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PD w/Tere 20.21

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Website which helps you pronounce difficult names

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A 4-Part System for Getting to Know Your Students | Cult of Pedagogy

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Relationship building is key to good teaching. This system will help you quickly get to know students and benefit from those connections all year long.

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Google Forms - create and analyze surveys, for free.

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Listen to my interview with Jim Sturtevant (transcript):
[This post contains Amazon Affiliate links; if you make a purchase from Amazon after going there through my links, I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thanks.]

I'll never forget what one of my college professors told me when I was studying to become a teacher. She said the number one factor in our effectiveness as teachers would be the relationships we built with our students. She felt so strongly about this that she paused, looked around so she could make eye contact with every person in the room, then repeated it: "More important than anything else you do as a teacher is the relationship you build with your students."

I kind of didn't believe her. I mean, I understood what she meant in theory, but I was pretty sure that planning interesting lessons and having a clear set of classroom guidelines were at least as important as "relationships." I appeared to be listening attentively, but inside, I thought she was a little off the mark.

That was before I started teaching. Now I agree with her 100 percent. And even before I started reading James Sturtevant's book, You've Gotta Connect - just skimming the table of contents - I knew I had found a kindred spirit, someone who believed the same as me and my college professor, that the relationships you build with your students are the key to working wonders in your classroom.
You've Gotta Connect: Building Relationships That Lead to Engaged Students, Productive Classrooms, and Higher Achievement
by James Sturtevant, 278 pages, Incentive Publications, March 2014
And the book definitely lived up to the promises made by that quick preview. You've Gotta Connect is full of practical, actionable advice and loaded with tools to strengthen the quality of your connection with students.

Although I recommend you read the whole book, here are a few take-away lessons from the book that can improve the way you connect with students right now:

1. Drop the nostalgia. One big barrier to connecting with students is our nostalgia for the past, the way we constantly compare our current students with the (better) ones we used to teach. "Do you remember earlier teaching years when parents were more involved and students were less hostile? Do you wish you were in that other school where you taught before - where you had fewer discipline problems and struggled with fewer slackers? Do you pine for last year when you got through all the material with students who behaved pretty well and seemed to enjoy learning? I don't know any teacher who does not have bouts of nostalgia. But hear me now: you've gotta let go of it! This nostalgia interferes with connection to present students. It keeps you from seeing THESE students - their needs and gifts" (52).

2. Tell your own stories. When you share parts of your own personal life with students, they get more comfortable sharing their own, and this is how connections are made. "Try to tell some sort of a personal story about once a week. It doesn't have to be long. It does not have to be earth shattering. When you get a lot of feedback or stories of their own, you know you have struck gold!" (202).

3. Learn their culture. Students live in a very different world than the one we lived in at their age. "You are, by definition, not 'one of them.' You don't need to and should not be 'one of them.' If you want to connect to them, however, they must immediately sense that you value them" (81). Sturtevant urges us to learn about students' musical tastes, the movies and T.V. shows they're into, and the slang terms they use. "These actions show you care enough to pay attention to their world, even if it pulls you a bit out of your comfort zone to do so" (86).

4. Keep prying. Keep persisting. Be patient. With students who are slower to warm up, we need to put our egos aside and just keep trying. "Gentle, focused nudging of a reluctant student toward being comfortable enough to open up a bit" is what will ultimately get you there, but don't rush it: "Be cool! You have time, perhaps all year. The goal is to have a strong relationship as soon as possible, but accept that it may not happen until late in the game" (88-89).

5. Run toward trouble. Connecting with students isn't just about smiles and funny stories. "Troubled times are the best times for connection," Sturtevant writes (226). "Be on the lookout for difficult times, blowups, setbacks, failures, hurt, and disappointments," resolve problems in a constructive, respectful way, and your connection to those students will be stronger.

You'll get a lot of insight by reading You've Gotta Connect on your own, but it would also make an excellent book for group study. Sturtevant has included dozens of hands-on tools you can use to develop and examine your own practice, like the "Environment Stealth Check" worksheet, which asks you to sit in your teacher's lounge and tally up the number of positive comments you hear about students versus the number of negative comments you hear, or the "Anatomy of a Conflict" worksheet, where you break down the components of past conflicts and get a clearer understanding of how you might have handled them better. These reproducible tools help you take the theories and ideas Sturtevant presents and apply them to your own teaching.

I also had the privilege of interviewing James Sturtevant for my podcast. In our conversation, he talks about how to deal with students who resist his attempts to connect, what it looks like when he has to reprimand a student, the research that shows the connection between teacher-student relationship and learning, and how people who aren't naturally extroverted can still build strong relationships with their students.

You can listen to the interview using the player above. A full transcript is also available if you aren't able to listen, but James is a pretty entertaining guy to listen to, so it's worth the time if you can make it happen.

James Sturtevant teaches social studies at Big Walnut High School in Sunbury, Ohio. You can find him at his website (his latest post is on reverse engineering your connection with students) or on Twitter at @jamessturtevant.

Stick around.
Join my mailing list and never miss another post. You'll get weekly tips, tools, and inspiration - in quick, bite-sized packages - all geared toward making your teaching more effective and joyful. To thank you, I'll send you a free copy of my new e-booklet, 20 Ways to Cut Your Grading Time in Half. I look forward to getting to know you better!

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Are You Really Connecting with Your Students?

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James Sturtevant's book, You've Gotta Connect, is full of practical, actionable advice and tools to strengthen the quality of your connection with students.

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Discussion and Supporting Materials

Thought starters

1. How does this practice affect classroom culture?

2. What does Ms. Wessling include in her pledge?

3. What would you include in your pledge?

School Details

Johnston Senior High School
6500 Northwest 100th Street
Johnston IA 50131

Data Provided By:

Teachers

English Language Arts / 10 11 12 / Teacher

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Sarah Brown Wessling starts school with a pledge to her students. In the pledge, she shares how she will act and her expectations for the class. She hand writes students' names and signs each letter before passing the letters out to each student in her class.

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"What are your hopes and dreams for the school year?"

Many teachers ask this question in the first weeks of school to help students get excited about learning and make a personal connection to what they will learn in school. Inviting students to name learning goals (hopes and dreams) right away shows them that school is a safe place, that they're important members of the classroom, and that they can look forward to an engaging, challenging, and fun year of learning. Establishing this classroom tone is one of the most important things to do at the beginning of the year.

The process of articulating hopes and dreams varies depending on the students' grade level and the teacher's style. Below are ideas for various grade ranges and special area teachers.

Grades K-2

Young students often need some school experience before they can start thinking about what they want to learn and do in school. Allow students to familiarize themselves with the new routine of school for the first couple days (or first week for kindergartners and first graders) before you help them establish learning goals.

After that initial settling-in period, invite the children to think about their hopes and dreams. Here's one approach to doing this with these young students:

Ask students, "Why do we come to school?" If they give a broad answer such as "to learn," help them stretch their thinking: "What can we learn in school?" Write down their ideas. They might say "To do things like write," "I think we will learn science stuff," or "To make friends."

The next day, ask students to reflect on their list of reasons for coming to school, and then help them think about specific learning goals. To guide them, say, "Today we're going to make another list. What are some of your hopes and dreams for the year?" Give examples of your own hopes and dreams, such as "This year, I hope our classroom will be a place where all of you find enjoyment and get to work at things that really matter to you." With this guidance, even students this young can turn a vague statement about why people come to school, such as "To do things like write," into a realistic learning goal: "I want to learn to write a story."

Over the next few days, continue to list students' ideas as they share. Keep each brainstorming session short, about five to ten minutes. Stretching this process over several days gives ideas a chance to percolate and sends the message that sorting out learning goals is important work, not something to rush.

If any goals seem unrealistic, coach students in rethinking. For example, if a student says "I want to read all the books in the library," you can respond with "Sounds like you want to do a lot of reading this year. Can I write that down as your goal?"

By the following week, everyone should be ready to choose one learning goal that's most important to them. Have students write down and illustrate that goal (with help from you and other adults in the room as needed).

By the end of that week, students can share their learning goal with the class. Post students' hopes and dreams on the classroom bulletin board for all to see.

Grades 3-4

To help students get enthusiastic about school right away, invite them to begin thinking about their hopes and dreams early in the first week of school. The challenge is to help them set learning goals that they truly care about and can realistically achieve in school this year. Here's one way to do this:

At the end of the first day, introduce students to learning goals in closing circle-a daily gathering before dismissal that helps students end the day on a positive note and feel energized about their learning. Going around the circle, ask students, "What's one thing you enjoyed about your first day of school?" and "What's something you're looking forward to tomorrow?" Then ask students to spend a few minutes that night thinking about what they want to learn and do in school this year.

Over the next couple days, help students brainstorm learning goals in short sessions, spreading this brainstorming over the course of the week to give them time to come up with lots of ideas. You might want to have students use a worksheet to help them come up with a goal that's achievable and meaningful. Start off the first session by sharing your own hopes and dreams. For example, you might say, "I hope our class grows into a safe and strong learning community."

Coach students who list goals that may be too broad or unrealistic for the school year. For example, if a student says "I want to be a professional musician," discuss the skills and habits needed to reach such a long-term goal and choose one that's realistic to focus on this year. For example, musicians need stick-to-itiveness, and an attainable school-year goal related to that might be "to keep trying even when something is difficult."

By the end of the first week, students should be ready to choose one goal to illustrate and share with the class. Display everyone's hopes and dreams on the classroom bulletin board for all to see.

Grades 5-6

Students in grades 5 and 6 are ready to set realistic, meaningful learning goals right from the start of school. Students this age are also ready for the additional challenge of stating one goal having to do with academic learning and one having to do with social relationships. Here's one way to help them do this:

On the second day of school, introduce students to learning goals in the Morning Meeting message, such as "This week we will think about our learning goals. What are some of your hopes and dreams for this school year? Try to think of both what you want to learn in different subjects and how you want to work with others." To guide students, state your own hopes and dreams. Be sure you also touch on both academic and social learning in your statement. For example, you might include in the message "I really hope everyone will feel safe, take care of each other, and be thinking workers."

Have a brief coaching conference with students who list goals that are too broad or unrealistic. For example, if a student says "I hope I get to play video games all day," you can help turn it into an attainable goal such as "to learn all that I can about computers this year."

By the end of the first week (or beginning of the second week), ask students to choose one social and one academic learning goal that is most important to them to write down and illustrate. Display everyone's hopes and dreams on the classroom bulletin board and give the class time to read what classmates have shared.

Special Area Teachers

Like other teachers, special area teachers can have students name learning goals for the year. This step establishes a sense of purpose and anticipation for the work students will do in the special area room.

Start by articulating your own hopes and dreams for this year. For example, you might say, "This year, I hope that we have the kind of [special area] classroom where students can be really creative, take some risks, and try new skills. I hope you all enjoy [special area] and look forward to coming each week."

Next, prompt students to think about their own learning goals by saying, "Now think about your hopes and dreams for this year in [special area]. What are some of your goals? What are some things you might like to learn?"

Special area teachers find many different ways for students to share their hopes and dreams. For example:

One physical education teacher has each student write their learning goal for PE on a paper basketball, which they then display on the "Hoops and Dreams" wall.

A music teacher fills his room with pictures of children playing an instrument, dancing, singing, or engaging in various other musical pursuits-students' illustrations of their musical hopes and dreams for the year.

Supporting a Key Goal of the First Weeks of School

One of our most important goals in the first weeks of school is to help students trust that school will be a place where their ideas matter and where the learning is meaningful. Guiding them in naming their learning goals for the year is a powerful way to meet this goal. Time spent on this activity is an investment that reaps benefits for months to come.

A Prelude to Rules

Besides setting a tone of purposeful learning, inviting students to articulate their learning goals for the year is also an important first step in co-creating classroom rules with students.

For example, after students share their goals with the class, you might say, "You've had a chance to read everyone's hopes and dreams. Let's start thinking of some rules that can help us work together really well and allow everyone to reach their goals." Next you would consolidate the ideas students name into a manageable list that will serve as the classroom rules for the year.

Even if you're planning to use existing rules-ones shared by your team, grade level, or whole school-you'll still want to ask students to articulate their hopes and dreams so you can talk with them about how these rules enable them to achieve their goals. When you connect students' goals to the rules like this, no matter where the rules come from, you help students see rules as positive guidelines that create a safe, supportive classroom in which they can do their best learning.

Learn More About the First Weeks of School

Creating learning goals is just one strategy for making the early weeks of school a highly fruitful time of year. To learn many others, see The First Six Weeks of School, 2nd edition. You'll find practical ideas that enable you to:

Create a climate of warmth, inclusion, and safety.

Teach classroom routines and behavior expectations.

Help students get to know and care for the classroom and school environment.

Establish expectations for academic work.

For more information on learning goals, how they connect to classroom rules, and other important strategies for a successful beginning to the school year, you can also check out Rules in School: Teaching Discipline in the Responsive Classroom.
(an adapted excerpt from The First Six Weeks of School, 2nd edition)
Tags: First Day of School, Hopes and Dreams/Learning Goals, Special Areas

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Inviting students to name learning goals (hopes and dreams) right away shows them that school is a safe place, that they're important members of the classroom, and that they can look forward to an engaging, challenging, and fun year of learning.

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Directions

1. Divide students into groups of 4-5.

2. Each group is given a topic, quote, question or prompt related to the learning target. This is placed in the center of the group as the "campfire."

3. Each student individually responds on a sticky note or slip of paper, and then places it around the campfire.

4. Students then take turns choosing a response other than their own to read aloud.

5. Each students responds to what was read; they can agree/disagree and say why, ask a question, or add to the discussion.

6. This continues around the "campfire" until all notes have been read and discussed.

Every student is engaged - even the shy ones. It is easier to read and discuss what someone else has written.

It provides the opportunity to think, write, and discuss open-ended questions. The instructional dialogue that ensues leads to higher levels of analysis and inquiry.

It validates and affirms sociocentric, cooperative, and relational cultural behaviors.

Finally, it is very versatile. You can have each group grapple with the same question or prompt for 10 minutes and move on with another aspect of the lesson. Several teachers have assigned each group a different question or prompt, and then had groups get up and move to a new campfire. This adds the element of movement as well as diverse perspectives.

​ Directions

1. Prepare an activity sheet (for review?) with questions, prompts, or even math problems, and distribute one to each student.

2. Students stand up and take only a writing utensil with them.

3. The teacher turns on music (something upbeat) and students move around the room.

4. When the music stops, they sit down wherever they are and choose a question on the sheet to answer.

5. The teacher turns on the music again and students repeat the process until all questions have been answered.

6. When students return to their seats, they form groups of 3-4 to compare answers.

7. The teacher can choose to review answers using a response protocol.

Every student is engaged in answering the questions.

Students can choose to answer the questions they feel confident about.

The anonymity of the answers on a student's sheet makes it easier to discuss and pose questions about whether or not it is correct.

This activity addresses multiple cultural behaviors: (1) sense of immediacy, (2) spontaneity, (3) dynamic attention span, (4) musicality, (5) sociocentric, and (6) communalism.

Teachers who have tried these two strategies are excited to share them with colleagues and use them again. Just when you think there are no new ideas out there, something pops up, and Dr. Hollie's book, , has a lot more to choose from. Some are tried and true, but others have a unique twist. Check it out. Strategies for Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Teaching and Learning

​As always, if you want to try one of these, or any new activity, just ask an Instructional Coach or an Implementation Associate to come and help. Together you can make it work for your students' benefit.

This post brought to you by Ellen Harford, an Instructional Coach at John Marshall High School
Connect with or by calling 507.328.5376

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More Strategies for Instructional Dialogue: You Can Never Have Too Many!

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Directions Divide students into groups of 4-5. Each group is given a topic, quote, question or prompt related to the learning target. This is placed in the center of the group as the "campfire." Each student individually responds on a sticky note or slip of paper, and then places it around the campfire.

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Individualist versus Collectivist Cultures 

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Individualist versus Collectivist Cultures 

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April 1999 | Volume 56 | Number 7
Understanding Race, Class and Culture Pages 64-67

Carrie Rothstein-Fisch, Patricia M. Greenfield and Elise Trumbull

I wanted to understand my students better so I started studying Mexican culture. Then I realized that the children in my class came from many distinct regions, each with different histories and traditions. I just knew that I would never know enough. I had to give up trying.

-Kindergarten teacher

This kindergarten teacher voiced the frustration experienced by many teachers. However, she had a different outlook after attending a workshop called Bridging Cultures, which focused on a basic value system common to Latino cultures that transcends languages, histories, and traditions: collectivism (Triandis, 1989). Collectivism is common in Mexico and in Central and South America, particularly among the rural poor who have had limited formal education. Because many Latino immigrants come to the United States with this kind of background, understanding collectivism becomes invaluable for teachers serving immigrant Latino children.

Collectivism Versus Individualism

Collectivism is a cluster of interrelated values that emphasize the interdependence of family members (fig. 1). Within this value system, children are taught to be helpful to others and to contribute to the success of any group they belong to-beginning with the family. Even knowledge of the physical world is placed within a social context.

In contrast, schools foster individualism, viewing the child as an individual who should be developing independence and valuing individual achievement (Greenfield, 1994). Unlike collectivism, which emphasizes the social context of learning and knowledge, individualism emphasizes information disengaged from its social context (Hofstede, 1980). When collectivistic students encounter individualistic schools, conflicts that are based on hidden values and assumptions can occur:

A kindergarten teacher was showing her class an actual chicken egg that would be hatching soon. She was explaining the physical properties of the egg, and she asked the children to describe eggs by thinking about the times they had cooked and eaten eggs. One of the children tried three times to talk about how she cooked eggs with her grandmother, but the teacher disregarded these comments in favor of a child who explained how eggs look white and yellow when they are cracked. (Greenfield, Raeff, & Quiroz, 1995, p. 44)

The first child's answer was typical of the associations encouraged in collectivistic cultures, where objects are most meaningful when they are used in connection with social interactions. However, the teacher expected students to describe eggs as isolated physical entities and did not value the object as a connection among people in social relationships.

The teacher was unaware that her question was ambiguous. Children who shared her orientation assumed that she was interested in the physical properties of the eggs, even though she had not made that point explicit. Children who did not share her orientation made different assumptions. They assumed that she was interested in the object as a mediator of social relationships (Greenfield, Raeff, & Quiroz, 1995).

To help teachers understand the assumptions underlying individualism and collectivism, we developed the Bridging Cultures Project as a research-based, professional development program. We introduced elementary school teachers serving large immigrant Latino populations to a new way of understanding the values that influence behaviors.

Promoting Helpfulness

When teachers understood that helpfulness is highly valued in collectivistic cultures, they questioned certain classroom practices. For example, in collectivistic households, older children are expected to help younger ones, even when it means putting aside their own task. But teachers often assign individual children to classroom roles, such as chalkboard cleaner or attendance monitor. When friends help one another, teachers may admonish them, saying, "That's Marco's job. You have your own job to do!"

However, once teachers understood the importance of helpfulness in collectivistic cultures, they no longer considered the helpfulness that children learned at home a discipline problem. Teachers began to appoint two children to each task or to allow children to help one another. Clean-up time became pleasant because children helped until the class was clean. These classroom changes increased efficiency, task completion, and classroom harmony. Teachers supported children for being helpful instead of punishing them for interfering with a classmate's responsibility. Helpfulness, a child development goal important to Latino immigrant parents, was valued at school.

Sharing Group Success

A 3rd grade Bridging Cultures teacher, Amanda Perez, mindful of the collectivistic orientation, initiated curriculum changes to systematically expand group learning. First, she increased choral reading so that it became a regular part of daily language arts. Trying out their burgeoning English skills in a group allowed the limited English proficient students to practice the rhythm and the sound of English without being spotlighted.

Perez also used the value of helpfulness in an academic context. At the end of each reading session, she gave each child a copy of the homework. The children discussed the questions, but were not allowed to write down the answers until they were at home. In this way, students more proficient in English helped classmates rehearse the homework. This literacy practice and preview resulted in a 100 percent homework return rate, surpassing the teacher's highest expectations. Perez stated,

Most teachers keep students isolated by levels. Now I mix them up. I have also learned that helping one another is not cheating! Because of the Bridging Cultures project, their English is improving. It is so nonthreatening because of the group experience.

In math, group celebrations incorporate an element of collectivism while recognizing individual academic achievement. For example, when an individual student advances to the next level of the multiplication table, the child rings a bell, stopping all action in the classroom and allowing everyone to clap. In this way, classmates share individual success, and one child's success becomes a success for the total group. Individual academic achievement, an intrinsic school value, is accomplished, and children are appreciated for their contribution to the group goal of multiplication mastery.

Scientific Information and Social Context

Understanding collectivism can also eliminate problematic assumptions about what constitutes scientific knowledge. For example, 4th and 5th graders in Marie Altchech's class were learning about plants and animals. Before the children took an excursion to a nearby wetlands, a park docent visited the classroom to prepare them. He asked, "What do you know about hummingbirds?" Students began to tell stories about their family's experiences with birds, but the docent became impatient and said, "No more stories!" He expected students to use scientific language to talk about hummingbird anatomy or ecology, that is, to talk about birds out of their social context. When the children were told to stop telling stories, they became silent.

However, in a Bridging Cultures workshop, Altchech had learned about and analyzed the egg example mentioned earlier. She knew that her students would first consider scientific information in the context of shared family experiences. She also knew that the children did possess the ability to describe physical and behavioral aspects of birds, but that this knowledge might be embedded in a social context. She developed a plan to tap both sets of knowledge.

After the docent left, Altchech invited the children to tell their family stories about birds. Her goal was to give them a collectivistic way to engage in scientific discoveries. As the children shared their family experiences, the teacher wrote story highlights on the left side of the chalkboard and scientific aspects of the children's experiences and observations on the right. This process honored the children's stories while producing a rich and dynamic list of topics for scientific discourse. The teacher and the class valued the stories and the scientific information equally.

In one story, a child reported being in the garden with her grandmother when she noticed that hummingbirds seemed to stand still in the air. This family-based story led to a discussion about how the wings of hummingbirds must beat rapidly to sustain their apparent stillness. The children, fascinated by the topic, engaged in scientific discourse, scaffolded by the teacher, about how body mass, metabolism, and food intake are related. Whereas the docent conveyed the message that the storytelling approach was wrong, the teacher validated the students' stories and used them to build a bridge to the scientific culture valued in school.

When teachers understand and respect the collectivistic values of immigrant Latino children, the opportunities for culturally informed learning become limitless. Our examples in classroom management, reading, math, and science demonstrate that educators can design instruction responsive to diverse groups that does not undermine home-based cultural values.

Although the framework of individualism-collectivism is only one tool for understanding cultural differences (and we caution against sweeping generalizations), it does open the door to new ways of thinking and acting for teachers. Instead of advocating cultural sensitivity in a general way, this framework alerts teachers to specific cultural differences that are likely to diverge from school-based practices and values. Most important, the framework encourages teachers to recognize their own practices as cultural in origin rather than as simply the "right way" to do things.

The frustration caused by the feeling of "not knowing enough about each culture" can be abated when teachers use their knowledge of individualism and collectivism to understand the underlying motivation behind specific cultural practices, including those of the school.

References

Greenfield, P. M. (1994). Independence and interdependence as developmental scripts: Implications for theory, research and practice. In P. M. Greenfield & R. Cocking (Eds.), Cross-cultural roots of minority child development. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

Greenfield, P. M., Raeff, C., & Quiroz, B. (1995). Cultural values in learning and education. In B. Williams (Ed.), Closing the achievement gap: A vision for changing beliefs and practices. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Hofstede, G. (1980). Culture's consequences: International differences of work-related values. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

Rothstein-Fisch, C. (1998) Bridging cultures: A pre-service teacher training model. San Francisco: WestEd.

Triandis, H. C. (1989). Cross-cultural studies of individualism and collectivism. Nebraska Symposium on Motivation, 37, 43-133.

Authors' note: The Bridging Cultures Project is sponsored by the Language and Cultural Diversity program of WestEd, a regional educational laboratory based in San Francisco, California. The Bridging Cultures teachers are Marie Altchech, Stoner Avenue School; Catherine Daley, Magnolia School; Kathy Eyler, Hoover Elementary; Giancarlo Mercado and Pearl Saitzyk, Westminster School from the Los Angeles Unified School District; Amada Irma Perez, Mar Vista School, from the Ocean View School District; and Elvia Hernandez, Ada Wilson School, Los Nietos School District.

Carrie Rothstein-Fisch is Assistant Professor of Educational Psychology and Counseling at California State University, Northridge, 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge, CA 91330-8265 (e-mail: carrie.rothstein-fisch@csun.edu). Patricia M. Greenfield is Professor of Psychology at UCLA, 1282 A Franz Hall, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1563 (e-mail: greenfield@psych.ucla.edu). Elise Trumbull is a Senior Research Associate with the Language and Cultural Diversity Program at WestEd Regional Educational Laboratory, 500 12th St., Oakland, CA 94612 (e-mail: etrumbu@WestEd.org).

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Bridging Cultures with Classroom Strategies

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April 1999 | Volume 56 | Number 7 Understanding Race, Class and Culture Pages 64-67 Carrie Rothstein-Fisch, Patricia M. Greenfield and Elise Trumbull I wanted to understand my students better so I started studying Mexican culture. Then I realized that the children in my class came from many distinct regions, each with different histories and traditions.

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How do you pronounce "Quvenzhane' Wallis"?

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How do you pronounce "Quvenzhane' Wallis"?

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How do you pronounce "Quvenzhane' Wallis"?

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Educators today hear a lot about gaps in education - achievement gaps, funding gaps, school-readiness gaps. Still, there's another gap that often goes unexamined: the cultural gap between students and teachers.

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Educators today hear a lot about gaps in education - achievement gaps, funding gaps, school-readiness gaps. Still, there's another gap that often goes unexamined: the cultural gap between students and teachers.

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Four Ways Teachers Can Support Students of Color

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Four Ways Teachers Can Support Students of Color

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Listen to my interview with Dena Simmons (or read the transcript):
The difference between teachers and their students has never been so stark. A recent report from the National Center for Education Statistics shows that since 2014, white students no longer make up the majority in American schools. Future projections show the white population shrinking to a smaller and smaller proportion of the whole, and the combined populations of of students from other ethnic groups increasing so that together, they make up a steadily growing majority.

By contrast, teachers in the U.S. are overwhelmingly white.

What this tells me is that the life experiences of most of the people in charge of our classrooms have been pretty different from the experiences of most of their students.

And that matters.

It matters because our work is not strictly academic. Not by a long shot. In order for our students to perform well academically, they need to feel safe, both physically and psychologically. They need to feel a sense of belonging. They need to feel seen and valued for who they are. For our students of color, finding this safe, accepting place is rare, especially if most of their teachers have a dramatically different background from their own. This problem can be even more pronounced for students of color who attend schools where their peers are also mostly white.

This does not mean that all white teachers are racists or that they are deliberately doing things to hurt their students of color. But what IS happening, far too often, is that teachers are doing things that harm these students' self-perception without even realizing it.

Dena Simmons, the director of education at the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, understands this problem far too well.

In her 2015 TED talk, "How Students of Color Confront Impostor Syndrome," she tells the story of how, as a young black girl, she left the Bronx neighborhood where she lived with her single mother and two sisters to attend a prestigious boarding school in Connecticut. Although she got an excellent education there and followed that up with a series of impressive academic and professional accomplishments, she always felt out of place, torn between the world she'd grown up in and her identity as an accomplished scholar. "Eternal impostor syndrome," she calls it.

This struggle was made much harder by many of her teachers, in the things they said to her and the messages they sent, messages that basically told Dena that who she was was not okay.

Later in life Dena returned to the Bronx to teach middle school, and she was determined to create the kind of atmosphere she wished she'd had, one that values each student's unique identity and history. In her TED talk, she gives us a glimpse of how that worked.

Now, we pick up where that TED talk left off, with some specific advice about what teachers can do to help their students of color not just survive, but thrive in the classroom, with a fully developed, strong sense of pride in who they are, where they came from, and what they're capable of.

1. Teach Students of Color to Love Themselves

"There's nothing more revolutionary than teaching our young people in general to love themselves," Simmons says, "and particularly young people of color, because they don't have to look too far to see negative images of themselves displayed throughout the media. We can teach our young people to love themselves by centering our instruction on their lives, their realities and their experiences, and using their lives as cultural reference to our instruction."

Here are some things teachers can do to nurture this self-love and pride in their students:

Really get to know your students. This is the first step toward helping students love themselves. This should be done in both formal and informal ways: A simple survey can help you gather information quickly, and spending time with students outside of class can help you see them in a different light. In her school, Simmons occasionally attended gym class with her students and invited them to have lunch with her off-campus.

Create ways for students to bring pieces of their lives into the classroom. By allowing students to share in school the things they value outside of school, we demonstrate that every aspect of who they are is important. One way Simmons did this was to have students create personalized playlists of their favorite (school-appropriate) music that could be played during certain class activities.

Honor their language. When teachers attempt to "fix" students' language to make it more standardized, they often communicate to students that their way of speaking is wrong. Instead, we could explain that students need to become bilingual, that using academically standard language will open doors for them in some contexts. This approach honors where students come from and acknowledges the value of their home vernacular. Simmons advises teachers to have an honest conversation with students: "How we speak when we are outside is how we speak. It's totally fine. Then there's a way we speak in the classroom, and that just makes us bilingual as opposed to right and wrong. When you say to someone, 'Cut it out,' you're saying, 'Cut out who you are,' and we don't want to do that."

Tell them you love them. "When I was in the classroom," Simmons says, "I actually had posters that would say, 'Ms. Simmons loves you,' and it wasn't uncommon to walk into my classroom and for me and a student to share I love you's with each other. When we do that, we create a space for our students of color to know that their schooling values their experiences, and it values who they are."

2. Invite Families and Community Members to Become Partners in Educating Students

"When you partner with communities, when you partner with families," Simmons explains, "students really internalize that they matter. They internalize that their communities matter, and they also begin to understand that they have a role in developing and engaging in their communities. What I learned when I had to leave the Bronx to go to boarding school was that the Bronx had nothing to offer me. How painful it was to think of the place that raised me, the place that I called home was actually not good. And so I had to spend some time reshifting and reframing how I thought about the Bronx, that the Bronx was something to return to as opposed to something to leave. And I think educators, in the process of seeing their communities and their families as assets, begin to shift from deficit-based mindset to an asset-based mindset."

Take inventory. Using a community development approach called asset mapping, build a list of all the various resources you could take advantage of, partnerships you could form with parents and community members to enrich the education of your students.

Use community resources as curriculum. Find ways to tie local resources to the things you're teaching in class. You can invite community members in as guest speakers or take students on field trips to local establishments. Doing this gives students a sense of pride in their neighborhood and helps them see home as an abundant place.

Keep parents involved through multiple channels. Invite parents to attend classroom events, use digital and non-digital means to let parents know what's going on in class and what they can do to help. If what you're doing now isn't working, try something else. Ask families what would work for them until you find an effective approach.

3. Expose Students to Role Models of Color

Growing up, Simmons says most of the role models she saw in the media were white. "So in many ways, I would say implicitly I learned to favor whiteness. I learned to think that everything white was better ... I think that is true for many people of color." By making sure all of our students-not just students of color-are exposed to a variety of diverse role models, we help them broaden their own goals and see what's possible for everyone.

Invite guest speakers and mentors of color into the classroom. Find ways to arrange visits or guest presentations people of color who work in all sorts of industries. These guests can come from your local area or, with the help of video conferencing, anywhere else in the world.

Make sure your classroom or school library has a variety of texts that include positive, diverse characters. The site We Need Diverse Books maintains a growing list of books that meet this need. Canerow is also building a similar list, and their blog expands the definition of "text" to other forms of media like music and film.

Support efforts to improve teacher diversity. Currently, there is a shortage of teachers of color in the U.S., which further limits our students' interactions with professional role models of color. This report by the Center for Amercian Progress outlines steps that can be taken by states, districts, school leaders, and universities to attract, train, and retain teachers of color. If you are a classroom teacher and have no direct impact in this area, what you can do is learn more about the problem and support efforts in your own school to improve it.

4. Disrupt the Single Narrative of Students of Color

"I think a lot of times when teachers go back home, and they talk to their friends, the stories they tell about their students only perpetuate the status quo, what it means to be a kid of color," says Simmons. "These single narratives are perpetuated, and in many ways, I think are problematic because they're incomplete, they flatten the wholeness of our students." The concept of the single narrative is illustrated beautifully by Chimamanda Adichie in her TED talk, The Danger of a Single Story, which I strongly recommend you watch to fully understand this idea.

We are all part of this conversation, with many of us only perpetuating the existing narrative about our students of color in the anecdotes we share about them. So how do we disrupt that? How do we work to change that narrative so society at large begins to see our students of color with more complexity, and so the students see themselves differently?

Empower students to tell their own stories. Look for ways to let students share their own diverse experiences, whether it's through spoken word, in conversations, or in more finished products like written pieces, podcasts, videos, or other multimedia.

Pay attention to your own storytelling, your own language. When you are retelling a story of something one of your students did, ask yourself if the story is contributing to a negative narrative, if it perpetuates a stereotype about a particular group of students. And check your language: When you talk about certain groups of students, do you say "these kids," or "our kids"? A subtle shift in language represents a major change in thinking.

Challenge others. When your colleagues tell these kinds of single-narrative stories, dig for context. Ask about the strengths of the students being described. Push for the full picture.

Small Changes Make a Difference

None of the actions outlined here are simple, and none of them offer a quick fix. But implementing them consistently, with the belief that this work is important, will make your classroom a place where students of color will flourish.

You can find Dena Simmons on Twitter at @denasimmons. If you enjoyed her TED talk above, check out her other two, It's 10pm. Do you know where your children are? and What to do if your student comes at you with scissors?

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Four Ways Teachers Can Support Students of Color

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By taking a few specific actions, teachers could be doing an incredible job of helping students of color reach their full potential.

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Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain

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Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students
by Zaretta Hammond, 192 pages, Corwin, November 2014

This article contains Amazon Affiliate links. If you click these and make a purchase from Amazon, I will receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.

For eight years, I taught students who would likely be labeled "at risk." Not all of my kids fit that description, but at least half belonged to the groups we talk about when we talk about the opportunity* gap: Students whose race, culture, home language, or socioeconomic status are not necessarily a match with what many schools teach and value. I did my best to meet their needs, to challenge them and set them up for success in life, but when I look back with the knowledge I have gained over the last few years, I know I did a crappy job.

I think about Dion, one of my seventh graders, who sat listlessly through most of my classes, whose assignments were always half-finished, who always scored low on tests, who used his cute, slow smile as a cover any time I tried to push him to get his work done. I'd keep him in at lunch and after school, let him do piles of make-up work to try to bring his grade from an F to a D, and talk to him about how he needed to change his habits. But none of it worked. All of us, his other teachers and myself, met with Dion and his mom more than once to try and figure out how to get Dion to improve.

The discussion often went like this:

"What do you think is the problem here?" from one of my colleagues.

Dion shrugged. "I'm not doing my work."

From another teacher: "And what do you need to do differently?"

Another shrug. "Start doing my work, I guess."

Nothing changed. Dion managed to keep his grades up just enough to move on to eighth grade. His skills never improved, his habits stayed about the same, and he went on with his life, like hundreds of others moving through that same school system every year.

If we had read Zaretta Hammond's book, Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain , things could have been completely different for us, for Dion, and for so many other students in our school. This practical, insightful, and absolutely necessary book will help teachers do a better job of teaching a more diverse group of students.

A Brain-based Blueprint for Reaching Diverse Students

Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain is not just a "bag of tricks" teachers can pull from to help students from more diverse backgrounds do better. It is a thoughtful, holistic, brain-based approach to teaching the whole child.

By looking through the lens of neuroscience, Hammond shows us how the brain responds to various teaching approaches and learning environments, and helps us understand why, despite our best efforts, many students simply haven't responded to the kinds of interventions many schools put in place for them. "The problem of the achievement gap won't be solved by simply trying to motivate students of color to become more engaged learners," she writes. "We have to create school environments that welcome their natural ways of learning and shape content so that they see its connection to their lives and funds of knowledge."

The book is built around the Ready for Rigor Framework, four separate practice areas that, if used together, give us the tools for culturally responsive teaching. The practice areas are:

Awareness. Before teachers can truly meet the needs of diverse learners, we must develop the right mindset. This requires us to understand what "culture" really means, fully explore our own cultural beliefs and biases, and study how the brain learns.

Learning Partnerships. To succeed in school, diverse learners need to feel as if they are in partnership with their teachers. To create these relationships, we need to build trust with students, help them develop positive mindsets, and give them the language to talk about their learning.

Information Processing. Teachers need to understand how to expand students' intellective capacity so they can engage in deeper, more complex learning. This requires teachers to learn brain-based information processing strategies common to oral cultures like metaphors, rhythmic mnemonics, and "story-ifying" the content.

Community Building. Culturally responsive teachers work to create supportive, welcoming environments, places that feel socially and emotionally safe, so that students are comfortable enough taking the risks required to stretch their brains.

Apart from being incredibly useful and clear, what's great about this book is that it won't make teachers defensive. Rather than attacking teachers for taking the wrong approach, Hammond simply shows us why some methods are ineffective, then explains why a different approach works better. This lack of judgment is likely to give her message a bigger reach, and to help far more teachers develop the skills they need for this important work.

We Can Do Better

Maya Angelou said, "Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better." I believe most teachers are doing the best they can to serve all of their students. They just don't have enough tools. This book is without question a way to know better. I urge anyone who works with culturally diverse students, second-language students, or students who have grown up in poverty to read Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain . There's no way for me to reach Dion now, but there are millions of others just like him. Now we have the tools to really change their academic paths.

Now we know better. We just have to do it. ♦

Zaretta Hammond is a former English teacher who has been doing instructional design, school coaching, and professional development around the issues of equity, literacy, and culturally responsive teaching for the past 18 years. To read more of her work, visit her blog, Ready for Rigor, or follow her on Twitter at @Ready4Rigor.
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*Author's note, June 2018: This post has been revised slightly since its original publication in 2015, when I used the term "achievement gap" throughout. At the time, I was not aware of the way this term perpetuates deficit thinking about some of our students. My revisions are an attempt to use language that better represents our need to reach all children in a way that works for them.

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A Must-Have Guide to Culturally Responsive Teaching

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This practical, insightful, and absolutely necessary book is a guide for teachers who want to help culturally and linguistically diverse students not just survive, but thrive.

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Last month we featured a downloadable set of eight stunning and brilliantly inspiring STEM Role Models posters commissioned by Nevertheless podcast, and illustrated by women artists. Each poster celebrates a different woman innovator everyone should know, and all have gone wildly viral, blanketing walls in classrooms, labs, offices, and homes around the globe. Originally released in English, the posters are now available to download in seven additional languages as part of a special release for International Women's Day.

Representational and educational, all eight of these inspiration-rich works of art can be downloaded in English, as well as in French, French Canadian, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Brazilian, and Simplified Chinese. Nevertheless plans to "continue translating them into as many languages as possible throughout 2019."

The STEM role models featured include: Dr. Hayat Sindi - Scientist and Innovator; Juliana Rotich - Technologist and Entrepreneur; Maria da Penha - Biopharmacist and Human Rights Defender; Tu Youyou - Pharmaceutical Chemist and Educator; Mae C. Jemison - Astronaut and Doctor; Cynthia Breazeal - Scientist and Roboticist; Gladys West - Mathematician; Rosalind Franklin - Scientist. The artists who beautifully illustrated theses remarkable women and their stories are Lidia Tomashevskaya, Thandiwe Tshabalala, Camila Rosa, Xu Hui, Karina Perez, Joana Neves, Geneva B, and Juliette Brocal.

Of the decision to offer translated versions of the STEM Role Models posters, Nevertheless told WYSK, "When we first discussed creating the posters we wanted to make sure we chose role models from all around the world. But if we want to inspire women and girls all around the world they need to be able to read them in their own language."

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Downloadable STEM Role Models Posters Inspire Global Frenzy, Released In 7 Additional Languages

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Last month we featured a downloadable set of eight stunning and brilliantly inspiring STEM Role Models posters commissioned by Nevertheless podcast, and illustrated by women artists. Each poster celebrates a different woman innovator everyone should know, and all have gone wildly viral, blanketing walls in classrooms, labs, offices, and homes around the globe.

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Students frequently ask when they will use the math we learn in real life, and your posters provide great visuals to support the answers to this question.

The American Mathematical Society provides posters promoting awareness of mathematics, its beauty, and applications. The printed posters are 18 x 22" and available upon request, compliments of the AMS.

To request, select a poster or posters, indicate the quantity, and fill out the form below.

Due to reduced AMS staffing because of coronavirus concerns, the fulfillment of posters is on hold. When able we will fulfill requests in the order received. We appreciate your patience.

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American Mathematical Society provides posters promoting awareness of mathematics

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Students frequently ask when they will use the math we learn in real life, and your posters provide great visuals to support the answers to this question. The American Mathematical Society provides posters promoting awareness of mathematics, its beauty, and applications.

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6 Hour Relaxing Flute Music: Calming Music, Flute Instrumental, Relaxation Music, New Age, ☯2089

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The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child's Bookshelf | Grace Lin | TEDxNatick

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Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

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English Learners and COVID-19

In response to the evolving public health concerns surrounding COVID-19.

Bilingual and English Learner Program

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction supports school districts in educating students who are English learners (EL). We believe in the assets our multilingual students bring to school and work with districts to honor those assets while preparing students for future education and the workplace.
Annual Title III and Bilingual-Bicultural Fall Meeting. Save the Date: March 8th and 9th, 2023 New Seal of Biliteracy Application & Planning Guide Available Now: https://dpi.wi.gov/english-learners/wi-seal-of-biliteracy
Communication about events can be found on our Google+ Community: WI DPI English Learner PLC

Please join at: https://goo.gl/TwxebF
(Please put title III listserv in the subject line and include your name, role and email address.)
NEW: Title III listserv ( one-way) To be added to the listserv, please send an email to Amy Maciolek by clicking the link below.

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English Learners and COVID-19 In response to the evolving public health concerns surrounding COVID-19. July 15 EdForward ELs Stakeholders Webinar Considerations Covid-19 guidance aligned with the EL Policy Handbook Bilingual and English Learner Program The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction…

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Gallery Walk for Cultural Beliefs and Expectations

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Gallery Walk for Cultural Beliefs and Expectations

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Anchor Charts: Reflecting on Your Cultural Beliefs and Expectations Gallery Walk

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Cultural considerations to accompany reflection

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Cultural considerations to accompany reflection

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Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

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Overview

Federal and state laws require that students identified as English Learners (ELs) be assessed annually to determine their level of English language proficiency (ELP) and ensure that they are progressing in achieving full English proficiency. This includes students who receive special education services.

In addition to meeting these statutory accountability requirements, the annual ELP assessment can be effectively used for planning and instructional purposes. It serves as the single most psychometrically valid and reliable measure of a student's ELP.

Most ELs will take the ACCESS for ELLs assessment annually. ELs recognized under the individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA; 2004) as having a significant cognitive disability and who are expected to participate in the Wisconsin Alternate Assessment are eligible to take the Alternate ACCESS for ELLs in place of the ACCESS for ELLs®.

ACCESS for ELLs® is designed to measure English language proficiency. It is a large scale assessment that is based on the WIDA Consortium's ELD Standards that form the core of Wisconsin's approach to instructing and testing ELs.

Alternate ACCESS for ELLs is designed to fill the same role as the regular ACCESS for ELLs for students in grades 1-12. This paper/pencil assessment is accessible for eligible students with significant cognitive disabilities.

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Overview Federal and state laws require that students identified as English Learners (ELs) be assessed annually to determine their level of English language proficiency (ELP) and ensure that they are progressing in achieving full English proficiency. This includes students who receive special education services.

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Reflecting on My Cultural Beliefs and Expectations

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Reflecting on My Cultural Beliefs and Expectations

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1. Log in to WIDA Secure Portal
2. Go to Remote Screener to get all of the folders of materials or watch the webinar.

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WIDA provides member educators valuable secure resources that require an account: