Inviting students to educate you about the cultural diversity in your classroom
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Transcript of Inviting students to educate you about the cultural diversity in your classroom
Inviting students to educate you about the
cultural diversity in your classroom
Challenges: There’s a cultural distance between me and many of my students...
Can you hear me over there?
...and failing to acknowledge it is inherently disrespectful...
...and frustrating.
I think all of my content just fell into
the cultural gap.
Challenge: There’s just one of me...
...and such a diversity of students!
How am I going to learn about all this diversity?
Multi-cultural
task force
Problem: Is it authentic to infuse a culture that isn’t my own into a lesson?
That’s right. And they dance like
this!
And even with adequate study, is it fair to assume that I know something about someone else’s culture?
...and now I’d like to teach you something that I’m pretty sure is true about some of
you...
It’s tough for anyone to recognize their own culture until they find out what it is not
Will you please stop talking through the whole entire movie? Stop yelling at the TV! You are ruining
this for me!
Ooooooh no! He didn’t just do that! Seriously! I would be out of there.
Wait... Are you even watching this?
Keeping all this in mind, I try to...
Remember that being culturally sensitive doesn’t mean wearing a variety of cultural hats while I teach...
...it means inviting contrasting (cultural) experiences and using them to learn about each other.
By sharing my own (cultural) experiences freely and welcome contrasting
experiences...So, how did
you ask her to marry you?
Well, I created this scavenger
hunt of memories from our
relationship and....
What? You should have taken her to
Red Lobster!
...and by creating opportunities for students to share their (cultural) experiences within the curriculum
In the story we read today, we’ll get a look
at how the Ancient Greeks believed the world began... What does the beginning
look like in your mind?
My assumptions:
• Anything that students share from their lives reveals an aspect of their culture.
• When they are sharing aspects of their own life, they are engaged
• When they are sharing aspects of their own life, they are anchoring the lesson
• When they are sharing aspects of their own life, I am learning in the most authentic way about the culture of my students!