A Class Divided Summary

In the film, “A Class Divided,” is based on Jane Elliott’s exercises. One of her exercises happened when she was a third grade teacher. Elliott allocated her students into two separate groups. She places the students according to their eyes color, the blue eyes and the brown eyes. She then allowed blue eye group to have extra privileges for one day and then vice versa for the brown eye group. She examined how each group treated each other. The other exercise was done to a group of correctional officers with the same concept with the eye colors. The whole exercise was to demonstrate prejudice and the effects of discrimination. The schools should experiment with the Elliott’s exercise again.

Elliott’s exercise should be integrated in today school

This exercise needs to be conducted before the students become adults because by the time the students are adults they are most likely not to change their prospective and have done the damage of discriminating someone because of their race. Kids need to be traumatized before they become racist. They need to learn how it feels to be discriminated against early on before they are influenced to be racists and act on it. For instance, when I was younger, I didn’t notice my friends by their skin color until when I got older when I was taught about the difference between us. The exercise worked. For example, when the Elliott’s grade school kids return as adults to discuss the exercise. They discussed what they have learned like how it felt to be discriminated against and how it have affected them. It caused them to feel the need deter from discriminating to others. In one case, a returning student stop stereotyping a person because she looked pass the race and realized other races doing those activities too. Another benefit from the exercise is where the student’s test scores improved. Some may argue that area with a wider span of diversity is more unlikely to suffer from prejudice and don’t see the need for Elliott’s exercise.