'Just like us'
BOUCHET ACADEMY | Kids at Michelle Obama's old school see reflection
When Principal Kim Sims of Chicago's Bouchet Math and Science Academy used to talk to kids about misbehavior, one favorite line was, "How would your parents feel about this?''
But these days, Sims is using another approach.
(Scott Stewart/Sun-Times)
"I ask them, 'How do you think Barack Obama would feel about this?' " Sims said.
The U.S. senator and president-elect from Illinois has become a new staple in schools nationwide. The American Federation of Teachers Web site already features lesson plans that weave Obama into social studies, language arts and technology classes.
But Obama has been cited in more than just academic lessons. Teachers are using him as a motivational tool.
The election of the nation's first African-American president has inspired kids nationwide, including at Bouchet, an overwhelming black, low-income Chicago public school at 73rd and Jeffery.
As eighth-grader India Allen, 13, put it: "Now that Barack Obama was elected president, anything is possible. Before, nobody could think a black person could be in the White House.''
Obama's success has special meaning at Bouchet. Back in the day when Bouchet was called Bryn Mawr, Michelle Obama skipped second grade here, attended gifted classes and graduated as salutatorian. And now, a student who walked these halls is packing up for the White House.
"She started off just like us and look how far she came,'' said eighth-grader Denika Williams, 14.
In classroom 303, where Michelle Obama once sat, the reading material in the "African American Center'' includes articles about Thurgood Marshall, Jesse Owens, Barack Obama and Michelle Obama.
Asked to write about a person who inspired them, some girls picked Michelle Obama, said sixth-grade teacher Jackie Ford.
A huge picture of Michelle Obama now hangs from one blackboard, carrying the white chalk caption "Our First Lady.''
And Barack Obama's picture is the 44th in a long line of presidential pictures that line the top of another blackboard.
"You used to tell your child, 'You can be anything you want.' Well, this is proof,'' said Ford, pointing to Obama's picture, which sits next to that of George Bush. "It's picture proof.''
Kids in seventh-grade teacher Johnny Lomax's classroom have been reading, writing and computing about Obama for weeks.
They converted the electoral delegate count for Obama into decimals, percentages and fractions. They used the last presidential debate to "compare and contrast'' how Obama and Republican opponent John McCain stood on various issues. They learned about sequences by studying the trajectory of Obama's political career.
"This is a person they can relate to,'' Lomax said.
Lomax also uses Obama to motivate kids he works with as a coach. Citing Obama's exercise routine, Lomax urges students to use exercise to work out their aggressions.
"Barack Obama walks, he runs, he works out," Lomax said. "He said it relaxes his mind. I use that to tell kids to run and work out.''
When kids are loathe to do their homework, Sims said, "I quote Barack Obama.'' She reminds them that as a child, Obama got up at 4 in the morning to study English with his mother.
At elite Whitney Young Magnet, where Michelle Obama graduated high school in 1981, British literature teacher Charlene Floreni said kids across races connect with Obama for a lot of reasons.
One Whitney Young African-American student said simply, "He has hair like mine,'' Floreni said. The son of Indian immigrants identified with Obama as "someone of color,'' she said. One white student in her class was impressed with Obama's intelligence.
"We are using him to inspire kids,'' said Sims. "He has called all of us to challenge ourselves. . . . That bar has been raised.''