Review_Author: Jill Jacobs
Book_Author: Shirley Heath
Book_Title: Ways with Words: Language, Life and Work in Communities and
Classrooms
Reference: 1983, New York, Cambridge University Press
Date: 5/22/00
Time: 4:05:06 PM
Remote Name: 138.123.64.137
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Shirley Heath spent nine years of her life observing two working class communities in South Carolina then reported her findings and observations in "Ways with Words: Language, Life, and Work in Communities and Classrooms" (1983). Heath focused on the social environments of Roadville (a white working class community) and Trackton (a black working class community) to study their ethnographics of communication. Neither of these two communities had a population of over 150 people. In the summer, the communities would sometimes shrink to 30 people due to summer vacation or travel. The average income level fluctuated between $8,000 - $10,000. The people in these two Piedmont Carolinas towns worked for the mill. These two communities were intrinsically tied together by commercial, political and educational interests. After looking at their language learning habits, she sought to determine the effects of preschool and home environments on the learning of those language structures which were needed in classroom and job settings. This book "argues that in Roadville and Trackton, the different ways children learned to use language were dependent on the ways in which each community structured their families, defined the roles that community members could assume, and played out their concepts of childhood that guided child socialization." Religious practices, as well, were "inextricably linked to the valuation of language in determining an individual's access to goods, services, and estimations of position and power in the community."
Heath went into the homes, factories, and classrooms to identify patterns of communications and to observe ways of acquiring, using and valuing language. Throughout the book, Heath compares and contrasts the two communities in terms of how children learn to talk, their oral traditions, their literate traditions. For example, in looking at the literature traditions of both communities, the families in Trackton do not value books or reading. One is considered to be a social outcast if he/she sits and reads alone. Children learn to read as a survival skill in society, not as a means for enjoyment. If part of a church service requires reading, members are asked to prepare in advance. Reading is news-related for informaiton. Talk is valued as the main component of reading. By contrast, the people in Roadville use writing as a means of communication. Written communication is frequently used to keep in touch with family members. Reading is used for bedtime stories, and Roadville homes contain numerous books for the children. The two, small mill communities are then compared to the larger community of townspeople.
Part II of this book discusses how the teachers make use of Heath's findings in incorporating better ways to teach language to the children of the two communities. The teachers sought to bridge the gap between the home as community to the school as community. The ways of the two communities were sharply contrasted and even futher contrasted when compared to the townspeople. The interactive approach to language helped the children of Roadville and Trackton make choices in regard to the knowledge of use of language and how to link this knowledge with life choices.
Heath bridges the communities of learners to the school through her study as an ethnographer. The cultural bridging of communities and schools can only be achieved when communities are cognizant of the challenges and work to create solutions. The particular time in history offered a unique opportunity for teachers to meet the challenge of desegregation and make it work successfully for the school, the community, and most importantly, the children. Therefore, Heath earned herself a place in educational history through positive results of her study and the nation that the contexts of learning can be modified to produce create success for learners.