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Teaching For Civic Engagement-Teaching Channel (Blog)

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Teaching For Civic Engagement-Teaching Channel (Blog)

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In this particular blog, Matt Colley (2017) explains the purpose of civic engagement. Anyone can register to the Teaching Channel Blog and subscribe to up to date information on current education topics and trends.

Educators can share and exchange ideas on various education topics- civic engagement being one of them. Through this blog teachers can find a vast amount of resources and lesson ideas on civic engagement in the classroom.  Within this page, educators can watch a video of a teacher modeling ways to encourage students to take action. Towards the conclusion of this blog post, there is a list of seven bullet pointed resources for educators to use. As a result, students participate in various civic engagement topics and become more globally aware of politics, culture and ways to get involved in their communities.

Colley, M. (2017, February 1). Teaching for civic engagement. Teaching Channel. https://www.teachingchannel.com/blog/teaching-for-civic-engagement

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Teaching for civic engagement is rewarding, challenging, and uncertain work. Civic engagement is some of the most important and vital work I do as a teacher, but it's also difficult to define, assess, and break down for students. Ultimately, it's these challenges that make the work worthwhile. This series is an effort to document, share, and collaborate with the larger teaching community to try and make sense of the complicated work of teaching for civic engagement.

To me, civic engagement means young people feeling empowered to advocate for themselves and their community and working with others to try and implement their vision of the future. Civic engagement requires a number of traditional academic skills, like discussion and problem solving, along with other skills and dispositions that aren't always valued in the era of high stakes testing, such as hope, optimism, resiliency, and creativity.

Teaching for civic engagement also gets at the heart of the purpose of school. Schools should serve the students and their communities and help students envision and create the world they want to live in. As an educator, teaching for civic engagement is deeply nourishing to me and fuels me to work hard and remember why I teach, even on those long weekend nights of grading. As Yuri Kochiyama, the civil rights educator and activist once said, "Our ultimate objective in learning about anything is to try to create and develop a more just society." Teaching for civic engagement is my attempt to apply what I've learned and to challenge my students to do the same, so that together we can create a more just society.

Similarly, I have a quote posted in my classroom from the poet and scholar Audre Lorde, where she reminds us that "the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." If we are to make change in our society and education system, we can't continue business as usual. We need to develop a new language, new methods, and new approaches to identifying and addressing the problems that plague our society. Teaching for civic engagement is one way I'm trying to develop new tools to dismantle the problems in our society and help rebuild a more equitable one.

One way I incorporate civic engagement in my classroom is by encouraging my students to take action. Check out this video, included in Teaching Channel's Educating for Democracy in the the Digital Age video series.
VIDEO: Encouraging Students to Take Action
In my ninth grade English and History block class, the year ends with a six-week-long Taking Action Project. This project asks students to research a contemporary problem in our society that concerns them, develop an action step to address the problem in some way, implement that action step, and then reflect on the whole process and share their work with their classmates. Throughout this series, I'll explain some specific steps I'm taking to work towards this final project, as well as my questions and reflections about what's happening in my classroom. By reading along, you'll see my process for scaffolding civic engagement throughout the year and gain ideas for how you might implement these lessons in your own teaching practice.

I hope these blog posts will inspire others to teach for civic engagement and provide a space for conversation for others to share their thinking, work, and insights.

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Teaching for civic engagement is rewarding, challenging, and uncertain work. Civic engagement is some of the most important and vital work I do as a teacher, but it's also difficult to define, assess, and break down for students. Ultimately, it's these challenges that make the work worthwhile.

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Creating Autonomy-Supportive Learning Environments | Jon Stolk | TEDxSMU

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Creating Autonomy-Supportive Learning Environments | Jon Stolk | TEDxSMU

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This TEDxSMU is part of a speaker series. In his YouTube video, Jon Stolk discusses the importance of creating autonomy in education (TEDx Talks, 2015).

This is an eighteen minute video that can motivate educators to foster a supportive learning environment in their classroom. Stolk explains how throughout his childhood his parents helped him develop his autonomy by creating a supportive learning environment in investing in his interests. Stolk also discusses how to translate pedagogical theory into pedagogical practice, as teachers provide students with the tools students need to take charge of their learning. He discusses the importance of letting go of the control over the classroom and provide students with choice, acceptance, care, trust, encouragement and dialogue. Consequently, the learning environment outcomes will be self-efficacy, metacognition, active help seeking, creativity, task value, peer learning and intrinsic motivation.

TEDx Talks. (2015, November 5). Creating Autonomy-Supportive Learning Environments: John Stolk: TEDxSMU. YouTube. [Video File]. https://youtu.be/SxlFzrfdqa4

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Creating Autonomy-Supportive Learning Environments | Jon Stolk | TEDxSMU

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The Mind Online Podcast Professional Development

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The Mind Online Podcast Professional Development

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Learning for Justice offers free educational resources on culture and climate, curriculum and instruction, leadership and family and community engagement. This link takes listeners to a podcast series titled, "The Mind Online," which focuses on topics like digital literacy, understanding cognitive bias, social media, virtual tools and new media (Bell, n.d.).

Teachers can listen to this podcast series to earn professional development credits. This is a podcast of experienced professionals, scholars, teachers and librarians who share their expertise on digital literacy. Teachers can easily listen to this free podcast on their drives to school to improve teaching pedagogy skills and foster learning gains for their students. As the demand of digital skills is increasing, it is important that educators are well informed and up to date on the topic of digital literacy. In order to help students be prepared for the future and gain 21st century skills, it is essential for all educators to implement these digital literacies into their classrooms; whether it be a virtual learning environment or a physical learning environment.

Bell, M. (n.d.). The mind online podcast. Learning for Justice. https://www.learningforjustice.org/podcasts/the-mind-online

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Exercise your ears and sharpen your brain with The Mind Online, hosted by Learning for Justice Managing Editor Monita Bell. Through conversations with teachers, librarians, scholars and reporters, Monita explores the critical aspects of digital literacy that shape how we create and consume content o…

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This site contains digital literacy anti-bias standards, which include, Identity Anchor Standards, Diversity Anchor Standards, Justice Anchor Standards and Action Anchor Standards, students learn and gain skills that help combat prejudices (Learning for Justice, n.d.).

These standards are to be used for K-12 age group. They provide a roadmap for teachers to use through the school year, within any content. By using these standards, while in the planning stage of any lesson, teachers help students learn to appreciate other cultures and eliminate biases. Not only will teachers have a guide to help students embrace their own culture, but to understand, stand up for and take action for any injustices.  As a result, a world of respect will flourish.

Learning for Justice. (n.d.). Social Justice Standards. https://www.learningforjustice.org/frameworks/social-justice-standards

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A Framework for Anti-Bias Education

The Social Justice Standards are a road map for anti-bias education at every stage of K-12 instruction. Comprised of anchor standards and age-appropriate learning outcomes, the standards provide a common language and organizational structure educators can use to guide curriculum development and make schools more just and equitable.

Divided into four domains-identity, diversity, justice and action (IDJA)-the standards recognize that, in today's diverse classrooms, students need knowledge and skills related to both prejudice-reduction and collective action. Together, these domains represent a continuum of engagement in anti-bias, multicultural and social justice education. The IDJA domains are based on Louise Derman-Sparks' four goals for anti-bias education in early childhood.

Each of the IDJA domains has learning outcomes and school-based scenarios organized by grades K-2, 3-5, 6-8 and 9-12.

Download the Standards

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The Social Justice Standards are a road map for anti-bias education at every stage of K-12 instruction, providing a common language and organizational structure educators can use to guide curriculum development and make schools more just and equitable.

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Film maker, George Lucas, developed Edutopia, as a platform for teachers to share and locate resources on ways to improve student knowledge in k-12 grade span. Within this webpage teachers, administrators and anyone interested in education can scroll down and find various resources on cultural responsive best practices.

Edutopia includes hundreds of posts of articles, videos and other resources on topics like "how to audit classroom libraries for inclusion," "support for migrant and immigrant students" to topics like "implicit bias" (Edutopia, n.d.). Teachers can use this site to find resources to foster cultural and global awareness; as well as, diversity in the classroom. By using the search bar, teachers can find relatable, up to date information on these topics. This information will help teachers create a positive, respectful learning environment. Not only that, but teachers who have used implementation techniques effectively, can share their success with other teachers.

Edutopia. (n.d.). Culturally responsive teaching. George Lucan Educational Foundation. https://www.edutopia.org/topic/culturally-responsive-teaching

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George Lucas Educational Foundation

Find and share resources and explore strategies to engage students by connecting to and honoring their cultures, experiences, and backgrounds.

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Understanding students' lives can help teachers foster a sense of belonging and ensure that all students feel respected and challenged.

A primer on the impact of implicit biases in schools and how they can be expressed by students and faculty.

Five ways teachers can celebrate and extend the linguistic expertise of young students who speak two or more languages.

Influenced by the pandemic and social unrest, two teachers recommend books to read this summer on topics like wrestling with loss, addressing inequity, and recharging for the school year ahead.

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Find and share resources and explore strategies to engage students by connecting to and honoring their cultures, experiences, and backgrounds.

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Global Awareness and Perspectives in Global Education

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Global Awareness and Perspectives in Global Education

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This is a scholarly journal that dives deep into the importance of implementing global awareness into content curriculum. It describes five dimensions of achieving global awareness; which include, perspective consciousness, state-of-the planet awareness, cross-cultural awareness, knowledge of global dynamics, and awareness of human choices (Burnouf, 2004).

Burnouf (2004) discusses the importance on integrating global awareness in content curriculum, in order to help build trusting relationships between educators and students and among students and their peers. He discusses how a successful learning environment is one where students feel safe. Reading this journal will enhance educator's perspectives on the value of global awareness. Not only that, but how taking the time to implement this awareness will contribute to student's content knowledge because of the increase of human perspective.

Burnouf, L. (2004). Global awareness and perspectives in global education. Canadian Social Studies, 38(3), n3. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1073942.pdf

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Global Awareness and Perspectives in Global Education