Asamblea y Constitución de Bayona Primer reinado de José

up, hit other children or make noise. I only chat when the teacher is out of the classroom and when I don’t have anything to do … but my friends bother me, that’s what I don’t like, they bother me when I’m studying … My teacher says that it is more important to learn literacy and maths. She says that they are all we need to pass the grade112

Marcos 6th grade

Totonaca I am more or less a good student. Sometimes I don’t

pay attention and when I am required to do some work, I don’t know what to do because I didn’t listen to what the teacher said. Since I was in first grade, I have gotten diplomas, from first to fifth grade. When we have flag salutation, you get the diplomas. I want to have another one in sixth grade113

maestro que tenemos que pedir la tarea y le digo que porque nadie vive por ahí y ya nos regaña… si no vemos al siguiente día tenemos que traer la tarea que nos dejaron y yo les digo que por ahí por mi casa no vive nadie y dice que de todos modos tenemos que tener la tarea… A mi me va regular, ni bien ni mal, le

echo ganas y hay veces que no le echo ganas porque cuando me siento con mis amigas me distraen

109 _{[Me gusta la escuela] [Me va bien] pero a veces no entrego los trabajos porque no alcanzo [porque] a}

veces ando platicando.

110 _{[me porto más o menos en la escuela] porque cuando se va la maestra nomás se quedan hablando,}

vienen a mi lugar y nomás me quedo platicando.

111 _{En el cuadro de honor nadie sale más que yo… son puras niñas}

112 _{Yo no soy así, yo no juego, yo tengo la costumbre de estudiar más en la escuela y como que ellos}

nomás se la pasan pensando en los otros compañeros, haciendo que se paren, que golpeen a los otros, que hagan desorden, que se la pasen platicando en clases y yo nomás platico con mi compañera pero nomás cuando la maestra no está y cuando no tengo cosas que hacer, pero cuando estoy estudiando, me andan molestando y es lo que no me gusta de ellos que nomás me molestan cuando ando estudiando. Dice mi maestra que vale más aprender Español y matemáticas que con eso pasa el año…

113 _{Yo soy más o menos, a veces no pongo atención y cuando me mandan hacer el trabajo pos ya no sé}

que voy a hacer, a veces no escucho lo que dice el maestro y ya por eso… Desde que entré a la primaria he sacado primero hasta quinto diploma. Cuando entregan la bandera dan diplomas, desde primero hasta quinto y quiero tener otro de sexto.

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Getting good grades, doing homework, attending school, being on time, doing the work that the teacher asks and not chatting with their classmates were the categories that most indigenous children mentioned as part of their learner identities. I argue that indigenous students have been able to navigate the school habitus by recognising the norms, beliefs, and expected behaviours. They have learned the school language to the detriment of their own mother tongues, as Thomson (2017) argues. Some children learn the school language and, therefore, are more likely to be successful and be treated better by teachers than other children, as shown in Alondra’s quote:

Alondra: There are some children that the teacher say that are more intelligent, and they get treated well, and those who they say they thick, they are treated bad....114

(Purepecha, 6th grade)

Schools reproduce a doxa of meritocracy where individuals advance based on their own merits and become part of the habitus (Thomson, 2017). Reay follows Layton’s (2009) ideas that, ‘the hegemony of neoliberalism and the dominance of free market

globalisation have created ever more pressure to construct independent, autonomous, entrepreneurial identities that repudiate the vulnerable and needy parts of the self’ (Reay, 2015, p. 15).

Schooling creates a social capital that reproduces the status quo, but is not in any way transformative. As stated by Lewis:

Capital is an important concept because it helps explain the mechanisms and processes whereby ‘meritocratic’ organisations like schools reproduce social inequality. Understanding that issues other than individual merit and effort shape school outcomes challenges meritocratic narratives that suggest that people are successful solely because of their individual abilities and that schools reward effort and talent so that those who ‘deserve’ to excel in fact do so. Absent from this story are the vast inequalities in the types and quality of schooling

114 _{Alondra: Hay algunos que los que dice el maestro que son más listos pues los tartan más bien y los}

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experiences. Children arrive at school with different socially acquired resources, and they generally leave school with similarly differentiated rewards. These inputs and outcomes are not solely (or even mostly) related to individual effort or innate ability. That is how social reproduction works. (Lewis, 2005, p. 5)

Many children share the perception that they are responsible for their own academic achievement, which depends on the amount of effort and determination they invest in their school activities, as a product of the formation of a neoliberal subjectivity. The school reinforces a certain type of capital within a meritocratic system rewarded through effort and hard work.

6.4.1 High academic achievement within poor quality school

The Simon Bolivar School on 2006 achieved very low academic results in comparison with other schools in the State of Jalisco and at the national level (Figures 6.1 and 6.2); however, indigenous children are at the top of their classes in academic achievement, with the exception of Silvia, who seems to have difficulties with her literacy skills (Figure 6.3).

Figure 6.1 Literacy achievement levels at the Simon Bolivar School (ENLACE 2006)

Figure 6.2. Maths achievement levels at the Simon Bolivar School (ENLACE 2006) 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 Simon Bolivar School State of Jalisco National

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Figure 6.3 Achievement levels among indigenous children in the Simon Bolivar School

Figure 6.4 Achievement levels among non-indigenous children in the Simon Bolivar School 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 Simon Bolivar School State of Jalisco National 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Manuel Luis Juan Silvia Luis

Miguel Andres

Children's grade Group average grade