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Thursday, January 10,2008
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In Shakespeare’s Spirit
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Our culture
is a disaster,” Rafe Esquith says. The fifth-grade teacher has been
upping the ante in the innercity Los Angeles school where he’s taught
for the past 25 years. In Teach Like Your Hair’s on Fire, he levels his
criticism at society’s veneration of wealth and celebrity.
“Children
are constantly being sent messages that are not in their best interest
to learn,” Esquith says. “We glorify and make heroes out of people who
I don’t think are really that heroic. I love sports and pop music, but
I don’t think I want some of those athletes and pop stars to be my
guiding force in how I decide to run my life. I would prefer they look
to their parents and maybe people trying to cure cancer to think about
how to live their life.”
As
far as he’s concerned, education seems to be divided into two equally
dismal possibilities. “On one side you have those who’ve taken all the
joy out of learning … they turn their classrooms into a Charles
Dickens’ Oliver Twist workhouse with kids grinding out math problems
all day,” he says. “And then you have the other side, which is, ‘Well,
we don’t want to take their childhood away, so we’re just going to let
them play all day long and sit in front of a television set.’”
His
book illuminates ways in which learning can be both intense and
enjoyable—an ethos that abounds in his classroom, where students tackle
high-schoollevel literature and math. Both teacher and students have
gained national and international recognition, not least of all for the
unabridged Shakespeare play they perform each year.
On Jan. 10
at 7 p.m., Esquith and his students come to Alverno College’s Wehr
Hall, where Esquith will discuss his book and students will treat
audiences to a performance of Shakespearean vignettes. For tickets,
contact the Alverno Box Office at
And
if parents are looking for further opportunities to immerse children in
the spirit of Shakespeare, they can do so at the Center Court of
Mayfair Mall on Jan. 12 between 1 and 3 p.m. Milwaukee Shakespeare and
Milwaukee Ballet team up to present “Mischief and Magic,” which will
explore the theme of dance and duel in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night and
A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
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