened intently to Jane Elliot. The brown-eyed students their body posture showed disappointment, they slouched over in their desks, one even put their head down and tried to tune out the teacher. The part that surprised me the most was how the kid reacted to this situation, especially at recess. I thought maybe if the kids were blue-eyed but their best friend was brown-eyed they would stick up for their friend. The complete opposite happened, kids started to fight and call each other “brown-eyed” or “blue-eyed” as an insult. The children showed distinctive groups within each other only the blue-eyed would hang out with each other and the brown-eyed would group together as well. I love saying that Jane Elliot says that went something along the lines of this…“they created their own mini microcosmic society in a matter of seconds”. The children really did create their own society and showed the true danger of discrimination and the true power a teacher has.
Post a Comment