To begin, all history or current events are understood through a particular lens. We advocate for a social justice lens—that is, telling the story of history or current events from perspectives other than those in power. What's more, we employ this lens with a liberatory pedagogy, a process whereby we do not merely learn about issues of social justice, but also seek practices that empower and liberate the student. This is an element often neglected, even in so‐called social justice curricula: to observe history or current events through a social justice lens is just a start; how we engage the material—and one another—makes for a liberatory pedagogy.

I have added the “emotional” element because social–emotional learning—the way we treat one another and deal with conflict with the school or home—is the way to teach broader lessons of society. Liberation occurs not merely in learning about issues; it occurs when we simultaneously embrace inner and outer freedom and power. So, we learn about social justice not simply by discussing the pressing issues of today or of history, or even by directly engaging with such issues and seeking to change the world. We must ground those issues in creating more just interactions and relationship within the learning space. Again, the classroom is a microcosm. A just and liberatory learning space brings forth a more just and compassionate world.

Lastly, while our children can and should look honestly at the injustices in our world, this ought not to lead to despair. The pursuit of justice ought to be a joyful endeavor, a practice of both genuine sorrow and of genuine celebration and community.

COMMUNITY

So, we begin with the formation of community as a context for liberation and as a way to support one another in our shared struggle. I would like to contrast the American, capitalist, individualistic notion of “freedom” with the deeper, collective notion of liberation. The concept of freedom in many contemporary circles has to do with one's legal rights as an individual, often contrasted with collective responsibilities. For example, debates about mask mandates or government regulation to protect against pollution are often opposed in the name of “freedom.” It is a freedom rooted in a cosmology of loneliness.

Our classroom is shaped like a circle. It honors the unique perspectives of each, values no one above anyone else. This circle is the antidote to loneliness because it allows us to find joy amid the suffering. This doesn't mean that we bypass the pain. We share the pain in community. This is genuine joy, as opposed to happiness or contentment.

The community is rooted in the shared stories about the struggles and injustices in one's community. We aren't yet at the solution stage. This is more about recognizing that the experiences on the ground in a community are valuable and need to be heard. It is important for adults to honor the wisdom and perspective of the youth and particularly important for educators who are outsiders in the community to honor the wisdom that comes from the lived experiences of community members.

INTELLECT

Just as cosmology rests on the foundation of the universe story, the intellectual foundation of social studies is the big story of humanity. And this is on the same timeline. Humanity emerges in Africa through evolutionary processes.

Understanding the thread of this single story is a beginning. It is how we see ourselves, humanity, in a broader context, and see humanity's singularity. There is no such thing, biologically, as race. Race is a social construct, invented for the purposes of rationalizing the global slave trade. For older students, approaches such as Critical Race Theory rest on this rigorous understanding of race.

But recognizing the diverse peoples and perspectives is also an important aspect of a liberatory pedagogy. Employing a liberatory lens in our approach to history and current events means that we see the story of history and politics not as neutral, but as an opportunity to seek out a more just and compassionate world. The central questions we must return to, again and again, are: What is the story being told? Who is telling it? Why are they telling it and what does it say about power?

Our intellectual engagement with social justice must also contain an epistemological element. It is often in the how a story is told, and by whom, that we can best analyze it. Because of the proliferation of the Internet and social media, it is useful to begin with media awareness. Youth, if they are old enough to use social media, can consider how much time they are plugged in. Keeping track of this for a week is a good practice. They then must consider the kind of media they are consuming and, as with history, who is telling the story and why.

At Wisdom Projects, we've watched commercials together to analyze images and the narratives various companies offer. What are they telling us about ourselves to get us to buy what they are selling? These questions can also be asked about historical or current events.

SOUL

The soul‐work of a liberatory pedagogy recognizes the social and political context for our emotional lives. Mental health is inextricably linked to our world. To reduce it to an isolated interiority is not only inaccurate; it is oppressive to those who deal with collective and generational traumas.

This oppressive attitude about mental health reached its nadir with the rise of “zero‐tolerance” policies, particularly prominent in charter schools found in black and brown communities. Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn write:

Schools everywhere—public, private, urban, suburban, rural, and parochial—are turning into fortresses where electronic searches, locked doors, armed police, surveillance cameras, patrolled cafeterias, and weighty rule books define the landscape. (Ayers and Dohrn 2000)

There has always been a racist and classist assumption in such policies, often unspoken, that certain kinds of children require more rigid discipline than others. This is rooted in the deeply entrenched beliefs about the need to control children generally, and black children specifically. The zero‐tolerance classroom is the classroom as prison; what we need is the classroom of play.

With this in mind, one approach to shared interior work are restorative practices. Rooted in indigenous traditions of community justice, restorative practices emphasize the restoration of community relationships over punishment. This is because they are rooted in the belief that we are fundamentally members of a community rather than individuals. Robert Yazzie writes:

Navajo justice is a sophisticated system of egalitarian relationships, where group solidarity takes the place of force and coercion. In it, humans are not in ranks or status classifications from top to bottom. Instead, all humans are equals and make decisions as a group … There is no precise term for “guilty” in the Navajo language. The word “guilt” implies a moral fault that commands retribution. It is a nonsense word in Navajo law due to the focus on healing, integration with the group, and the end goal of nourishing ongoing relationships with the immediate and extended family, relatives, neighbors, and community. (Yazzie 1994)

A community is essentially a web of relationships. Trust, responsibility, and compassion are required for those relationships to be maintained. When harm is done in a community, there is a severance of these bonds. Punishment does not restore these bonds, nor does labeling someone as good or bad. This does not mean that people do not do harm or should not take responsibility for harm that is done. Rather, it means that the emphasis is placed on restoring trust and repairing the relationship.

Like mindfulness and other buzzwords, restorative justice can be implemented in ways that appropriate elements of the practice without truly being a part of a restorative classroom. Restorative justice advocate and professor of education Kathy Evans explains:

[I]n our haste to implement RJ in schools, we don't lose our way. Not all programs that call themselves restorative are indeed restorative. Many are restorative‐ish; others have been completely co‐opted so that restorative terminology is used to rename the detrimental programs they are meant to replace. For example, having kids wash the cafeteria tables in lieu of suspension may be a better option, but it isn't necessarily restorative … Implementing restorative justice to address behavior without critically reflecting on how curriculum content or pedagogy perpetuates aggression is limiting. (Evans 2014)

Moreover, we must be careful not to forget the indigenous cultures from which restorative practices come. This is a matter of learning respect for the wisdom that has been accrued for generations by these cultures. But it also is about truly embracing the worldviews upon which they are based. Without this, restorative work can be merely another practice to perpetuate an oppressive system.

HANDS

There can be no justice without engaging the world and working for change. This is where the liberatory classroom truly extends beyond the walls. But a word of caution is in order. Too often, activist, or social justice, curricula skip over the holistic process of self‐discovery and development that is a prerequisite for activism.

In other words, activism must come from the students, not the teachers.

The aim of direct action by student groups is only partly to enact change; equally important is the process of shared inquiry that allows students to lead themselves into direct action. Action begins with asking students questions. What are their concerns? What is it about their world that they want to change? What makes them angry? What are the pressing questions? What questions and problems make them feel alive? If a classroom can be a space in which these questions are freely asked and answered, a space in which the students' stories are truly heard, then it can also be an effective space to organize.

OIKOS

The liberatory approach to ecology addresses the social inequities connected to the climate crisis. Rather than viewing social justice as something separate from climate change, those crises can be understood as part of the same crisis—the crisis of the cosmology of loneliness. Understandably, students from marginalized communities might feel as though the climate crisis is secondary to their daily concerns of safety and survival. Rather than making arguments against this mentality, it is most important for educators to listen to these perspectives. That said, there are also ways to link a young person's daily struggles to the broader struggles of the planet, just like the struggles of one marginalized group can be connected to another's.

Eco‐Justice

In this activity, we have the students line up in a straight line. For each “yes” to the following questions, students take a step forward. See how many students have at least four “yeses.”

1. Do you or someone in your family live near a place where there are trucks idling?
2. Do you or someone in your family have asthma?
3. Do you or someone in your family live near a landfill or dump?
4. Do you live near any factories?
5. Do you know anyone who has suffered from lead poisoning?
6. Do you or does anyone in your family have cancer?
7. Do you live in an area where there are no stores with affordable fruits and vegetables?

Have students take a pin and indicate their neighborhood. Map the neighborhoods of those who have four or more yeses and compare to those who have three or less. Would it be as easy to find people to answer “yes” to these questions in a wealthy, white neighborhood? Why?

Plants/Brand Names

This is an activity that I've led with groups of people pretty much from middle school to graduate school. The basic purpose is to better understand where our consciousness is by seeing how much we know about plants versus products.

1. Define what a brand is.
2. Describe what attracts you to certain brands.
3. Identify the impact that brands have on you and others.

Split students into groups. Ask each group to make a list of as many brand names as they can come up with in five minutes. Then do the same with species of plants.

Usually, the list of brands is much longer. Why? What does this say about what we focus on in our lives? What has more value, a plant or a brand name? Discuss the actions of certain popular brands. How does this change your perception of that brand?

Notice how often you are alerted to a brand name in your daily life? What feelings come up as you associate with these brands? Next, try to notice the role of different plant species in your life.

Economics/Ecology

Perhaps no subject could demonstrate the values of our society more than economics. We have made economics primary when it, in fact, describes a subset of ecology. Both come from the Greek word oikos, meaning home. Ecology refers to the web of relationships that support life—including us. Our primary home is the ecosystem of which we are a part. Economics originally referred to the way we manage the resources of our home. It now refers to the way the human manages the resources of the planet. Money, an abstraction of these resources, is the primary way to ascribe value to these resources in economics. How does this fail to account for the true value of life? What are your values? What are society's values? How are they different?

Gross Domestic Product

Students explore the values of our culture by studying the GDP (gross domestic product). Some may have heard of it and may know what it stands for, but few will understand what it means for our communities. For most politicians, a growing economy and GDP is the highest value. But the GDP grows for any economic activity. Together, make a list of some things that may not be so positive but grow the GDP:

• Someone gets cancer
• An oil spill
• Someone gets arrested
• A prison is built
• We declare war

Explore one or two of these that have directly affected the students' community. What does this say about our values as a society? What is the difference between equating life or existence with value and the dollar? What are the students' values?

An ecological classroom also must be structured in such a way that, as with an ecosystem, relationships are primary. Justice‐making begins seeking fairness and justice in the child's daily life. It begins with all voices being heard. It begins with relationships and community being primary.

CREATIVITY

In Hands above, we addressed what youth activism should not be—initiated and organized by adults. What, then, is activism? In part, activism is play. Activism is art. When a group of young people seek to change their community, world, or classroom, the power of their action resides in the creativity of their protests, the images and stories and songs they might use to create change.

Creativity and art can be a way to foster joy in the process. There is so much despair, so much suffering in the world. While it is important to look honestly at all this, it is equally important to avoid succumbing to despair. We can find beauty in the struggle.

Art is also a way for us to imagine the impossible. Part of the challenge of justice work is that it is often so hard to envision a different kind of world. If we look at our economic system, the values of capitalism are so deeply entrenched in the symbols and stories of the culture, it often seems inevitable, a force of nature. Another way seems impossible.

But the creativity of youth can be a way to envision this alternative world. It is important for teachers to see the classroom as a space for imagining the impossible rather than pushing realism and offering limits. The world beyond the classroom will provide plenty of limitations. The classroom is the place to dream up a new world.

The following is another form of the “I Am” poem that pays special attention to justice and transformation.

Reimagining the “I Am” Poem

The story the world has about me is … My story is …

I am (an example of the way I express my wisdom in action)

I am not (an example of an inaccurate stereotype)

I am (an example of a species of tree)

I am (something that you ate)

I am not (a brand)

I am (a person or group who has faced oppression or discrimination)

I am (one word to describe your uniqueness or gift)

I am (describe your family)

I am (describe your community)

I am (describe your world)

I used to be … Now I am …

INTEGRATION

Our world is at once given and created. While it is important to have the humility to know we cannot change or control everything, it is equally important to instill in our youth the belief that they can make change. How we educate our children, the kinds of spaces and processes our youth receive growing up, determines the world they will co‐create. Liberation begins in the classroom.

Each subject must be a vehicle for liberation, justice, and joy:

• Cosmos: Science can and should be a context for advocacy, including eco‐justice and the fight against environmental racism as well as the work to seek out more sustainable practices and technologies.
• Arts: The arts can be a vehicle for social engagement. The activist uses creativity to imagine new possibilities for the future, to critique power and create a vision that people will hear and want to follow, and to bring joy into the process.
• Spirit: An element of spiritual practice is ethics and justice‐making. The tradition of sacred activism, from Martin Luther King Jr. to Gandhi to Thích Nhâ´t Hanh, teaches us that our spirituality isn't merely about life after death or detachment, but also about making a more just world, here and now.
• Hands: There is an inherent egalitarianism in the shared pursuit of meaningful work and practical life in our classrooms. This offers a new way of being in community.

When these things come together, we are left with a world‐vision guided by justice and equality. This is a liberatory process, and one that is never quite finished. But if we enter into it with our whole selves and as a whole community, the process, even if it is painful, can be a joyful one.