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Education Equity Resources | Equity Literacy Institute

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View and download free resources and handouts on educational equity related to class, race, gender, and other issues

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Developing Antiracist, Pro-Human Students video

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Developing Antiracist, Pro-Human Students video

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episode 10: teacher talk with afrika afeni mills

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‎Lessons Learned: Episode 10: Teacher Talk with Afrika Afeni Mills on Apple Podcasts

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‎Show Lessons Learned, Ep Episode 10: Teacher Talk with Afrika Afeni Mills - 29 Apr 2024

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The 1619 Project Educational Materials Collection

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The 1619 Project Educational Materials Collection

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Using the concepts of area and square unit, students get to design their own apartment. Watch Kay Toliver deliver a portion of the Length and Area Activity in her own classroom. Download lesson plan below.

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Kay Toliver Classroom Lessons - The Futures Channel

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Using the concepts of area and square unit, students get to design their own apartment. Watch Kay Toliver deliver a portion of the Length and Area Activity in her own classroom. Download lesson plan below.

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This article was first published in the Journal of Negro Education in 1993. In this first person account, Kay Toliver lays out the fundamental principles that underlie her teaching methods.

Intro by Kay Toliver

Kay Toliver, East Harlem Tech, Public School Number 72, New York City

I have been teaching for over 25 years. I have taught mathematics and communications arts at East Harlem Tech, the junior high school component of Public School 72, a "school of choice" in New York City's school district four. Prior to entering the junior high program, I taught elementary grades at P.S. 72. I believe I am a good teacher because I have had many successes over the years. Yet, when others ask me why I am successful, I often find it difficult to put my reasons into words. How does one explain something that has become second nature over the years? If I had to encapsulate my methods, they would be stated simply as "teaching and learning through listening, speaking, touching and writing." Still, I probably could not explain what I mean by "good teacher" any more than I could explain what it is like growing up in East Harlem; or explain why, after all these years, I am not (as some put it) "burnt out." I can state with conviction, however, that my methods stem from my deep love of teaching, part of which springs from my larger love for learning. After 25 years, I still see myself as a student striving for greater knowledge and a better understanding of both my particular role in life and life in general. Perhaps having this frame of mind gives me my longevity, but can it be taught? I can only hope that in offering some possibilities from my methods, I will inspire others to create their own.

I. FUNDAMENTALS OF MY APPROACH - Caring

Caring is the foundation of good teaching. In my classes, caring can and does take many forms. The first form, perhaps, is in the giving of my time. Many students are under the impression that teachers are not willing to invest extra time because they have seen that when the school day ends, too many of their teachers have other things to do and are not interested in spending this time with their students. Unfortunately, where this is the case, these teachers are missing an important opportunity. I generally stay after school or come in early, depending on my students' preference, to help students with their homework or work with them individually if they have questions about the concepts covered in class. I see this as an opportunity for me to discover where students are lacking as well as to ensure they are not falling behind the pace of the class. The other side of this is that if I am giving of my time, I expect my students to invest some of their own. Recently, I have also begun to come to school early to work with students who want extra help but are unable to stay after school.

Caring also includes being a willing listener. My students know that they may come to me with problems, questions, or realizations, whether school-related or not. They view me as someone they can talk to, and I serve as counselor or preacher as needed. In turn, I share my own experiences with my students. For instance, when I came back from a summer of study, I told them of the difficulties I faced going back to school and concentrating on my studies. Additionally, my students all have my home number, and they are free to call me anytime. After all, their lives do not go "on hold" after the school day - neither does my status as a teacher. Because of this openness, my students are not hesitant to open up to me.

Often, it is only through a deep caring on the part of the teacher that a great student appears. In that regard I am reminded of a former student of mine named Xavier. When I think of Xavier, I see a talent who might easily have been missed. Anyone who is familiar with New York City's homeless shelters knows that they are terrible, and Xavier was living in a shelter on 42nd Street when he first came to my class. (I believe his previous home had burned down, leaving his family with no other recourse than to seek public aid.) He was very introverted due to his difficult personal experiences, and I suspect that the other students secretly ridiculed him because he lived in a shelter. He would not talk to anyone.

Xavier began coming to school very early in the morning to get out of the shelter. One morning I found him crouched in the corner of the hall, and I told him that if he was going to come in early he could help me prepare for class. Thus, he became my "assistant" for that year. I would help him get breakfast, and soon he started to open up and began speaking to me. The other students, seeing how much I cared for Xavier, began to gravitate toward him and include him in their conversations. By the end of the school year, he was much less introverted, and it turned out he was both an excellent student and a wonderful artist. Consequently, I managed to get him into an art program for high school.

Students like Xavier are easily missed. Their brilliance is almost buried under the problems they are having in their environments and at home. They often appear to be unwilling to learn or hopeless to teach, and many slip "through the cracks" of the educational system, never reaching or even seeing their potential. Only a caring teacher can bring out their true intelligence and vitality.

Caring is the basis on which a class can be built. If students perceive that their teachers are there to help them and willing to assist them in getting through difficulties, it is then impossible not to teach them. If they perceive that their teachers are bored with their jobs, their subject matter, or their students, then it is no surprise if teaching becomes a chore.

High Expectations

High expectations are vital to success, especially for students who are regularly told they are "disadvantaged" and who, by the time they reach my junior high school class, may have the impression that mathematics in particular is a subject beyond their abilities. That is why I tell each and every one of my students, from the first day of class, that anyone can learn math. I put them on notice that if they approach the subject with an attitude of "I can't do it" or "I don't like it," then their prophecies will probably come true. I believe every student can succeed in mathematics, even if they have never before been successful. "Forget what has happened in the past," I tell them at the beginning of the school year, "This is a new day and we will work from here." I do not believe in failure. Mathematics may be hard to learn-it takes dedication and hard work-but I let my students know two things from the beginning: (1) I am with them to teach, and (2) I expect to be met halfway.

Some children enter my seventh-grade mathematics classes unprepared. Factors such as unstable households, crime, and drug-infested communities as well as poverty help to create students with uneven educational backgrounds. These situations can make it very easy for children to do poorly in school. However, I believe I would be doing a disservice to my students if I let them use their problems as excuses for failure or for not reaching their potential. On the other side of the coin, our school system does not always have money for the supplies, equipment, and other resources that would make teaching a little easier, but I never use this as an excuse for poor teaching nor do I allow my students to use it as an excuse for poor studenting. Despite these "disadvantages," I seek to provide them with the best schooling possible. I do not pity my students' school or home situations because doing so simply will not achieve my objective, which is to make them more successful and able students. This may seem coldhearted, and perhaps it is, but I believe it is far more coldhearted to allow these children to "fall back" on their troubles and miss the opportunity to succeed.

This does not mean I am oblivious to their difficulties; I myself grew up in the South Bronx and East Harlem. I also realize that often my students lack money for paper and pencils and other essentials, but these are not reasons for failure. I can and do get them many of the supplies they need and I help where I can with their other problems because I believe the greater the problems surrounding the students, the more important it is that they triumph in their education and thus receive the key to a better life.

Creating Interest

In a home, community, and school environment that is often chaotic, students find many reasons to miss class. However, I have found that the students who come to class always succeed to some degree. Therefore, it is my job to get them "hooked," to entrance them with schooling to the point that they anxiously look forward to coming to and participating in class.

Consequently, my math classes might seem a little odd to a newcomer; certainly, my new students find them so. My classes do not follow the mold of traditional math classes. The first oddity is that I do not use the textbook to teach the class. That, in my opinion, is my job. Though I consider textbooks valuable for homework practice or extra drill problems, I have developed a general order of lessons and I use the textbook only occasionally to support me in this. Secondly, my lesson topics are not as clearly delineated as is usual. I view the whole body of mathematics study as a unified subject in my class, and therefore I present the various subdivisions as interrelated facets of the same principles. For example, topics such as measurement, volume, square roots, fractions, and decimals may be covered in the study of geometry by applying each of these subjects to geometric shapes and formulas. At other times, students' pursuit of a greater understanding of mathematics may take the class into a discussion of history, a tour of literature, or an exercise in language skills. Also, I make every effort to show my students the wholeness of mathematics and how it relates to every aspect of life in "the real world." I only present my students with problems that require a sensible, well-thought-out answer. I also point out that many problems do not have only one correct answer; indeed, it is often quite the reverse. Thus, they become problem solvers and learn the real value of using mathematics as a tool.

Many times students are still asleep when the first class starts at 8:00 AM in the morning, and I have to wake them up and get their interest. This may entail getting them to laugh, for if they are laughing at me, at least I know they are paying attention. For example, for my lesson on interior angles, I wear a "Zorra" (the female version of "Zorro") outfit made by my students. When I dramatically slash a big "Z" on the board, my students are immediately captivated and soon fascinated by the angles we begin to find in that letter. My use of costumes is not designed to turn math class into entertainment, but rather to add a little spice to the lesson and get my students' attention-even if they are only looking to find out whether or not I am crazy!

However, mathematics is not only fun and games, as my students also come to know. The fun of it must be followed by hard work, but it does not have to be drudgery. My math classes are full of conversation, with increasing amounts of idea sharing and question posing as students begin to feel that the class is theirs as well as mine and that mathematics is a subject of real value to their lives.

No Time for Discipline

Discipline as such is a foreign concept in my classroom. I have a reputation for accepting no bad behavior, which, I believe, must contribute significantly to my success. My students learn very quickly that the only thing that makes me angry is when they fail to do their best. I believe students who desire to learn will not present problems unless that desire is disappointed, so I strive never to disappoint them in that regard. As a result, my students never present discipline problems for me (though occasionally some do fall asleep in class because they have been "hanging out" in the streets the previous night). Even students who are considered "troublemakers" in other classes are wonderful students when they get to my math class.

The best form of discipline in my view is to keep students very busy, so I come to class ready to teach. As soon as they enter the classroom they are presented with a "Do-Now" problem that I write on the chalkboard. These Do-Nows are warm-up exercises to get them into a "mathematics frame of mind," and eliminate any time for nonsense. They include problems such as "see how many different shapes you can make on a geo-board" or "represent the number 43 using seven 7's and any operations." One Do-Now asked students to take several multiples of 3 (3, 6, 9, 12, etc.), multiply them by 37, and describe any pattern they noticed. Student Maria Sanchez* wrote the following response upon solving the problem: "I discovered that for every multiple of 37, the answer is 3 digits all the same numbers and the more you multiply the higher the numbers." Another student, Lucy Reyes, a seventh-grader and Special Education student, submitted the following proof, replete with a six-step diagram as illustration, regarding the area of an isosceles triangle:

I made an isosceles triangle then a (sic) made an altitude line then I cut it in half and I had two triangles then I put it together and made a square and the area is A= 1/2 b x h.

This last example is especially impressive because it shows that the student discovered for herself how the formula was derived. Most students merely memorize this formula, but in this student's case, the Do-Now heightened her understanding of the formula's origin and made it much more meaningful to her.

*Pseudonyms are used throughout this article to protect students' identities.

Performance-Based Assessment

Assessment takes many forms in my classes; yet, because I do not expect my students to learn by rote, I do not assess by rote. I do not adhere to the rigid practice of numerically graded, paper-and-pencil assessment tests, nor do I prejudge my students' performance based on cumulative report card grades or other teachers' comments. I have found that such tests rarely provide accurate measures of my students' progress, understanding, or true knowledge in mathematics; while report cards or other reports are often based on the children's previous test scores or ability (or lack of ability) to memorize. Consequently, test scores are of secondary importance to my goal of developing in my students a basic appreciation for mathematics. Many public school systems are beginning to move away from reliance on standardized tests, or at least they are beginning to question the value of such tests. I think this is very much a step in the right direction.

I believe that constant contact and communication are the best tools for monitoring and assessing student performance. They are also my tools for helping students improve their performance. Therefore, I try to create a classroom atmosphere in which students feel comfortable about answering problems, whether they are right or wrong. According to my philosophy, there is no point in a student finding a correct answer if he or she has no idea why the answer is correct or does not know how to prove it is right. In daily classroom work, my students know that they must justify each answer with a proof. Conversely, the process by which students err is equally as important as that by which they succeed. I am therefore very interested in how students arrive at wrong answers (an interest that often confuses my new students) because I believe that uncovering the reasons for incorrect answers is the key to helping students find the correct answers.

Hence, my tests are never of the "fill-in-the-blank" variety; rather, they are performance based. The result, however is that students' test papers are often as diverse as their personalities. For example, some students respond to test questions with step-by-step directions explaining the processes by which they arrived at an answer; others write their answers in narrative form or compose a story about the problem. They are also required to illustrate their answers with diagrams where applicable. This flexibility allows students to show their creativity along with their understanding. Though students are graded on the number of correct answers they provide, their ability to explain the processes through which they arrived at those answers is far more heavily weighted. Class grades are based on students' performance test scores and on the quality of the classroom and homework assignments they submit.

No student can expect to sit quietly through a semester in my class and receive a good grade at the end of it. However, any student who participates and produces excellent work will receive an excellent grade. My goal is to bring about a change of attitude toward mathematics. I want my students to learn that mathematics is not an impossible subject; that it is not something that belongs only in school or in a classroom. I know my students are succeeding when they begin to see mathematics in the world around them. I know they are making progress when they begin to write sensible explanations to accompany their answers. If I can change their attitudes and make mathematics a subject they truly understand and for which they gain an affinity, I know that good test scores will follow.

Parent Involvement

Success in the middle grades often sets the precedent for children's success as they move into high school. Yet, many parents of middle school-age children begin to take less interest in their children's education during this critical period, perhaps because they believe these children are at last big enough and old enough to take care of themselves. This could not be further from the truth. Children entering middle school must walk a difficult line between childhood and young adulthood, and parental support at this juncture is extremely important. Many of the parents of my students have told me that they cannot help their children with my homework assignments because middle school mathematics is a subject they do not understand. Others are afraid of mathematics and their math anxieties are carried over to their children. However, I want parents to understand what I do in my classes; more importantly, I want them to gain an appreciation for mathematics themselves. Their help on homework projects is always welcome, but even if they are not able to help their children with homework, a positive attitude on the part of parents can make a world of difference to how children approach the subject. A parent who is supportive and who actively contributes to a child's education usually increases the self-confidence of the student immensely.

To assist parents in this goal, I instituted "family math" sessions during parents' meetings. During these sessions I present "nonthreatening" activities to involve children and their parents in joint mathematics learning. I also encourage parents to call me at home to talk about any problems or difficulties their children are having in my class. Even when the reasons for the calls are very minor problems, I always appreciate hearing from parents because, to me, education is a mutual effort. It is always most effective when parents and teachers work together. Unfortunately, many parents are accustomed to hearing from teachers only when their child has done something bad. While I do not hesitate to call a student's parent if the child has been regularly absent or if some point of behavior should be corrected, I often call parents just to share good news about their children's performance. I am generally able to achieve a happy medium in my communications with parents by sharing with them "both sides of the coin" regarding their children.

II. TECHNIQUES AND TACTICS - An Emphasis on the Language Arts

Perhaps the way in which my approach most diverges from the norm is in its emphasis on blending history, culture, literature, writing, and other subjects with the study of mathematics. As I have stressed before, mathematics is not an isolated subject. If students are ever to view it as a tool for their futures, it will be because they understand how mathematics can be used in their lives and how it relates to their daily activities. Thus, I require my students to record, in individual journals, their thoughts about each day's lesson. In these journals they are to write about any difficulties or successes they may be experiencing in a classroom activity or note anything else they wish. For instance, sometimes, when the class is in the middle of figuring out a problem and it appears that several students are at the height of frustration over it, I tell the class to stop, pull out their journals, and write down how or what they feel about the problem. I have noted a wide range of responses, and have discovered that many of my students have difficulty expressing themselves in writing. What better way, in my view, to give them practice in expressing themselves on paper than to have them write about their troubles and thoughts in mathematics class?

Some will write, "I'm so frustrated and I wish she'd go on," or "I can't stand this problem-I don't like what she's doing." Others might make comments about my zany outfits (i.e., "Why does she dress up like [Zorra]?") or about my teaching methods. Others, such as Anna Colon, wrote the following entry in her math class journal:

I learned that a mathematical sentence is a statement that states a fact, is judged to be true or false, contains an idea. This is called logic. Logic is thinking, reasoning, and using common sense. Ex.: She fell from her bike is ...an open sentence. Another ex.: A non-mathematical sentence is 6 + 2. The purpose of using logic is in every day life because we are always thinking.

Indeed, the point of this journalizing is to get students to write! In addition to providing writing practice, however, the journals also provide me with wonderful assessments of how well students understand my lessons and how well my lessons are reaching them. By collecting and reviewing the journals once a week, I can find out very clearly how well my students are doing. Their comments often show me those areas about which students are confused or do not fully understand. They reveal gaps in instruction that I might have otherwise missed, thereby allowing me to adjust my teaching methods accordingly.

Literature often provides me with an excellent means of introducing mathematical topics and motivating students to discuss them. Students frequently read intriguing poems and short stories in my class as part of the mathematics lesson. For example, a "Dr. Seuss" story on the creation of a mysterious substance called "oobleck" provides the entry for a lesson on complex fractions. After reading a short excerpt from the story with my students, I introduce the idea of a complex substance; from there, I introduce the concept of complex fractions as it relates to the story line.

I frequently require students to give oral presentations about mathematical problems because I have found that children can often "go through the motions" of solving a problem without having any real understanding of why the operations they apply work. If a student can coherently and confidently discuss a mathematical concept or process, then I am more certain of their understanding of the solution they give for a math problem. I also assign research projects on mathematics and mathematicians so that my students can gain background information on the lessons at hand. In this way students come to learn that mathematics has existed for many thousands of years, and that it has developed in various ways through diverse cultures. Awareness of the history of mathematics and of the great minds who have made outstanding contributions to the field lends the subject a fullness and an overall importance it may not otherwise have.

Not surprisingly, my students often ask me just what class they are in; no other teacher has made them read and write in mathematics class, some protest. In response I merely tell them that the world is changing, and they simply will have to adjust. However, I have found that when students begin to succeed in my mathematics class, they also start doing better in their other classes. Often as a result of my class, students' attitudes about school, their levels of competence in all areas of study, and their confidence in themselves as students begin to change for the better.

Creating and Traveling the Math Trail

I teach in a community where the students do not hear a lot of positive comments about the area in which they live. Our school building is usually referred to by visitors as a "relic." To counter these negative assessments, I try to show my students that there is a wealth of mathematics in our neighborhood. I developed a lesson called the "Math Trail" to give students an appreciation for the community as well as an opportunity to see mathematics at work.

To create a Math Trail, the class must first do some research on the history of East Harlem. Then, they are instructed to plot a course, starting from the school plaque in the lobby of the building, that leads the class through the community and back to school, with stops along the way to visit several interesting sites and create math problems about various real-life situations. For example, on one such walk, students created a math problem centered around the number of times a bus stopped at a particular bus stop in one hour. Another concerned the ratio of "gypsy cabs" (freelance taxis) to Yellow Cabs in the neighborhood. Other problems examined the geometric shapes and the angles on the buildings we passed. One set of student-generated Math Trail problems instructs students to visit the school yard and asks questions about the mathematics to be found at that site:

1) There are 14 steps on the right hand side of the ramp. If I counted the steps every time I went up and I counted 126 steps, how many times did I go up the stairs?

2) How many steps does it take to walk from the bottom ramp to the fence across the yard?

3) How many feet of fencing is needed to cover the perimeter of the yard?

4) If the ramp takes up two-fourths of the school yard, what fractional part of the school yard is left?

To culminate the Math Trail exercise, the class prepares a book, complete with photographs and illustrations, of their Math Trail problems. Students must proofread their work rigorously to ensure that their problems are clearly written as well as mathematically interesting. Thus, the importance of grammar and spelling in expressing mathematical situations is highlighted, and students' skills in all three areas are simultaneously enhanced.

I have discovered that some students who are not the best test takers have a very good understanding of how to apply the mathematical concepts involved in these Math Trail exercises. I recall one girl who pointed out two triangles on a rooftop and explained to me that they must be similar. When I asked her what one would have to know to prove this, she explained that the sides would have to be proportional and angles congruent. She then went on to explain that the angles would remain the same regardless of the size of the triangle. Imagine my surprise to hear this from a girl who had failed three-quarters of the tests I had given in class! I knew then that she had really learned a great deal of mathematics and learned it well enough to apply it in a practical fashion to the world around her. With other students, I have noticed the reverse. They do well on tests but have difficulty applying what they have studied. Math Trail exercises force these students to make a connection between the ideas they memorize for the tests and the real world. However, as one group of students wrote in the introduction to their book of Math Trail problems, the purpose of this experience is "to prove that the classroom is NOT the only place to learn math."

In coming semesters, I hope to bring parents along on the Math Trail as guides and participants. I believe it will be another effective way in which parents can gain a greater appreciation for mathematics with their children.

Math Fairs

A few years ago I initiated math fairs at P.S. 72. These events are similar to science fairs but involve students in creating and displaying projects relating to mathematics. The first such fair was an opportunity for my eighth-grade students to create original projects that would showcase the knowledge they had acquired in eight years of math, with an emphasis on the topics they were learning in the eighth grade. Participants had to be able to explain thoroughly the mathematical theories and concepts behind their projects, which were placed on display at the school so that students from the lower grades could examine the older students' research. Several students created mathematics games such as "Dunking for Prime Numbers," "Fishing for Palindromes," and "Black Jack Geometry." Some did research projects. One girl researched the Fibonacci sequence and made a display of examples of this sequence's occurrence in nature in certain leaves, pine cones, and so forth. The next year, at the request of my principal, I expanded the fair to include all grade levels, even down to the pre-kindergarten students, who made a display on sorting and colors. The event has developed into a week-long celebration of mathematics, through which students of all ages learn by doing and creating. It provides a wonderful way to introduce younger students to the excitement of mathematics.

New Directions

For the past five years I have worked part-time as a staff developer for my school and district, giving workshops and sharing with other teachers information on the ways I have been successful. I am also pleased to be working with Jaime Escalante and the Foundation for Advancements in Science and Education (FASE) to create a multimedia computer product that will allow Escalante, me, and one other teacher to disseminate some of our successful methods to teachers across the United States. The product will be designed to relate various pre-algebra topics covered in the middle grades to applications in the real world; for example, by helping teachers develop projects like the Math Trail for use in their own classes. It will also include video footage drawn from Escalante's public television network educational video series, "Futures," which showcases professionals who use mathematics on the job.

In my own future, I hope to become more involved in training teachers. Though I cannot imagine fully removing myself from the classroom, I hope I will one day have the opportunity to pursue projects like these full-time. In addition to teacher training, it is my sincere hope that I will have the opportunity to recruit more minorities into teaching mathematics. Specifically, I would like to be the link that brings inspired young people of color into the field of mathematics teaching; yet I have found that minority students often do not want to be teachers for one reason or another-most would rather go into business or pursue other careers. Still, teaching contributes to every career, and good teachers are the backbone of any field. While I do not believe ethnic minority students must be taught by persons of like ethnic background, I do believe it helps for students to see someone like themselves in the role of teacher, someone about whom students can think, "If she (or he) did it, maybe I can, too." Ultimately, however, it is the spirit teachers bring to class, not their skin color, that determines their success. Beneath all methods and rationales, a teacher must have the desire to teach. His or her ultimate goal must be that of helping students achieve understanding, and there are as many ways of doing this as there are "good" teachers.

I have wanted to be a teacher since I was in second grade and have never regretted my choice. I feel very privileged to be able to open up new worlds to the bright minds of tomorrow. My rewards are many and they increase with every student who succeeds. My hope is that teachers will find a few really useful ideas in what I do and will be able to incorporate these into their classes. If my experience and success can help them in this way, I will feel I have made a valuable contribution.

Resources

Baker, D., Semple, C., & Stead, T. (1990). How big is the moon? Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Educational Books.

Bilistein, R., Libeskind, S., & Lott, J. W. (1990). A problemisolving approach to mathematics for elementary school teachers. Redwood City, CA: Benjamin/Cummings.

Bums, M. (1987). Collection of math lessons for grades 3-6. New Rochelle, NY: Math Solutions Publications.

Burns, M. (1992). Math and literature (K-3). New Rochelle, NY: Math Solutions Publications.

Bums, M., & Humphreys, C. (1990). Collection of math lessons for grades 6-8. New Rochelle, NY: Math Solutions Publications.

Countryman, J. (1992). Writing to learn: Mathematics strategies that work. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Educational Books.

Dolan, D. T., & Williamson, J. (1983). Teaching problem-solving strategies. Chicago: Addison-Wesley.

Escalante, J., & Dirmann, J. (1990). The Jaime Escalante math program. Journal of Negro Education, 59(3), 407-423.

Griffiths, R., & Clyne, M. (1988). Books you can count on: Linking mathematics and literature. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Educational Books. Kaye, P. (1987). Games for math. New York: Pantheon Books.

Meyer, C., & Sallee, T. (1983). Make it simpler-A practical guide to problem solving in mathematics. Chicago: Addison-Wesley.
Shult, A. P., & Choate, S. A. (1977). What are my chances? (Book B).

Sunnyvale, CA: Creative Publications. Stenmark, J. K., Thompson, V., & Cossey, R. (1986). Family math. Berkeley, CA: Lawrence Hall of Science, University of California.

Stephens, M., Hoogeboom, S., & Goodnow, J. (1988). The problem solver: Activities for learning problem-solving strategies. Sunnyvale, CA: Creative Publications.

Zaslazsky, C. (1979). Africa counts. Brooklyn, NY: Lawrence Hill.

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Kay Toliver Math Program - The Futures Channel

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This article was first published in the Journal of Negro Education in 1993. In this first person account, Kay Toliver lays out [...]

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The Underrepresentation Curriculum Project – A flexible curriculum designed to help students critically examine scientific fields and take action for equity, inclusion and justice.

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What if we could equip students with the tools of science to examine science itself?

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Curated by educational leader Jonathan Osler, RadicalMath empowers STEM educators to address issues of social and racial justice in math classrooms. RM is a hub for curriculum, resources, and professional development opportunities.

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Download as PDF What we mean by "White antiracist activist":
Antiracism for White people is a process of recognizing the impact of race as a system of oppression and engaging in practices, behaviors, and ways of being that disrupt racial discrimination. Racism advantages White people and disadvantages People of Color via inequitable systems of institutional power, authority, and violence. The term "People of Color" includes Native, Black/African American, Latinx, Asian American/Pacific Islander, Middle Eastern, and Multiracial people. More accurately, this group is also referred to as "people of the global majority." The goal of this activism is to challenge the racist status quo to bring about social change, healing, and liberation for non-White identified communities. The following people and organizations are White antiracist/anti-oppression activists who questioned, resisted, and interrupted racist systems.
People of Color have always worked to end racism. By naming these White activists and organizations, we hope to show that for as long as there has been racial oppression, particularly in the United States, there have been White people who have stood in solidarity with People of Color By highlighting these White activists, we hope to expand the understanding of how White people can work toward racial justice in proactive and productive ways. Much of what our students learn in schools about race reflects People of Color as oppressed and White people as "bad racists," but the realities of anti-oppression/antiracism work are far more nuanced and complex. To disrupt the narratives we learned in schools, and to support White students in recognizing their empowerment in antiracist work, we are sharing a collection of noted White antiracist/anti-oppression activists whose work can serve as a guidepost. We also recognize that these activists are products of their particular time and reflect the limitations of their time period. We also offer these examples as a way for White educators to think about their personal stake and role in challenging racism in their classrooms. This list is by no means exhaustive, but for those looking to build your curriculum, we hope you will find this list a helpful starting point. This is an attempt to highlight the work of White activists who stood up to racism when it was challenging, unpopular, and even illegal. As a means of studying and learning from these activists, we offer these critical questions for consideration:

In considering the activists' lives, what were the significant moments that led to their activism? What motivated them to work for change?

What skills do/did they need to challenge racial injustice?

What blind spots might these activists have?

How can White people work effectively in solidarity with People of Color? How do they keep from replicating the very system they are trying to challenge?

What is the value of a multiracial, antiracist coalition?

What actions might you take to work for racial justice?

The African Free School (founded November 2, 1787) was founded by members of the New York Manumission Society to provide education to children of slaves and free people of color. Many of its students became leaders in the African American community in New York. Established in 1794, the first school was a one-room schoolhouse that held about 40 students. Originally the Manumission Society hired White teachers, but it eventually employed Black teachers as well. By 1835, when the schools ended their run as privately supported institutions, the African Free School had seven buildings in different neighborhoods, and it had educated thousands of girls and boys. At that time the African Free Schools and their facilities were integrated into the public school system. This was several years after New York freed the last adult slaves under its gradual abolition law.

Anne McCarty Braden (1924-2006) was a journalist and community organizer from Louisville, Kentucky, who defied racist real estate practices and the House Un-American Activities Committee and organized White Southerners to support the civil rights movement. She is best known for helping a Black couple buy a house in an all-White neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky in 1954. She and her husband were put on trial for sedition, banned from jobs, threatened, and reviled by their fellow White Southerners for what they did. She wrote a book about her sedition trial, The Wall Between, which was nominated for the National Book Award. She worked closely with Rosa Parks (in photo below) and Ella Baker, and she is mentioned in Dr. King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail.

John Brown (1800-1859) was also an ardent abolitionist who worked with the Underground Railroad and worked to inspire a slave insurrection at Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. As a 12-year-old boy traveling through Michigan, Brown witnessed an enslaved African-American boy being beaten, which haunted him for years to come and informed his own abolitionism. In 1855, Brown moved to Kansas, and with the passing of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, there was conflict over whether the territory would be a free or slave state. Brown, who believed in using violent means to end slavery, became involved in the conflict; in 1856, he and several of his men killed five pro-slavery settlers in a retaliatory attack at Pottawatomie Creek. With the intent of inspiring a slave insurrection, he eventually led an unsuccessful raid on the Harpers Ferry federal armory on October 16, 1859, holding dozens of men hostage. Brown's forces held out for two days; they were eventually defeated by military forces led by Robert E. Lee. Many of Brown's men were killed, including two of his sons, and he was captured. Brown went to trial and was executed on December 2, 1859.

Edgar Chandler (1904-1988). A Navy Chaplain, congregational minister, and director of the Church Federation of Greater Chicago during the 1960s, Chandler worked closely with Martin Luther King, Jr. Chandler later hired Jesse Jackson at the Church Federation of Greater Chicago and they became friends. Chandler "really helped to bring me into the civil rights movement," Jackson was quoted as saying, "He helped to hire me when I had no money, and helped sustain my family."

Christopher Chandler (1938-2019). A longtime journalist who focused on social justice issues, Chandler helped start the Chicago Journalism Review, the Chicago Free Press, and the Daily Planet, and worked on exposés of the 1969 police raid that resulted in the killings of Black Panthers leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark. Later, he was Press Secretary for Chicago Mayor, Harold Washington, and later for U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush. From 1997 to 2001, Mr. Chandler worked in media relations for the Government Accountability Project, a Washington, D.C., group that assists whistleblowers.

Prudence Crandall (1803-1890) was an American schoolteacher and activist. She is believed to have run the first known school for Black girls in the United States. When Crandall admitted Sarah Harris, a 20-year-old African American female student in 1832 to her school, she had what is considered to be the first integrated classroom in the United States. Parents of the White children began to withdraw them. She decided that if White girls would not attend, she would educate Black girls. She was arrested and spent a night in jail. Soon the violence of the townspeople forced her to close the school and leave.

Virginia Foster Durr (1903-1999) was a housewife and political activist from Birmingham, Alabama, who fought against the poll tax and Southern White male domination. Durr was a close friend of Rosa Parks and Eleanor Roosevelt, and was sister-in-law (through her sister's marriage) of Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, who sat on many crucial civil rights cases. In 1933, Durr moved with her husband to Washington, D.C., which was where her activism began. She met important people through her husband's New Deal contacts, some of whom changed her conservative views on civil matters. Durr joined the Woman's National Democratic Club, and in 1938, she was one of the founding members of the Southern Conference for Human Welfare (SCHW), an interracial group working to reduce segregation and improve living conditions in the South. The group was formed in part as a response to Franklin Roosevelt's proclamation that the South was the leading economic problem in the nation. By 1941, Durr became the vice president of the SCHW's civil rights subcommittee. Working together with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, she lobbied for legislation to abolish the poll tax. She worked jointly with liberal political leaders in order to gain the necessary support needed for legislation, which ultimately resulted in the passing of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Jane Eliot (1933-). In response to the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968, Elliott devised the controversial and startling, "Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes Exercise." This, exercise labels participants as inferior or superior based solely upon the color of their eyes and exposes them to the experience of being a minority. Elliott's classroom exercise was filmed the third time she held it with her White third-graders in 1970, becoming the documentary The Eye of the Storm. This in turn inspired a retrospective that reunited the 1970 class members with their teacher fifteen years later in "A Class Divided," an episode of the PBS series Frontline. After leaving her school, Elliott became a full-time diversity educator. She still holds the exercise and gives lectures about its effects all over the U.S.

Bob Fletcher (1911-2013) was a farmer, fireman, and community historian best known for safeguarding the farms of expelled Japanese Americans in Florin, California, during World War II. With the attack on Pearl Harbor and the eviction of West Coast Japanese Americans looming, the Tsukamoto family of Florin approached Fletcher with a proposal: would he manage the flame tokay grape farms of two of their friends, paying taxes and mortgages while there were excluded? Fletcher agreed, quitting his job, and eventually took over the farms of the Okamoto, Nitta, and Tsukamoto families, a total of ninety acres. In doing so, he bucked popular opinion that largely supported the exclusion of Japanese Americans and opposed their return. He was, in fact, fired on while in the Tsukamotos' barn. When the families returned from their incarceration in the fall of 1945, their farms and homes were intact, and their half of the profits was waiting for them. Fletcher continued to help the families after the war, sometimes buying supplies and equipment for them when local businesses would not sell to them. In the later part of the 20th Century, with changing attitudes toward the wartime incarceration, Fletcher received acclaim for his wartime actions. He died at the age of 101, his actions celebrated in obituaries in the New York Times and other newspapers.

William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879) was a prominent American abolitionist, journalist, suffragist, and social reformer. He is best known for his widely-read anti-slavery newspaper The Liberator, which he founded in 1831 and published in Boston until slavery in the United States was abolished by Constitutional amendment in 1865. He was one of the founders of the American Anti-Slavery Society, and promoted immediate and uncompensated, as opposed to gradual and compensated, emancipation of slaves in the United States. Garrison also emerged as a leading advocate of women's rights, which prompted a split in the abolitionist community. In the 1870s, Garrison became a prominent voice for the women's suffrage movement.

Andrew Goodman (1943-1964) and Michael Henry "Mickey" Schwerner (1939-1964) were American civil rights activists, murdered at a young age by members of the Ku Klux Klan. They took part in the Freedom Summer campaign to register African Americans to vote in Mississippi, where they met fellow social activists, James Chaney. They all worked together in Meridian, Mississippi, where Schwerner was designated head of the field office. The Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission was strongly opposed to integration and civil rights and paid spies to identify citizens suspected of activism, especially people from the North and West who entered the state. On their return to Meridian, the three men were stopped and arrested by Deputy Sheriff Cecil Price (a Klan member) for allegedly driving 35 miles over the 30-mile-per-hour speed limit. They were arrested, released, and eventually turned them over to Klansmen who shot and killed them. The Commission was eventually implicated in the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner.

Sarah Moore Grimké (1792-1873) and Angelina Emily Grimké (1805-1879), known as the Grimké sisters, were speakers, writers, and educators who were the first nationally known White American female advocates for women's rights and the abolition of slavery. They grew up in a slave-owning family in South Carolina but moved to the North in the 1820s, settling for some time in Philadelphia and becoming part of its substantial Quaker community. They became deeply involved with the abolitionist movement, traveling on its lecture circuit and recounting their firsthand experiences with slavery on their family's plantation. Among the first White American women to act publicly in social reform movements, they were ridiculed for their abolitionist activity and perspective. They also became early activists in the women's rights movement.

Rachelle Horowitz was an organizer and strategist during the height of the modern civil rights movement, and is a major figure in labor union politics. As a student member of the socialist party during the late 1950s, Horowitz was encouraged to become involved in the civil rights movement by party leaders who recognized the leadership potential that she and other young members possessed. She worked with organizer Bayard Rustin on the March on Washington in 1963, assisting with planning for demonstrations and labor organization efforts and securing transportation to get leaders, organizations, and March participants to and from Washington, D.C. Horowitz also assisted Rustin with running the March's organizing headquarters in New York. In the following year, Horowitz spent three months in Jackson, Mississippi for the formation of the Freedom Democrats, and she assisted with organizing Freedom Summer. She also continued to work with Rustin, serving as his assistant from 1964 to 1973, and working with him and others to form the Social Democrats. She continued her efforts with labor unions throughout the 1970s and served as the political director of the American Federation of Teachers from 1974 to 1995.

Eric Kulberg was a photographer at the March on Washington in 1963. Only 18 at the time, Kulberg convinced his supervisors that he needed to be at the March to document the experience. After some initial resistance, his bosses relented and supported Kulberg's decision. One of the only photographers to capture the experience in color film, Kulberg generated some of the most iconic images of the experience. He also was changed by what he witnessed. Standing a mere few feet from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as he spoke, Kulberg had two revelations: he wanted to eradicate prejudice, and he wanted to center the experience of African Americans through radio, film, and television-which is how Kulberg has spent the majority of his career.

Margaret Leonard was a Freedom Rider and Civil Rights Activist. When she was a student at Sophie Newcomb College in New Orleans, she began going to Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) meetings and participated in both local sit-ins and the Freedom Rides of 1961. At the CORE meetings, she learned about the practices of nonviolent resistance that became the mainstay of the Freedom Riders movement. She was the first unmistakably Southern White student to participate in the Mississippi Freedom Ride and inspired other White people to follow her lead. Leonard is retired now from a reporting career at the St. Petersburg Times, Miami Herald, and Tallahassee Democrat and still occasionally unites with other Freedom Riders.

Viola Liuzzo (1925-1965) was a Unitarian Universalist Civil Rights activist from Michigan. In March 1965, Liuzzo, then a housewife and mother of five with a history of local activism, heeded the call of Martin Luther King, Jr. and traveled from Detroit, Michigan, to Selma, Alabama, in the wake of the Bloody Sunday attempt at marching across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Liuzzo participated in the successful Selma to Montgomery marches and helped with coordination and logistics. Driving back from a trip shuttling fellow activists to the Montgomery airport, she was shot dead by members of the Ku Klux Klan at age 39.

Richard Loving (1933-1975) was married to Mildred Loving, and they were plaintiffs in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia (1967). The Lovings were an interracial married couple who were criminally charged under a Virginia statute banning such marriages. With the help of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), they filed suit to overturn the law. In 1967, the Supreme Court ruled in their favor, striking down the Virginia statute and all state anti-miscegenation laws as unconstitutional violations of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Hazel Massey (born Hazel Bryan 1941-) first appeared in an iconic photograph in 1957, as she leered at The Little Rock Nine, nine black students who were integrated at Central High School. Bryan is captured leering at Elizabeth Eckford, who is also featured in this photograph. Bryan, only 17 years old at the time and a high school dropout, was haunted by the image for which she became notorious. Several years after the photograph was taken, Bryan-tormented by the image and what she had done-tracked Eckford down, and apologized. The two women forged a friendship for a number of years, and in 1999, journalist David Margolick decided to write Elizabeth and Hazel, two years after the 40th anniversary of the events in Little Rock.

William Lewis Moore (1927-1963) was a postal worker and Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) member who staged lone protests against racial segregation. Moore undertook three civil rights protests in which he marched to a capital to hand-deliver letters he had written denouncing racial segregation. Moore was in the midst of a one-man civil rights march to Jackson, Mississippi, to implore Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett to support integration efforts. He wore signs that stated: "End Segregation in America, Eat at Joe's - Both Black and White" and "Equal Rights For All (Mississippi or Bust)." On April 23, 1963, Moore was found dead on U.S. Highway 11 near Attalla, Alabama-only four days shy of his 36th birthday. A letter he had written, meant for Governor Ross, was opened when Moore was found, and its contents stated that "the White man cannot be truly free himself until all men have their rights." He asked Governor Barnett to: "Be gracious and give more than is immediately demanded of you."

Joan Trumpauer Mulholland was a White teenager in the South during Segregation who put herself on the front lines of the Civil Rights struggle. She Stood for Freedom is a biography about her experiences, published simultaneously in picture book and middle-grade editions, detailing the many events she participated in. She attended demonstrations and sit-ins and was one of the Freedom Riders in 1961 who was arrested and put on death row for months at the notorious Parchman Penitentiary. She was the first White person to join in the 1963 Woolworth's lunch counter sit-ins in Jackson, Mississippi, and that same year participated in the March on Washington with Dr. Martin Luther King. Jr. and the Selma to Montgomery march in 1965, which contributed to the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act that year. Her willingness to stand up for justice has been an inspiration, "Anyone can make a difference. It doesn't matter how old or young you are. Find a problem, get some friends together, and go fix it. Remember, you don't have to change the world . . . just change your world."

Peter George Norman (1942-2006) was an Australian track athlete who won the silver medal in the 200 meters at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City. Norman is best known as the third athlete pictured in a famous photograph of the 1968 Olympics Black Power salute, which occurred during the medal ceremony for the 200-meter event. He wore a badge of the Olympic Project for Human Rights in support of fellow athletes John Carlos and Tommie Smith. Norman was not selected for the 1972 Summer Olympics, and retired from the sport soon after.

Mary White Ovington (1865-1951) was an American suffragist, journalist, and co-founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Ovington became involved in the campaign for civil rights in 1890 after hearing Frederick Douglass speak in a New York City church. She also supported the work to improve living conditions in tenements and investigated housing and employment discrimination.

Theodore Parker (1810-1860) was an American transcendentalist and reforming minister of the Unitarian church. A reformer and abolitionist, his words and popular quotations would later be mentioned in speeches by Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr. In Boston, he led the movement to combat the stricter Fugitive Slave Act, a controversial part of the Compromise of 1850. This act required law enforcement and citizens of all states - free states as well as slave states - to assist in recovering fugitive slaves. Parker called the law "a hateful statute of kidnappers" and helped organize open resistance to it. He and his followers formed the Boston Vigilance Committee, which refused to assist with the recovery of fugitive slaves and helped hide them. For example, they smuggled away Ellen and William Craft when Georgian slave catchers came to Boston to arrest them. Due to such efforts, from 1850 to the onset of the American Civil War in 1861, only twice were slaves captured in Boston and transported back to the South.

Joachim Prinz (1902-1998)devoted much of his life in the United States to the Civil Rights Movement. He saw the plight of African Americans in the context of his own experience under Hitler. From his early days in Newark, he spoke from his pulpit about the disgrace of discrimination. He joined the picket lines across America protesting racial prejudice from unequal employment to segregated schools, housing and all other areas of life. While serving as President of the American Jewish Congress, he represented the Jewish community as an organizer of the August 1963 March on Washington. He came to the podium immediately following a stirring spiritual sung by the gospel singer Mahalia Jackson and just before Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. Dr. Prinz's address is remembered for its contention that, based on his experience as a rabbi in Nazi Germany after the rise of Hitler, in the face of discrimination, "the most urgent, the most disgraceful, the most shameful and the most tragic problem is silence."

Fred Rogers (1928-2003) was an American television personality, musician, puppeteer, writer, producer, and Presbyterian minister. He was the creator, showrunner and host of the preschool television series Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, which ran from 1968 to 2001. While Fred Rogers benefited from a system of advantages for White people, he sought to create a show that could repair some inequities. For example, Francois Clemmons - an African-American actor - was an integral part of the show and he depicted a loving, positive role model. Further, the audience for the show was mixed race, indicating that the show appealed to all children. Finally, the documentary Won't You Be My Neighbor sought to include significant historical context about race to deepen the movie's message about inclusion and belonging.

Sally Rowley (1931-2020). While working as a secretary in New York in the early 1960s, Rowley joined the freedom riders, a group of activists who traveled to the south to challenge segregationist policies. She was arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1961 and served time in the Mississippi State Penitentiary.

Christine Saxman, teacher and racial equity consultant, and Shelly Tochluk, professor of education and counselor, have worked together to identify White nationalist groups and their recruiting tactics. They have done intensive research to document how these groups target young people, in particular White boys, and to provide resistance strategies and resources for parents, schools, and young people. See Inoculating Our Students Against White Nationalism as an example of their work.

Robert Shetterly (1946- ) is an artist whose series of portraits, Americans Who Tell the Truth, (example left of Tarana Burke) has given Shetterly an opportunity to speak with children and adults all over this country about the necessity of dissent in a democracy, the obligations of citizenship, sustainability, U.S. history, and how democracy cannot function if politicians don't tell the truth, if the media don't report it, and if the people don't demand it. Shetterly has engaged in a wide variety of political and humanitarian work with many of the people whose portraits he has painted. In the spring of 2007, he traveled to Rwanda with Lily Yeh and Terry Tempest Williams to work in a village of survivors of the 1994 genocide there. Much of his current work focuses on honoring and working with the activists trying to bring an end to the terrible practice of Mountaintop Removal by coal companies in Appalachia, on climate change, and on the continuation of systemic racism in the U.S. particularly in relation to the school-to-prison pipeline.

Gloria Steinem (1934- ) is an American journalist, feminist activist, organizer, and writer. In 2013, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama. With Dorothy Pittman-Hughes, Steinem co-founded Ms. magazine and the Women's Action Alliance, a pioneering national information center that specialized in nonsexist, multiracial children's education. The partnership between Steinem and Pitman Hughes began in the early 1970s as the pair took to the podium to discuss the importance of intersectional feminism. She is the founding president of the Ms. Foundation for Women, a national multi-racial, multi-issue fund that supports grassroots projects to empower women and girls, and also a founder of Take Our Daughters to Work Day, a first national day devoted to girls that has now become an institution here and in other countries. She was a member of the Beyond Racism Initiative, a three-year effort on the part of activists and experts from South Africa, Brazil and the United States to compare the racial patterns of those three countries and to learn cross-nationally. She works with the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College on documenting the grassroots origins of the U.S. women's movement, and on a Center for Organizers in tribute to Wilma Mankiller, Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation.

"The symbolism of a Black and White woman standing together, demonstrating the Black power salute is as important now as it was in the 70s," said Pitman-Hughes. "A hundred years of the suffrage movement has not eliminated racism, classism and sexism. Black women and White women can make this change together, but not until we acknowledge and resolve the racism problem that stands between us."

Laura Towne (1825-1901) was an American abolitionist and educator. She is best known for forming the first freedmen's schools (those for newly freed slaves), notably the Penn School. She was raised in Philadelphia hearing sermons about the abolition of slavery. Influenced by these teachings, Towne answered the call for volunteers when the Union captured Port Royal and other Sea Islands area of South Carolina. With the help of her Quaker friend Ellen Murray, they founded the Penn Center on St. Helena Island, the first school for newly freed slaves in the United States.

James Tyson partnered with Bree Newsome to remove the Confederate flag that was flying over the South Carolina Statehouse on June 27, 2015. The two 30-year-old Charlotte activists, who had met only a few days before, hustled toward the flagpole bearing the South's most controversial flag. Tyson braced himself so Newsome, strapped into climbing gear, could use his leg to jump the four-foot fence. Tyson, who stood quietly at the base of the pole while she climbed, remained in the background. That was the plan, to show White support without dominating. After scaling the flagpole and taking down the flag, Newsome and Tyson were arrested. The state legislature voted to remove the flag permanently less than three weeks later.

Julius Waties Waring (1880-1968) was a United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of South Carolina who played an important role in the early legal battles of the American Civil Rights Movement and who opened White primaries to Black voters. Waring spent the early part of his career in Charleston, South Carolina, but after political, editorial, and social leaders in South Carolina criticized and shunned Judge Waring and his wife for their progressive views, Waring left Charleston altogether, and moved to New York City and quickly transitioned even further from a racial moderate to a proponent of radical change. Speaking at a Harlem church, he proclaimed: "The cancer of segregation will never be cured by the sedative of gradualism." During his career, he fought against racial segregation and worked towards equal opportunities for the Black community in political, economic, and educational spheres.

The Weathermen, also known as the Weather Underground Organization (WUO), was a radical left militant organization active in the late 1960s and 1970s, founded on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. The WUO organized in 1969 as a faction of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) largely composed of the national office leadership of SDS and their supporters. Beginning in 1974, the organization's express political goal was to create a revolutionary party to overthrow what it viewed as American imperialism. In 1969, the group authored a paper a position paper distributed at an SDS convention in Chicago, which called for a "White fighting force" to be allied with the "Black Liberation Movement" and other radical movements to achieve destruction of U.S. Imperialism in favor of a classless communist society. The FBI classified the WUO as a domestic terrorist group, with revolutionary positions characterized by Black power and opposition to the Vietnam War. In the 1970s, the Weathermen took part in a range of bombing campaigns within the U.S,. and they began to disintegrate after the United States reached a peace accord in Vietnam in 1973. The group was defunct by 1977.

The White Rose (German: ) was a non-violent, intellectual resistance group in Nazi Germany led by a group of students including Hans and Sophie Scholl. The group conducted an anonymous leaflet and graffiti campaign that called for active opposition to the Nazi regime. Their activities started in Munich in 1942, and ended with the arrest of the core group by the Gestapo in February 1943. They, as well as other members and supporters of the group who carried on distributing the pamphlets, faced show trials by the Nazi People's Court ( Volksgerichtshof), and many of them were sentenced to death or imprisonment (both School and Probst were executed). The group wrote, printed and initially distributed their pamphlets in the greater Munich region. Later on, secret carriers brought copies to other cities, mostly in the southern parts of Germany. In total, the White Rose authored six leaflets, which were multiplied and spread, in a total of about 15,000 copies. They denounced the Nazi regime's crimes and oppression, and called for resistance. In their second leaflet, they openly denounced the persecution and mass murder of the Jews. By the time of their arrest, the members of the White Rose were just about to establish contacts with other German resistance groups like the Kreisau Circle or the Schulze-Boysen/Harnack group of the Red Orchestra. Today, the White Rose is well known both within Germany and worldwide.

Dave Zirin (1974- ) is an American political sportswriter. He is the sports editor for The Nation, a weekly progressive magazine dedicated to politics and culture; he also writes a blog named Edge of Sports: the weekly sports column by Dave Zirin and has authored nine books, including The John Carlos Story: The Sports Moment That Changed the World. He has repeatedly called for sports boycotts of certain teams, states, or nations for political reasons, including a boycott against sports teams from Arizona as a statement against the Arizona immigration law. He has spoken out against boycotts of Israel, has criticized Hank Williams, Jr. for racist remarks about Barack Obama, and has defended baseball player Barry Bonds, noting that most criticisms against Bonds were rooted in racism.

James Zwerg (1939- ) is an American former minister who was involved with the Freedom Riders in the early 1960s. He participated in a one-semester student exchange program in 1961 at Fisk University, a predominantly Black school, and met John Lewis who was a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). As a Freedom Rider, he traveled by bus to Birmingham where Zwerg was first arrested for not moving to the back of the bus with his Black seating companion, Paul Brooks. Three days later, the riders regrouped and headed to Montgomery. At first the bus station there was quiet and eerie, but the scene turned into an ambush with the riders attacked from all directions. Zwerg was denied prompt medical attention because there were no White ambulances available, and he remained unconscious for two days. His post-riot photos were published in many newspapers and magazines across the country.

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White Antiracist Activists - Teaching While White

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Download as PDF What we mean by "White antiracist activist": Antiracism for White people is a process of recognizing the impact of race as a system of oppression and engaging in practices, behaviors, and ways of being that disrupt racial discrimination. Racism advantages White people and disadvantages People of Color via inequitable systems of institutional power, authority, and violence.

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Cross Cultural Solidarity - History; in the Service of Solidarity

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In 2007, I spent a year teaching incarcerated youth in northern Arizona. That year, I discovered history as a powerful tool for helping young people wrestle with the biggest questions they had in their lives. Why was the reservation so poor? Why were there so many Black youth in jail in a region with a small Black population? Such questions also forced me up against my own ignorance as a White man born into a society that devalued history... partly, I suspected, as a means to avoid facing the contemporary ramifications of historical inequities. Night after night, I found myself in the university library until closing, trying to understand the history behind my student's most burning questions. And so, in my mid-twenties, I became devoted to history education both as a means to empower young people, and as a means to liberate myself from my own ignorance and step into the world with more clarity and integrity.

Back in Oakland, California, I pursued a Master's in history education and became a high school history teacher. I also continued to study racial justice history with a passion. Over the years I found that the more I learned, the more difficult it became to find materials I was satisfied with for my students. I began writing for them, composing histories both as a means to target specific learning goals, and to engage them with stories I knew would ignite their interest. When we were learning about freedom struggles, one of my goals was to help my students learn to think strategically by examining how communities organized using a variety of tactics, based on what made sense in their context. I sought to make inspiring figures relatable by portraying their growing process and emotional lives. And I did my best to portray the important roles of women, youth, LGBT figures, and others who had been marginalized in movement history.

In classrooms of primarily Black and Brown youth who sometimes experienced tensions between their communities, I also highlighted stories of Black and Brown solidarity. I brought in stories of White antiracism as well, so that White youth could see positive examples of how White folks had shown up for racial justice. It was those stories of solidarity that most inspired my students. Learning how diverse communities came together - rather than fighting their battles alone - gave them hope and a heightened sense that real change was possible. I came to see these stories of solidarity as being important beyond my classroom: seeing examples of how bonds of solidarity were built in history could help us, as a society, learn to build those bonds in the present. These stories presented an important antidote in a world of division.

I adored teaching, but by 2013 I was wondering if I could have a broader impact as a writer telling these stories. As a teacher I had learned to portray historical depth and complexity in a clear, accessible, and engaging way that I felt could also support public understanding. However, I had little time to write, let alone engage in research. I wanted to take the plunge and embrace myself as a writer of racial justice history, with a general audience in mind, but it was hard to imagine stepping away from the classroom.

In 2015, fate intervened. My mother had a health crisis that left her having to relearn how to speak and eat. She needed 24-hour care. I stepped away from teaching so I could have the bandwidth to support her, and spent much of my time researching and writing as she recuperated. I joined the gig economy, driving for Uber and Lyft to have flexibility as a caretaker and a writer. And I founded CrossCulturalSolidarity.com, as the home for my racial justice history writings and resources.

Since that time, I've bootstrapped this project into being: I've given rides to over 20,000 people throughout the Bay Area as an Uber driver... and have built over 200 racial justice history resources, many of which are now featured on ethnic studies departments around the country. I've written dozens of chapter-length pieces on a variety of racial justice topics, some of which have been linked to in articles by the Washington Post, Yes! Magazine, The Black Agenda Report, Spartacus Educational, and Aljazeera. I've presented at national history education conferences, offered racial justice sermons, and discussed the work on numerous radio programs and podcasts. I've also led trainings for dozens of White antiracist groups across the country, using lessons from the White antiracist past to help them strengthen their own antiracist practice.

Slowly but surely, grassroots community support from across the country has grown to support this work, and that's what makes me the happiest: knowing that this project will succeed, not because it has any proximity to big institutions or large donors... but because a broad network of ordinary people who sincerely care about this work have chosen to lift it up. Through this work, I've come to know hundreds of activists and scholars and movement elders who I deeply admire, and could have hardly imagined being in touch with - much less befriending - before I set off on this path.

I hope you'll join Cross Cultural Solidarity in our monthly discussion group, Black Movement Thought. And I hope you'll join the community of supporters helping Cross Cultural Solidarity maintain this work over the long-haul, by joining the Patreon, where you'll receive monthly updates about all the great resources being developed, all the interviews with movement elders and movement thinkers, and invites to all events. Most of all, I hope you take some time to explore the site, and that you find something that inspires you here!

In the spirit of solidarity,

Lynn Burnett

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About Lynn Burnett - Cross Cultural Solidarity

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In 2007, I spent a year teaching incarcerated youth in northern Arizona. That year, I discovered history as a powerful tool for helping young people wrestle with the biggest questions they had in their lives. Why was the reservation so poor?

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"Can you type?" SNCC executive secretary Jim Forman asked Dorothy "Dottie" Miller shortly after she walked into the SNCC office on Auburn Avenue in Atlanta, Georgia. (She later married SNCC's Bob Zellner, becoming Dottie Zellner.) Although she had come to Atlanta to join SNCC, she had not heard back and had instead spent the last five months working at the Southern Regional Council (SRC). As she remembered, "the more stories I read about the heroic actions of SNCC workers, the more awed I became. The more awed I became, the shyer I was." Within a matter of months, however, Zellner went from "being afraid to walk twenty minutes to the SNCC office to being a full-fledged staff member in an organization I loved." Zellner was 22-years-old at the time, and she would ultimately spend the next 22 years of her life in the South.

Zellner was born and raised in New York City. The child of immigrant Jewish leftists, her parents taught her about Black history and the need for racial justice. She grew up hearing stories of Jewish resistance to Nazi fascism. Zellner's parents supported her move to Atlanta, and it came as no surprise when years later, Zellner's father proudly passed around a press clipping of his daughter in jail.

After graduating from Queens College and inspired by the sit-in movement, Zellner first went South in 1960 to attend a CORE workshop. She later helped plan and orchestrate New Orlean's first sit-in. Many of Zellner's friends at CORE would speak "incessantly" about an organization run completely by young people. This organization was SNCC.

As a staff member in the Atlanta office, Zellner would type reports from SNCC field secretaries who had accompanied disenfranchised Black people to vote in rural parts of Georgia and Mississippi. She would type, word for word, as field secretaries such as Curtis Hayes, Willie Peacock, Sam Block, and Hollis Watkins described similar narratives of mobilizing Black people to register-enduring intimidation, violence and sometimes arrest in the process-while rarely ever successfully registering a person to vote. SNCC used these reports to help build a national network for Friends of SNCC groups in northern cities and college campuses throughout the United States and also as a means to pressure the federal government to guarantee the Black franchise. Dottie Zellner also worked with SNCC Communication Director Julian Bond on press releases and articles for The Student Voice.

Zellner felt comfortable as a white person in a Black-led organization and felt that SNCC represented the ideal of a "beloved community." As a Jew in the South, however, she found very little support for her work. The southern Jewish community felt their position was "already insecure" and tenuous.

In the fall of 1963, Zellner moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts with her then husband, Bob Zellner, to run the Northeast Regional Office of SNCC. She traveled to colleges and universities throughout the northeast region to recruit student volunteers for the Mississippi Freedom Summer Project of 1964. During Freedom Summer, Zellner worked in the Greenwood, Mississippi office, answering calls from civil rights workers who had been beaten, arrested, or had disappeared, thereafter alerting local authorities, the press and family members.

It was after the betrayal of the Freedom Democratic Party at the Atlantic City Convention that Zellner first began hearing discussion within SNCC of becoming an all-Black organization. "I remember hearing this for the first time and simply could not conceive of my life without SNCC," she remembered. By the winter of 1967, most white people had left SNCC, but she and Bob Zellner, made one final attempt to remain in SNCC. The Zellners understood the need to live and organize among the white community but wanted to continue doing this work as SNCC staff members in an interracial community. The Zellner's request to remain in SNCC was denied.

The couple moved to New Orleans in 1968. They began leading Project Grow (Grass Roots Organizing Work), an effort aimed at undermining racism in the working-class white community. "For me, probably the hardest consequence of leaving SNCC was the subsequent breach between many black and white SNCC people, years of distance and chilly separation. But this has changed. Now, so many years later, we are often together, and when this happens, when I am with other SNCC people, I feel a kind of joy-a feeling of being, at last, complete," Zellner explained.

Zellner moved back to New York in 1983 and still remains active in feminist causes and is also involved in advocacy work on behalf of Palestinians.

Sources

John Dittmer, Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994).

James Forman, The Making of Black Revolutionaries (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1997).

Judy Richardson, "SNCC: My Enduring 'Circle of Trust,'" Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by Women in SNCC, edited by Faith S. Holsaert et al. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010), 348-365.

Dottie Zellner, "My Real Vocation," Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by Women in SNCC, edited by Faith S. Holsaert et al. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010), 311-326.

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"Can you type?" SNCC executive secretary Jim Forman asked Dorothy "Dottie" Miller shortly after she walked into the SNCC office in Atlanta, Georgia.

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How Can We Learn from White Anti-Racists from the Past?

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How Can We Learn from White Anti-Racists from the Past?

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It is easy for white people to find examples of other white people being racist or staying silent in the face of racism. It's harder for us to find role models of white people standing up against racism - and it can feel daunting when we don't see examples of others like us doing this work. We are taking these next two months to showcase some examples of white people taking action against racism to give us courage and inspire us. There are so many who came before us to defy the system that gives us privileges but robs all of us of our humanity.

We're not in this work alone.

This month we offer a "choice board" of 9 people who fought racism in the past. We encourage you to give your participants the choice this month to choose which activists they would like to read about.
​
Primary Resource: ​

​​As we grow in year six, we hope that one person in your group can take a few minutes to

What do you feel as you read about this activist? What specific ideas occur to you?

What barriers did these individuals overcome to do the work they did? What enabled them to do so?

Antiracist work is ongoing. No one is a perfect example. What might these individuals have overlooked? As they engaged in antiracist activism/organizing, where might they have retained racist ideas?

What evolution do you see in the beliefs or in the work of these activists? What does it mean to you that they evolved?

In order to stand up for others, we often need to make personal sacrifices and experience discomfort. What privilege did these individuals have that allowed them to take a stand? What were they sacrificing in order to do so? What risks did they take?

How can we apply what we learned from these examples in our own context?

​
​Secondary Resources:
Facilitation Reference Guide:

Set a day and time for your group to meet - Make sure to send reminders. If you're meeting in person, snacks are always a good idea!

Send this month's Primary Resource to your group. Look through the additional readings to see if there is another reading that might be better suited to your group and its interests.

Pass the Hat and collect donations for Highlander Research and Education Center this month.

Complete the Feedback Form .

Prepare yourself for next month by setting a date and time, inviting colleagues, and looking out for our next Discussion Guide on March 1st.

Feedback Form:
fill out our feedback form to let us know how it went.
Pass The Hat:
In addition to being accountable to our colleagues and students of color, we believe it is important to be financially accountable to people of color who are doing this work on a daily basis. Each month, we will recommend an organization led by people of color, in education and beyond, doing the work of pushing for justice.

At the end of each monthly discussion, pass a hat (or a box) and collect donations for the designated organization. You can then have one group member go online and donate in the name of your school. If you want, you can add "Building Anti-Racist White Educators" after your school name

This month, we encourage you to donate to Highlander Research and Education Center , which was started by Myles Horton and is a SURJ partner. Highlander serves as a catalyst for grassroots organizing and movement building in Appalachia and the South. They work with people fighting for justice, equality and sustainability, supporting their efforts to take collective action to shape their own destiny. ​​

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February: How can we learn from white anti-racists of the past?

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It is easy for white people to find examples of other white people being racist or staying silent in the face of racism. It's harder for us to find role models of white people standing up against...

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Black Parents Explain How to Deal with the Police

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Black Parents Explain How to Deal with the Police

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Black Parents Explain How to Deal with the Police | HiHo Kids

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As part of a series of videos about race, we are featuring personal stories that reflect the breadth of experiences in the United States.

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A swastika, 20 feet in diameter, is burned into the pavement at a junior high school. A group of white high school students dresses in banana suits for a basketball game and taunts their majority-black rival with racial slurs. A Sikh student has his turban pulled off and hair cut by fellow students.
Your school has plans and protocols in place to respond to fires, severe weather, medical emergencies, fights and weapons possession. But what about school incidents like those listed above that involve bigotry and hate? Are plans in place to respond to a bias incident or hate crime? Too often these plans are created in the moment during the actual crisis. Bias incidents are far too complex for on-the-fly planning; an early misstep can heighten tension and damage chances for long-term success.

Responding to Hate and Bias at School is designed primarily for school administrators, but teachers, staff, counselors, students and others also may find guidance here.

The guide is divided into three sections:

Before a Crisis Occurs

How can you and other school leaders assess your school's climate with an eye toward defusing tension, preventing escalation and avoiding problems?

When There's a Crisis

What are the nine key points to consider when responding to a crisis that has been triggered by a bias incident at your school?

After the Worst is Over

How can you address long-term planning and capacity building for the future, including development of social emotional skills?

Hateful acts at school are dangerous, disturbing and disruptive. But keep this in mind: A bias incident does not define a school. It is, in many ways, a test of the school's culture and climate. How you respond is the true measure of a school's character.

It's up to school leaders to set expectations. Everyone on staff, from the bus driver and custodian to classroom teachers and the IT department, must know that hate, disrespect and intimidation have no place on campus, and that every student should feel welcome.

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A swastika, 20 feet in diameter, is burned into the pavement at a junior high school. A group of white high school students dresses in banana suits for a basketball game and taunts their majority-black rival with racial slurs. A Sikh student has his turban pulled off and hair cut by fellow students.

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Critical Practices for Social Justice Education

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Critical Practices for Social Justice Education

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What comes to mind for you when you think of healing? For me, I immediately think of wounds, and when I think of wounds, I think about the many I experienced as a child while playing outside. One incident comes to mind in particular.

When I was around five years old, I was playing outside with one of my pre-school friends (I'll call him Zion). I grew up in Brooklyn, and playing in the water looked more like someone opening a fire hydrant on the block, or playing in the cement splash areas at a local park. Zion and I were playing around in one of those neighborhood parks. The water wasn't really running . . . it was drizzling lightly from the faucet, but Zion was undeterred.

With his little five-year-old hands, he did his best to get water into the very thick Tropicana orange juice 32-ounce glass bottle he had found in the park. He called my name, I turned around and he attempted to splash me with the water in the bottle. Unfortunately, water had drizzled onto the side of the bottle while he was filling it, making it slippery. I'll leave out the gory details, but suffice it to say that I sustained a blow to my forehead, and the bottle that was 12" before it hit me was about 6-7" and jagged afterward.

Zion wasn't trying to hurt me. His hands were small, and the bottle was slippery. Not so with racialization. Racial categories are a lie. Subjugating people is malevolent. The wound was intentional. The cut is deep. The weapons that caused the wound were fashioned by deception and in shadows - cloaked and seductive.

It seems that just as the skin begins to knit itself back together, the wound is forced open.

Trail of tears.

Enslavement.

"Residential Schools."

Black codes.

Jim Crow.

Internment.

Voter suppression.

Segregation.

Redlining.

Mass incarceration.

Book bannings.

When I came home from preschool that day, I had a bandaid on my forehead, and it was clear to my parents that it was insufficient for the injury I had sustained. Thankfully our next-door neighbor was a nurse, and she gave me stitches. You can't really see the scar that remains unless you look at me really closely, and at a certain angle.

We, as a society, don't tend to respond well to the wounds our human family has sustained. We often turn away - pretending that we don't see them or that there's nothing we can do. Sometimes we begin the process of healing but seem to keep putting bandaids on wounds that need stitches, and mistakenly think we've done enough. Sadly, we even fail to see that racialization is an indiscriminate monster that lacerates us all in different ways. Racial healing requires that we understand the nature of the wounds - when, why, and how they happened - that we sanitize our hands so we don't do additional damage, invest in the first-aid supplies we need, and get about the business of rehabilitation.

More stories about Racial Healing

Afrika Afeni Mills is an author, an Education Consultant, and Adjunct Instructor. In addition to authoring Open Windows, Open Minds: Developing Antiracist, Pro-Human Students (Corwin, June 2022), she works with colleagues, teachers, coaches, and administrators to develop and sustain student-centered learning experiences that are diverse, inclusive, and equitable. Afrika has been featured on podcasts, blogs, delivered keynote addresses, and facilitated sessions at conferences across the United States. She will also be publishing a book with Corwin Press in 2022.

Afrika believes that all educators can be motivated, engaged, dynamic practitioners and leaders when provided with the support needed to create student-centered, antibias, antiracist, pro-human, culturally responsive learning environments that inspire wonder and creativity and nurture authentic diversity, belonging, equity, and inclusion.

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Healing Requires More Than a Band-aid - Brownicity

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Afrika Afeni Mills * August 29, 2023 What comes to mind for you when you think of healing? For me, I immediately think of wounds, and when I think of wounds, I think about the many I experienced as a child while playing outside. One incident comes to mind in particular.

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https://padlet.com/megankuehl/justice-oriented-science-resources-ajp6ep0y0ckwzm6p

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This is an audiobook version of the paperback title published by Corwin Press.

Although there has been significant exploration of the need for and importance of culturally responsive, sustaining, equitable and inclusive teaching and learning within the past several years, the focus is often on creating these environments and experiences for Black and Brown students. While it is essential for teachers to become culturally responsive practitioners, we don't often explore how racialization has harmed White students, and the importance and benefit of creating and sustaining learning environments where White students learn to shift from centering their own racial identity to recognizing and valuing the histories, perspectives, experiences, interests, identities, and contributions of traditionally marginalized people.

Open Windows, Open Minds builds from Rudine Sims Bishop's concept of Mirrors, Windows and Sliding Glass Doors to provide anti-bias, anti-racist, and allyship development for teachers, then to offer strategies for moving that work into classroom instruction through literacy practices. From awareness to action, the book explores what White anti-bias, anti-racist practitioners wish they had known when they were K-12 students; defines why learning to appreciate the experiences and perspectives of others is essential for our White students; and offers practical guidance to teaching and learning that will equip White students as informed, empathetic, inclusive global citizens who genuinely value diversity and will actively engage in dismantling systemic inequities.

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Check out this great listen on Audible.com. This is an audiobook version of the paperback title published by Corwin Press. Although there has been significant exploration of the need for and importance of culturally responsive, sustaining, equitable and inclusive teaching and learning within the p...

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Speak Up at School: How to Respond to Everyday Prejudice, Bigotry, and Stereotypes

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Speak Up at School: How to Respond to Everyday Prejudice, Bigotry, and Stereotypes

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Let's Talk: Facilitating Critical Conversations with Students

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Let's Talk: Facilitating Critical Conversations with Students

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The Critical Need to Reframe the Discussion - and Training - About Race

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The Critical Need to Reframe the Discussion - and Training - About Race

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Guest Afrika Afeni Mills, MEd, is the CEO of Continental Drift, LLC, an author, Education Consultant, and Adjunct Professor at Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development. She has been an educator since 1999 with a background as a classroom teacher, instructional coach, teacher developer, and school administrator. Afrika is the author of Open Windows, Open Minds: Developing Antiracist, Pro-Human Students, as well as the viral blog post, A Letter to White Teachers of My Black Children. Her TED-Ed Talk, Having Conversations About Race is Just Another Hard Thing We Can Learn to Do was released in Spring 2023. The Takeaway In this episode, we discussed the importance of addressing inclusivity and racism in education - first through self-reflection - while emphasizing the need to support educators' holistic well-being and anti-racism training via a long-term approach. Listen for The need to reflect on one's racial beliefs and behaviors.
The challenges posed by the banning of books by black authors and limiting the teaching of black American history
How educators need to collaborate with families and communities to address systemic issues and how that effort will take time and persistence
Why it's essential to incorporate anti-racism training in pre-service teacher and administrator education programs.
Why it's important for educators to take care of their whole selves.
Connect with Afrika Website
LinkedIn
Referenced Open Windows, Open Minds
TEDTalk

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the critical need to reframe the discussion – and training – about race

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‎Cultivating Resilience: The Critical Need to Reframe the Discussion - and Training - About Race on Apple Podcasts

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Guest Afrika Afeni Mills, MEd, is the CEO of Continental Drift, LLC, an author, Education Consultant, and Adjunct Professor at Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development. She has been an educator since 1999 with a background as a classroom teacher, instructional coach, teacher...

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The subject of race can be very touchy. As finance executive Mellody Hobson says, it’s a “conversational third rail.” But, she says, that’s exactly why we need to start talking about it. In this engaging, persuasive talk, Hobson makes the case that speaking openly about race — and particularly about diversity in hiring -- makes for better businesses and a better society.

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White students need more information about race and racism, not less

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White Students Need More Information About Race and Racism, Not Less

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White Students Need More Information About Race and Racism, Not Less

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Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

As an assistant professor of education at Howard University, I have watched over the past two years as state lawmakers and governors have made it harder to teach public school students about American racial history.

These "anti-CRT" and "divisive concept" laws make teachers afraid to talk openly about the history of race and racism in this country, which will leave gaps to fill in years to come. As many have pointed out, a lack of accurate history harms all students. I want to offer my perspective as a white woman who, like many other white people, grew up without exposure to accurate information about race and American history until later in life. I use it to underscore why white children, in particular, need more information about race and American history, not less.

I went to high school in a blue-collar, midwestern city where the automobile industry fed the local economy. I attended a mostly white high school and had no idea that just a few miles away, the schools were mostly Black. In fact, we lived in one of the most segregated cities in the nation during the 1980s.

In high school, we read Maya Angelou and Mildred Taylor, and learned about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. But we did not learn how racial segregation laws had shaped the schools we attended, nor how redlining and racial covenants had shaped the surrounding neighborhoods.

We did not learn why it was that our school had so few Black students or so few Black teachers. Each day, the ebb and flow of mostly white students and teachers went unquestioned, leading me, and likely other white students, to assume it was perfectly normal. At home, we did not talk about race, history, or politics. Maybe it was because, like other working-class families, we went to work and did not ask questions. Or maybe it was because, like many white families, talking about race explicitly is taboo.

It wasn't until graduate school at a predominantly white university at the age of 25 that I began to learn about the history of race in America. And, importantly, it wasn't by choice. I was not a "race and ethnicity" or "ethnic studies" or "Black studies" major. I was an education major. Making the difference were my professors, who integrated information about race, racism, and the histories and contributions of Asian Americans, Black Americans, Indigenous peoples, and Mexican Americans into the class curriculum.

As a result, my entire understanding of this country changed. And in fact, it improved. I understood more about laws and civics and social movements, and the history of the United States and the colonies. I gained significant respect and reverence for communities of color and a new understanding of my own history as a white person. It opened my worldview and expanded my perspectives and relationships. It made me more committed to our democratic ideals and to building community.

Learning about race and American history fundamentally changed my entire trajectory, and for the better. It shaped each personal and professional decision that I made thereafter.

But what if, instead of learning this in my late 20s, I had learned this history as a child? It was only by accident, to some extent, as a first-generation college student, that I attended the graduate program that I did. And it was only through the work of my professors, many of them faculty of color, that I was exposed to anything different. Think of all the other white students in my high school who have proceeded through life, casting votes and making decisions that impact the lives of other people, without an understanding of this nation's past.

Many white people that I talk to from my own generation, even now, do not know much about America's racial history. Just this past year, I've talked with white people about the ways white lawmakers segregated schools and universities, how Klan members held public offices in the 1920s and 30s, and how Massive Resistance unfolded during desegregation. And it is new to them. When they hear this, it's like a light bulb goes off. Suddenly, anti-racism and diversity efforts make more sense.

Opponents of addressing this history are afraid that it will make white children feel bad. And yes, I did learn of the brutality and violence of white people. I know that we have the potential to act with malice and disregard for the lives of people of color. But did this make me feel bad? No. It made me feel a healthy sense of responsibility to those different from myself. Teaching our children about the harms white people have perpetrated will not make them feel bad; it will keep them from doing the same thing in the future. And importantly, we must teach them how white people can contribute responsibly and with reverence to the work of racial justice.

White children notice race and internalize prejudice and superiority early on. If we do not inoculate our children from these ideas, we leave them vulnerable to the rising tide of prejudice and race-related hate. Today we are seeing the political impact of my generation, who went through school without enough information about race, racism, and American history to make better decisions in the interest of democracy. We will continue to pay a collective price as a nation if we censor this information in schools.

As white people, we have a lot to learn about the history of race and racism in America. As adults, we have our own gaps, and those of our children, to fill. We need to learn the accurate history of white people, the bad and the good. We need it to better understand ourselves and the world and human dignity. We need it to be better members of our community and to make informed policy decisions and to inoculate our children against racial extremism and xenophobia.

Learning about race, racism, and American history has fundamentally changed my life, and for the better. What I needed as a young white student - what so many of us need still today - was more information about race, racism, and American history, not less.
Kathryn Wiley is an assistant professor on educational policy and leadership at Howard University.

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White students need more information about race and racism, not less

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As an assistant professor of education at Howard University, I have watched over the past two years as state lawmakers and governors have made it harder to teach public school students about American racial history.

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https://www.lindsaybethlyons.com/blog/113

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Good and Beautiful and Kind - Lesley University

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Kids, Books & Anti-Racism Series featured speaker Afrika Afeni Mills highlights how characters on screen and paper broadened her perspective.

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Mapping

We strive to map Indigenous territories, treaties, and languages across the world in a way that goes beyond colonial ways of thinking in order to better represent how Indigenous people want to see themselves.

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Native Land is a resource to learn more about Indigenous territories, languages, lands, and ways of life. We welcome you to our site.

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Our searchable library of short texts offers a diverse mix of stories and perspectives. This multigenre, multimedia collection aligns with the Common Core's recommendations for text complexity and the Learning for Justice Social Justice Standards. Choose from informational and literary nonfiction texts, literature, photographs, political cartoons, interviews, infographics and more.

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Effective classroom management is critical to supporting student engagement and achievement.

You can spend hours crafting a creative, engaging, standards-aligned lesson, but that lesson will be of little use if taught in a chaotic or unsafe classroom. Classroom management issues are a leading cause of educator burnout. What's more, poor classroom management can harm students by diminishing instructional time and pushing students into the school-to-prison pipeline.

Reframing Classroom Management offers educators a variety of tools to help demystify common behaviors and reinforce what works. Based input from over 1,200 educators, the handouts help users foster empathy, avoid common mistakes, improve their teacher-student relationships and find alternatives to classroom removal. A forthcoming publication will describe the research that underpins these suggestions and offer further recommendations for implementation.
Download the handouts as a PDF.

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Reframing Classroom Management: A Toolkit for Educators

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You can spend hours crafting a creative, engaging, standards-aligned lesson, but that lesson will be of little use if taught in a chaotic or unsafe classroom. Classroom management issues are a leading cause of educator burnout. What's more, poor classroom management can harm students by diminishing instructional time and pushing students into the school-to-prison pipeline.

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From "What They Did Yesterday Afternoon"

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From "What They Did Yesterday Afternoon"