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K-12 schools have long served as a safe space for students. Whether a student is escaping abuse at home, discrimination due to sexuality or race, or overcoming trauma, teachers and schools regularly provide much more beyond academic learning. They also offer therapy, support, and a place of refuge for many, which makes learning possible. Looking at schools as safe, inclusive spaces helps prepare young people for our diverse world, giving them a sense of belonging and support so that they're able to face life's challenges in healthy ways. So let's take a closer look at the meaning and history behind safe spaces.

The history of the safe space

While the exact origin of the safe space concept is unknown, some trace it back to the 1960s women's movement, as a means to create protective spaces for women against violence, and to provide a community to make change. Activist and scholar Moira Kenney notes that "Safe space, in the women's movement, was a means rather than an end and not only a physical space but a space created by the coming together of women searching for community."

The safe space term extended to the LGBTQ community around the same time. A safe place was "where people could find practical resistance to political and social repression," says Malcolm Harris in his historical review of the safe space movement. The safe space movement further extended into calls for intersectionality.

As feminist and LGBTQ communities made themselves heard, so too did the call for these movements to recognize their own institutional racism and to become inclusive and protective of people of color, not merely as part of the whole, but in particular. Today, safe space or safe zone stickers and placards denote that a place, organization, or person is welcoming to all.

Beyond a shield: the safe space in the K-12 classroom

In an article about the controversy surrounding Yale's Halloween costume policy, author Annie Murphy Paul notes that " research shows, a sense of belonging is essential for learning. We humans are social beings, wired for membership in a group." When our mental resources are "devoted to monitoring one's environment for cues of rejection" then they can't be used to comprehend and remember academic content. In the K-12 arena, we must help students feel included, safe, and strong enough to learn.

In providing a safe academic community, we must offer more than a refuge that merely shields a learner from an offending or dangerous mechanism. Our education communities must also provide targeted support, so that students can learn to effectively deal with conflicts, stress, and injustice in order to become successful in the classroom and in the outside world.

Safe spaces for racial or ethnic identity

A steady barrage of videos showing racial bias, bigotry, and violence on social media are highlighting the rampant and public nature of racism in our nation. According to Clemson University's " Status of Bullying in School" report from 2013, of the 160,000 children bullied every day, 31% are multiracial. Psychologist Morris Rosenberg found that "African-Americans showed high rates of self-esteem when they compared themselves with other African-Americans, but when they compared themselves to white peers, self-esteem levels dropped. In schools, that translated to lower achievement levels."

McKinsey & Company's The Economic Impact of the Achievement Gap in America's Schools notes that "Black and Latino students are roughly two to three years of learning behind white students of the same age." Safe spaces in the K-12 sphere can help minorities feel empowered to speak up, understand systemic inequities, and receive the support they need to believe and achieve. Most of all, schools must be authentically inclusive spaces that recognize systems perpetuating oppression in order to dismantle them.

Safe spaces for gender + sexuality

Advocates for Youth states that that 6 - 10% of the young people in your school may be LGBTQ. "Unless your program positively acknowledges their presence and actively affirms their rights and dignity, these young people may feel compelled to keep their sexual identity a secret. Having to keep secret such an essential part of life puts these youth at risk of negative mental and physical health outcomes." No matter your school or organization's stance on sexuality, ensuring the safety, dignity, and rights of all citizens - especially our most vulnerable young people - is essential. All students, regardless of gender or sexuality, have a right to learn safely and inclusively. This includes things like adopting inclusive language, enacting anti-bullying protections and transparent educational content. A safe space or safe zone sticker on an educator's door can signal to students that anti-LGBTQ language and harassment will not be tolerated.

Safe spaces for students coping with trauma

Trauma-informed teaching is not new, but it's certainly at the forefront of pedagogical discourse today. According to American Journal of Preventative Medicine, "children of all races and socioeconomic backgrounds experience and are impacted by trauma. Research suggests that between half and two-thirds of all school-aged children experience trauma, as they are exposed to one or more adverse childhood experiences that can be trauma-inducing." Trauma-informed instruction prepares teachers to recognize the symptoms of trauma and to support students through interventions, counseling, and classroom practices. In K-12 schools, safe spaces and trauma-informed practices help students learn to self-regulate and process negative emotions like anger and sadness. They're able to develop long-term, self-management abilities that make room for academic success as they get older.

When we begin with inclusive K-12 classrooms, we're able to provide our students with the tools they need to survive in a complex world.
Jennifer L.M. Gunn spent 10 years in newspaper and magazine publishing before moving to public education. She is a curriculum designer, teaching coach, and high school educator in New York City. She is also co-founder of the annual EDxEDNYC Education Conference for teacher-led innovation, and regularly presents at conferences on the topics of adolescent literacy, leadership, and education innovation.

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Tags: Bullying and Bully Prevention, Professional Development, Trauma and Resilience

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History & Importance of Safe Spaces in Schools | Resilient Educator

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K-12 schools have long served as a safe space for students. Whether a student is escaping abuse at home, discrimination due to sexuality or race, or overcoming trauma, teachers and schools regularly provide much more beyond academic learning. They also offer therapy, support, and a place of refuge for many, which makes learning possible.

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Like automotive models, women's hemlines, and children's toys, pedagogical fads come and go, causing an immediate stir but rarely influencing teaching practice in any significant way. The notion that every innovation dreamed up by reformers inside and outside public schools makes its way into the nation's classrooms is popular among those hunting for reasons to malign the schools. But it is crucial to distinguish between mere intellectual chatter and ideas that provoke substantive change.

Where on this spectrum does the idea of the "open classroom" lie? At first glance, it would seem to be just another fad. It burst onto the American education scene in the late 1960s, only to fade away by the late 1970s. Appearances, however, can be deceiving.
British Invasion
The open-classroom movement originated in British public elementary schools after World War II. The movement, known then as informal education, spread slowly to the United States. In 1967 a parliamentary commission headed by Lady Bridget Plowden published a report, Children and Their Primary Schools, that promoted open education in all British schools. American educators who visited British schools during the late 1960s had read the Plowden report and visited classrooms where informal education dominated teaching and learning. They viewed informal education-or, as they came to call it, open classrooms or open education-as an answer to both the American education system's critics and the problems of U.S. society.

For more than a decade, U.S. schools had been subjected to withering attacks, blamed for everything from the launch of Sputnik to urban decay. They were faulted for not developing enough engineers and scientists; for being racially segregated and hostile to disadvantaged children; and for producing uncreative graduates who seldom questioned authority. Critics thought that the schools could be the vehicle for winning the Cold War, furthering the civil rights struggle, and roiling a 1950s culture of conformity that suffocated imagination.

Open classrooms' focus on students' "learning by doing" resonated with those who believed that America's formal, teacher-led classrooms were crushing students' creativity. In that sense the open-classroom movement mirrored the social, political, and cultural changes of the 1960s and early 1970s. The era saw the rise of a youth-oriented counterculture and various political and social movements-the civil-rights movement, antiwar protests, feminist and environmental activism-that questioned traditional seats of authority, including the way classrooms and schools were organized and students were taught.

In both Britain and the United States, open classrooms contained no whole-class lessons, no standardized tests, and no detailed curriculum. The best of the open classrooms had planned settings where children came in contact with things, books, and one another at "interest centers" and learned at their own pace with the help of the teacher. Teachers structured the classroom and activities for individual students and small work groups. They helped students negotiate each of the reading, math, science, art, and other interest centers on the principle that children learn best when they are interested and see the importance of what they are doing.

Consider the scene from a 3rd-grade open classroom in a New York City elementary school described by two proponents, Walter and Miriam Schneir, in a 1971 New York Times Magazine article:

What is most striking is that there are no desks for pupils or teachers. Instead, the room is arranged as a workshop.

Carelessly draped over the seat, arm, and back of a big old easy chair are three children, each reading to himself. Several other children nearby sprawl comfortably on a covered mattress on the floor, rehearsing a song they have written and copied into a song folio.

One grouping of tables is a science area with . . . magnets, mirrors, a prism, magnifying glasses, a microscope. . . . Several other tables placed together and surrounded by chairs hold a great variety of math materials such as "geo blocks," combination locks, and Cuisenaire rods, rulers, and graph paper. . . . The teacher sits down at a small round table for a few minutes with two boys, and they work together on vocabulary with word cards. . . . Children move in and out of the classroom constantly.

Schools without Walls
As the idea of open education gained momentum, thousands of elementary-school classrooms became home-like settings where young children moved from one attractive learning center for math to another for art. Additional learning centers engaged them in science, reading, and writing lessons. Teams of teachers worked with multiage groups of students and created elementary schools where children were no longer assigned to grade levels. Some school districts started alternative open education programs at the high-school level and gave teachers discretion to create new academic courses where students directed their own learning, worked in the community, and pursued intellectual interests. At both the elementary and secondary levels, open education meant teachers were acting more as coaches in helping students than as bosses directing children in every activity.

Avid promoters of open education commissioned architects to build schools without walls. Teams of teachers worked collaboratively with one another, using movable dividers to reconfigure the open space for large- and small-group projects and individual study.

By the early 1970s, the phrase open classrooms dominated educators' vocabularies. Even though parents and practitioners found it hard to pin down exactly what open education meant, many school boards adopted open-education programs, and open-space schools were built across the country. Few superintendents or principals could risk saying aloud that they had neither heard of the innovation nor found it desirable without risking sneers from peers or criticism from bosses.

So many schools were adopting the physical attributes of open classrooms that some advocates wondered whether the spirit of informal education was truly being followed. In his 1973 book The Open Classroom Reader, Charles Silberman warned enthusiastic teachers and parents:

By itself, dividing a classroom into interest areas does not constitute open education; creating large open spaces does not constitute open education; individualizing instruction does not constitute open education. . . . For the open classroom . . . is not a model or set of techniques, it is an approach to teaching and learning.

The artifacts of the open classroom-interest areas, concrete materials, wall displays-are not ends in themselves but rather means to other ends. . . . In addition, open classrooms are organized to encourage:

* Active learning rather than passive learning;

* Learning and expression in a variety of media, rather than just pencil and paper and the spoken word;
* Self-directed, student-initiated learning more than teacher-directed learning.

Backlash
Just a few years later, however, the ground shifted. In the mid-1970s, with the economy stagnating and the nation deeply divided over the Vietnam War, critics again trained their sights on the public schools. The national crisis gave rise to a perception, amplified by the media, that academic standards had slipped, that the desegregation movement had failed, and that urban schools were becoming violent places. This time the call was not for open education but for a return to the basics, again mirroring general social trends-namely, the conservative backlash against the cultural and political changes of the 1960s and early 1970s.

Traditional schools sprang up in suburbs and cities. Open-space schools rebuilt their walls. States tried to raise academic standards by developing minimum competency tests that high-school students had to pass in order to receive a diploma. Citations in the media and academic journals indicate that interest in open classrooms peaked somewhere around 1974. By the early 1980s, open classrooms had already become a footnote in doctoral dissertations.

But were open classrooms just another fad? Perhaps in the sense that, like hula hoops and pet rocks, they had soared onto the scene and then disappeared without a trace. Considering them merely a fad, however, would miss the deeper meaning of open classrooms as yet another skirmish in the ideological wars that have split educators and the public since the first tax-supported schools opened their doors in the early 1800s.
The School Wars
For at least two centuries, competing traditions of teaching reading, math, citizenship, and morality have fired policy debates and occasionally touched classroom practices. In teacher-centered instruction, knowledge is often (but not always) "presented" to a learner (via lectures, textbooks, and testing) who is-and the metaphors vary-a "blank slate" or a "vessel to fill." In student-centered instruction, by contrast, knowledge is often (but not always) "discovered" by the learner (via individual and small-group work, projects blending different subjects and skills, and inquiry and questioning), who may be described as "rich clay in the hands of an artist" or "a flourishing garden in need of a masterful cultivator." On the whole, different forms of teacher-centered instruction have dominated U.S. classrooms for the past century.

However, major challenges to teacher-centered instruction were mounted at the beginning of the 20th century by "pedagogical progressives," to use Lawrence Cremin's apt phrase; in the 1960s by enthusiasts for open education; and again in the late 1980s and early 1990s by neoprogressives committed to integrated curricula, performance-based assessments (rather than standardized tests), and smaller schools. Nevertheless, a wide gap remained between ideas and actual practice. Among educators, mainstream classroom practices remained teacher-centered, even if substantial numbers of teachers-trained by progressive faculty members-grasped pieces of the student-centered tradition and created hybrid practices.

The present moment in American education, with its emphasis on standards-based curricula and test-based accountability, surely favors the teacher-centered crowd. Nevertheless, many teachers, particularly in elementary schools, continue to prize active student involvement, cross-disciplinary projects completed by small groups, and similar activities. And even full-fledged open education is still thriving in schools across the country, from the Los Angeles Open Charter School to the Irwin Avenue Open Elementary in North Carolina's Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district. Many teachers and principals still embrace the principles of open education, but keep their heads low to avoid incoming fire.

In high schools, most teachers continue to use teacher-centered practices, leavened slightly by informal practices that have crept into their repertoires. Yet activists in the small-schools movement carry the torch of open education and progressive practices from earlier generations.

Why this long-running ideological war over the best ways to teach reading, math, civic engagement, and character building? The short answer is that these enduring pedagogical quarrels are proxies for deeper political divisions between conservatives and liberals on issues ranging from environmental protection to foreign policy. There are, of course, liberals who believe in traditional education and conservatives who embrace progressive ideas, but the lines are fairly well drawn.

So while the open classroom has clearly disappeared from the vocabulary of educators, another variation of open education is likely to reappear in the years ahead. Deep-seated progressive and traditional beliefs about rearing children, classroom teaching and learning, and the values and knowledge that should be instilled in the next generation will continue to reappear because schools historically have been battlegrounds for solving national problems and working out differences in values.

Since children differ in their motivations, interests, and backgrounds, and learn at different speeds in different subjects, there will never be a victory for either traditional or progressive teaching and learning. The fact is that no single best way for teachers to teach and for children to learn can fit all situations. Both traditional and progressive ways of teaching and learning need to be part of a school's approach to children. Smart teachers and principals have carefully constructed hybrid classrooms and schools that reflect the diversities of children. Alas, that lesson remains to be learned by the policymakers, educators, and parents of each generation.
-Larry Cuban is a professor emeritus of education at Stanford University.

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Like automotive models, women's hemlines, and children's toys, pedagogical fads come and go, causing an immediate stir but rarely influencing teaching practice in any significant way. The notion that every innovation dreamed up by reformers inside and outside public schools makes its way into the nation's classrooms is popular among those hunting for reasons to malign the schools.

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For some, the ivory tower of academia is "ivory" in more ways than one.

Events over the last year showed us that within our educational spaces, racial tension can quickly bubble to the surface. Protests erupted across the country, and college campuses became hotbeds for a new wave of student activism that helped deliver a powerful, inescapable message: As a country, we have failed to address how race fits into American education, and communities of color feel a lack of representation. Whether it was the absence of diversity among faculty members or outright instances of racism, student activists cited myriad reasons for their discontent. Children of color will make up 52 percent of K-12 students by 2021. Will this spike in non-white Americans feel the same alienation from, and even anger toward, what is perceived as a mainstream American education? What can be done today to bridge the gap in achievement-and the gap in classroom representation? We might start with culturally responsive school curricula.

As many have said before me, education plays a major role in framing American culture and identity. Through our schools, we reflect on which "ideas, phrases, and principles...are woven into the fabric of the nation," argues my colleague Robert Pondiscio. An American education should teach us what it means to be American-but for too many minority students, our education system has left them feeling like outsiders. To understand why this may be, we can look to the world of social psychology, which comes from the very same rarified academic realm that was under indictment for much of 2015. While skepticism is understandable, I believe the implications of some of this research has huge value for those who wish to promote education for all.

Stereotypes about which racial groups can and cannot succeed academically have become pervasive in American classrooms. A large, growing body of research has demonstrated how teacher expectations can reinforce the notion that white and Asian students will outperform their black and Hispanic classmates. The American Psychological Association has found that this kind of stereotyping can widen the achievement gap by creating a "stereotype threat"-a self-enforcing stigma for students who believe they are "inferior in academics." Stereotype threat can "raise inhibiting doubts and high-pressure anxieties," potentially damning a student's academic performance. Culturally responsive curricula would work to intervene and directly address issues tied to race, such as stereotype threat, by providing an opportunity for students to dig deep into the multiplicity the American experience. This would go beyond the "multiculturalism" that is often presented to students in the brief photo captions of history textbooks, or the lessons on black history and contributions we jam into the month of February.

To be sure, elements of multiculturalism are probably more present in U.S. school curricula today than ever before. The fact that we have a Black History Month at all is progress. Unfortunately, the presence of multiculturalism in education has not done much for struggling students of color. Despite our best efforts, the achievement gap persists between white and Asian students and their black and Hispanic classmates. Regardless of how much progress towards an inclusive, representative education we've made in our classrooms, there's room for improvement-especially when emerging research suggests that there is much to be gained by bolstering our efforts in this field.

A recent NBER study argues that culturally responsive curricula (also known as ethnic studies) can have major causal effects on outcomes for at-risk minority students. San Francisco Unified School District teamed up with the Stanford Graduate School of Education to pilot an ethnic studies course for 1,405 incoming high school freshman students who were deemed at risk of dropping out (with a GPA of 2.0 or lower upon completing the eighth grade). The course, designed by San Francisco State University, "focused on themes of social justice, discrimination, stereotypes, and social movements from U.S. history" from the eighteenth century through the 1970s. Students were also encouraged to engage with their community and family history through required service-learning projects. Participating students' cumulative GPAs jumped by 1.4 grade points, their attendance increased by 21 percent, and they earned twenty-three more credits overall compared to peers just beyond the program's threshold for inclusion. More impressively, GPA gains were larger for boys than for girls, a feat nearly unexampled in recent education reform measures.

My own experience in Los Angeles public schools exemplifies the difference that a frame of relevance can have on a student's interest in education. Despite being Korean American, I was never the straight-A, 4.0 GPA, math-whiz, Saturday-school-dwelling cliché so often applied to my peers. My not-really-a-Tiger-Mom left me to my own devices when it came to school. Sometimes, the studying got done-but there were many, many times that it didn't. By my freshman year of high school, I was struggling in more classes than I was succeeding in. World history was one such class. Memorizing the succession sequence of Russian tsars or the date the Magna Carta was signed just didn't interest me.

I do, however, remember one lesson that really resonated. It was the day we discussed personal narratives of Japanese Americans in World War II internment camps. Knowing that my grandparents had immigrated from Korea to the States around that time, I ruminated for days on how this ugly period of history must have affected my fellow Asian-Americans. Discussing it with my family that week led to some of the fullest moral conversations of my pre-college years.

As an Asian American, I escaped much of the negative stereotyping that black and Hispanic students often face in the classroom. I never felt like I was expected to fail because of my racial identity. I simply found that curriculum rarely succeeded in getting me to question, reflect, and engage with the material I was learning on a deep level. Culturally responsive curricula would introduce a means through which students of color could directly engage their education, working to counteract negative stereotyping and heighten student interest as well.

The parallels between the perceived representation gap in higher education and the achievement gap in K-12 education are striking. For struggling students of color, a new take on school curriculum might help narrow both. To be clear: An emphasis on culturally responsive curriculum is not the same as suggesting that we stop teaching about America's founders, or any of the other pivotal figures or moments in history that don't center on people of color. This is not an attempt to " assert that every racial group should have its own sealed and separate history." Rather, it would encourage efforts to diversify material, promote pride in cultural differences, and encourage existing teaching practices that have already demonstrated success in the classroom. Introducing culturally responsive curricula could be a critical step toward breaking down the ivory tower's walls and reminding all our students that academic excellence was meant for them too.

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A culturally rich curriculum can improve minority student achievement

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For some, the ivory tower of academia is "ivory" in more ways than one. Events over the last year showed us that within our educational spaces, racial tension can quickly bubble to the surface.

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Overview

Inclusive teaching refers to a variety of teaching approaches that strive to address the needs of all students. Inclusive teaching provides a learning experience that allows students from all backgrounds, learning styles and abilities to be successful. Inclusive teaching strategies contribute to an inclusive learning environment in which all students feel equally valued. Inclusivity in the classroom implies that the classroom environment is one in which all students feel that their contributions and perspectives are equally valued and respected (Cal Poly).

Strategies

Make it Personal

Provide opportunities for students to share their own experiences and perspectives. Students learn from each other and the various perspectives and existing knowledge their fellow students bring to the table. Activities such as a fishbowl activity or reverse circle discussion activity can encourage and direct these challenging conversations.

Include Various Perspectives

Provide a variety of perspectives on the topics you teach. For instance, literature that comes from only one perspective lacks depth. Varied perspectives might offer new ideas and unique views. One example would be to teach a World War II class from an American historian's perspective only. The look into that historic moment will be rather narrow. Include literature from the experiences of other groups such as concentration camp survivors, German foot soldiers, French resistance workers, and Vichy government officials. As much as possible provide content from diverse perspectives or created by individuals from differing backgrounds.

Know Your Students

Get to know your students. Invest time to focus on getting to know your students. The impact may surprise you. The simple gesture of addressing a student by their name demonstrates care and concern. You can do this through classroom icebreakers (.pdf).

Respect Diverse People

Establish respect for the values of diverse peoples by using specific examples. Examples that demonstrate a respect and appreciation for diverse peoples and cultures. Use language that is gender neutral or takes into consideration the gender identity of students.

Respect Diverse Talents

Students not only come from diverse backgrounds, ethnicities, race, and gender, but students also bring different talents and styles of learning. All students should have the opportunity to learn in a way that works for them and they should be able to showcase their talents.

References

Related Resource Library Topics

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Inclusivity in the Classroom | Center for Teaching Excellence

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Inclusivity in the classroom implies that the classroom environment is one in which all students feel that their contributions and perspectives are...

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Open Concept theory applied to the classroom

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Open Concept theory applied to the classroom

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Morris Weitz claimed that there is no concise definition to art, seeing as we all use our own language, understanding, and beliefs to craft our own understandings of what art is. I think applying this to a learning environment would be helpful in fostering the development of everyone actively engaged. It would create an open dialogue between student and teacher about what we are doing and why, and can further be tailored to meet the needs of everyone, rather than just those who excel in certain kinds of environments.

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moving at a pace which is tailored to every student's needs, even if it means adapting curricula to different students at different stages in their development

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moving at a pace which is tailored to every student's needs, even if it means adapting curricula to different students at different stages in their development

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-active and available support for those students who require it.

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Liberationism
Social Constructivist

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IDEAL CLASSROOM: How padlet can function to assist our ideal classroom:

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IDEAL CLASSROOM: How padlet can function to assist our ideal classroom:

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- padlet is a platform which allows multiple users to post information (pictures, writing, links to other sources).
-It could be used in our ideal classroom as a means of giving students a digital space to organize and collaborate information on various topics, as well as viewing and interacting with each others work.
-it serves as an open forum for students to share their thoughts and opinions on different topics discussed in class, and interact with others.