Thursday, November 13, 2014

The biggest take away for me in the first two chapters of this book were the surprising statistics of the amount of people that are still living in poverty.  I have always felt that if a person wanted to work in the United States that there should be jobs available.  After the discussion within our group I realized that many that are not working may be because this is how they were raised, and do not know how to break the cycle.  I realize that even in our own community there are many people that are living below the poverty level, this has to be very hard for them trying to raise kids when there are so many that have everything.  I grew up in a large family and if we wanted to buy anything we had to make our own money and pay for it ourselves, I feel there are very few families that have to do this anymore.  It was not always easy for us, because there was very little money and we made do with what we had, but I know that there are some that are less fortunate.


I have been to a conference called "Bridges over Poverty"  there was a lot of great information presented to us, that really made me stop and think about ways that I could maybe help these people.  When I see a child living in poverty now, I would like to see if there is any way that I can assist them.  I know that there is nothing that the children in these families can really do, unless that it is something that they want bad enough.  It is not always easy to get out of these living conditions, but sometimes you need to want something bad enough, that you will find a way out.  One of the things that sticks out in my mind about the reading is the amount of words that a child living in poverty is exposed to compared to those that come from higher income families.  I feel the best thing that we can do for these children is to be there for them in every way that we can, if they need a little help offer assistance, if they need a little push, do that also.


There are a lot of statistics provided in this book, not only about the education, but also the many other factors in these children's lives that could be affected because of the type of family they were born into.  We can not only think about what some of these children are doing wrong all the time, but need to be mindful of what they are also doing right and letting them know about it.  They may have many struggles at home including where their next meal will come from, if they have clean clothes to wear, and even getting to school.  if they make it to school, I hope that this is a place where they feel safe and know that the teacher is there to help them and not hinder them.

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