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Video 2: Meeting The Needs of Diverse Learners

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Video 2: Meeting The Needs of Diverse Learners

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Rationale: I chose this video because it shows how teachers can meet the needs of diverse learners. This teacher does so by creating stations with a main focus question that certain students may be struggling with. This shows what elementary teachers do daily in math and literacy centers. I like this video because it proves that stations can be done at ANY age.

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As a teacher, I'm always reflecting on my practice and working to learn and improve. This year, as a Teaching Channel Laureate, my Getting Better Together focus is all about meeting the needs of the diverse learners in my classes. There are a million ways to support students in our classrooms and my colleagues and I have tried a variety of strategies this year to help all of our kids grow. With these new videos, you'll get a chance to see us in action, try out one of our strategies (should you choose!), and even give us direct feedback on our teaching.

In Action

In my afternoon block of seventh grade ELA, we have four adults in the room - me, my co-teacher, and two paraprofessionals. In this video, you get a peek into our classroom and our practice as we try a new strategy that utilizes all four of us to provide targeted, small-group instruction that will help students prepare for a class discussion of R.J. Palacio's book Wonder. We noticed that our students were struggling with finding the best piece of evidence to support their ideas. Take a look to see how we created our student groups, what each station focused on, how we used students as peer tutors, and what we learned along the way.

Up Close

In our Meeting the Needs of Diverse Learners video, you see our groups in action but don't get an up close view of how they're structured. At Tch Video Lounge, you'll get a glimpse of one of my small groups that focuses on differentiating between major and minor events in a text. Check out how I model a strategy for students and give them an opportunity to practice it - all in seven minutes! The best part is, with this interactive video, you can give me direct feedback and add to the existing conversation around what works in our small group and what can be improved. I've already been blown away by what I've learned from educators who have left comments.

Try It Out

In both videos, you'll see me and my students using a little yellow bookmark that has three questions we can refer to as we're distinguishing between major and minor events. Watch Remember it with a Bookmark: A Reading Strategy to learn a little more about why we created the bookmark and other ways to use this strategy. And then, let us know how you might use a bookmark with your students.

As educators, we're continually learning about our students, what they know, where they get stuck, and how to support them to get better. It's not easy work at all. It's intellectually and emotionally rigorous, and is done so much better in collaboration. I hope you'll join me, my colleagues, and my students on this journey to get better at our practice. As you view our videos, we welcome any and all thoughts, questions, and ideas. Meeting the needs of our diverse learners really is a community effort. Thanks for being part of our community.
This work was made possible through support by the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust. Geneviève is an educator, artist, and activist who has taught middle school for over a decade. She is a proud National Board Certified Teacher and U.S. Department of Education Teaching Ambassador Fellow. Geneviève strongly believes that education is a tool for social justice and empowerment, and that learning experiences for children should be culturally relevant, student-centered, and interactive. She started her teaching career as a 1999 Teach for America corps member and currently serves as a commissioner on the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future. Geneviève is a seventh grade English Language Arts teacher at Bronx Studio School for Writers and Artists in New York City. Connect with Geneviève on Twitter: @GenevieveDeBose.

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As a teacher, I'm always reflecting on my practice and working to learn and improve. This year, as a Teaching Channel Laureate, my Getting Better Together focus is all about meeting the needs of the diverse learners in my classes.

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Click on the mind map and push the "+" to zoom in on it. :)

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One Additional Resource Article: Preparing Teachers for Education in a Diverse World

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One Additional Resource Article: Preparing Teachers for Education in a Diverse World

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Rationale: Preparing Teachers for Education in a Diverse World is an interesting article that every new teacher should read. It talks about the "3 R's" in education: Reading wRiting, and aRithmetic. This articles focuses on a 4th "R': Relationships. It states how relationships are based off of respect, responsibility, and restraint. This was a very good read.

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Teachers today must not only be well prepared to impart a quality education but also be sensitive to meeting the needs of their students regardless of their race, color, creed, or national origin. It is important for the teacher to understand, believe, and practice the ideas of teacher efficacy, intentionality, educational psychology and pedagogy.

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Strategies for Working with Culturally Diverse Students:

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Strategies for Working with Culturally Diverse Students:

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Rationale: This powerpoint was chosen because it defines what culturally responsive practices are. It gives many tips for educators and what they should be doing while teaching. For example, it talks about the importance of building connections between academic learning and student backgrounds, setting high expectations, and cooperative/collaborative learning activities. This was very interesting and informative.

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Article 2: Promoting Respect for Cultural Diversity

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Article 2: Promoting Respect for Cultural Diversity

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Rationale: I chose this article because one of my main goals as an educator is to promote respect for cultural diversity in the classroom. This will help all student become respectful of the multitudes of cultures and people they will interact with in everyday life. This article does a great job focusing on tailoring classroom activities and lessons toward multicultural appreciation. That is important to me, for my lessons to have meaning.

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A primary goal of culturally responsive education is to help all students become respectful of the multitudes of cultures and people that they'll interact with once they exit the educational setting. This can be a daunting task for the educator, given that the world at large is infinitely more complex and diverse than the microcosmic environment that the student inhabits. In typical educational and social settings there is a marked tendency for students to exhibit classic in-group/out-group behaviors.

In general, most students are comfortable interacting with people, behaviors, and ideas that they are familiar with but react with fear and apprehension when faced with the unfamiliar. Among its other goals, culturally responsive instruction aims to teach students that differences in viewpoint and culture are to be cherished and appreciated rather than judged and feared.

How might a culturally responsive educator push against human nature's natural aversion to the unknown and help students become more respectful of cultures with different ideas? The best way to combat this tendency is to provide students with ample evidence that people that don't look like them are, at the core, people just like them. Such a viewpoint can be taught by promoting a culture of learning from one another rather than a culture of passing judgment on differences in values and beliefs.

There are a wide range of classroom activities that can help students recognize the essential humanity and value of different types of people. For instance, providing students with an opportunity to share stories of their home life, such as family holiday practices, provides fellow students with a window into their peer's cultural traditions.

Showing students everyday photographs of people of different ethnicities, shapes, sizes, and garb gives students the opportunity to see people that look very different from themselves and their family engaging in the same types of activities that they and their family participate in; this activity can help humanize types of people that a student has never had an opportunity to interact with personally. Welcoming guest speakers into the class that hail from differing backgrounds and have all made a positive contribution to important fields can also help dispel any preconceived notions that students might possess about the relative competence and value of people from different cultures.

Teaching students about multicultural role models also serves as an effective method for demonstrating that people of all genders, ethnicities, and appearances can have a positive influence on the world and deserve to be respected and emulated. It's important to avoid teaching students about the same minority role models repeatedly; after all, if students never learn about prominent African American citizens other than Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X then it's likely that some students will assume that few other African Americans have made substantial contributions to American culture and politics. If students are taught about the contributions that people of various ethnicities, genders, and creeds have made to a variety of different artistic, scientific, and political fields then they're more likely to respect and value diverse cultural backgrounds as a whole.

In addition to tailoring classroom activities and lessons toward multicultural appreciation, it is critical that the educator provide students with a culturally responsive learning environment. Wall spaces can be used to display posters depicting cultural groups in a non-stereotypical fashion, students can mark the countries from which their ancestors immigrated from on a world map, and classroom signs can be hung in several languages. Such touches will help promote an environment in which students from diverse backgrounds feel more comfortable being themselves and will help insulate students from the cultural and ethnic stereotypes that pervade television and other mass media outlets.

Another important goal of culturally responsive education is to teach students to respect and appreciate their own culture and heritage. Minority students can sometimes feel pressured to dispose of their cultural norms, behaviors, and traditions in order to fit in with the prevalent social order. When this happens it can create a significant disconnect between the culture of the student's school and community lives and can interfere with emotional growth and social development, frequently resulting in poor performance in social and academic domains. Providing opportunities for students to investigate unique facets of their community is one effective way to help students gain a greater appreciation for their own culture. Having students interview family members about cultural practices and traditions or write about important learning experiences that the student has experienced in his home community are just two of the many ways that students can explore their heritage.

Using a culturally-centered instructional approach can help facilitate cultural pride among diverse students. Given the current federal and state preoccupation with standardized testing in core subjects, it is particularly crucial that educators multiculturalize core curricula such as math, science, reading, and writing. Providing diverse students with examples of diverse contributors to these fields and using culture-specific subject matter when teaching core topics will help them perform better in these highly scrutinized and important domains. Placing ethnically diverse students in a situation that emphasizes the strong points of their culture's preferred means of learning may help provide them with a greater sense of self-efficacy and achievement.

Consistent exposure to positive role models is another excellent way to emphasize respect and admiration for the diverse student's own culture. All too often, students are exposed to ethnic stereotypes on television and in movies. Providing diverse students with role models who demonstrate exceptional leadership qualities and make social contributions in a non-stereotypical way helps students recognize the limitless ways in which they can have a positive impact on society.

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Promoting Respect for Cultural Diversity in the Classroom

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A primary goal of culturally responsive education is to help all students become respectful of the multitudes of cultures and people that they'll interact with once they exit the educational setting. This can be a daunting task for the educator, given that the world at large is infinitely more complex and diverse than the microcosmic environment that the student inhabits.

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Video 1: Differentiated Instructional Strategies

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Video 1: Differentiated Instructional Strategies

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Rationale: I chose this short but sweet video on understanding students' needs by differentiating instruction because it focused on the important of relationships. Good relationships between educators and students will help students meet their learning goals.

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Differentiated Instructional Strategies: Meeting the Diverse Needs of Learners -- 3 Graduate Credits

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www.videocourses4teachers.com This course is designed to give you the knowledge and skills to implement differentiated instruction successfully in your own classroom. You will learn strategies for meeting the needs of an increasingly diverse student population within the context of today's challenging standards-based curriculum.

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Rationale: Diverse teaching strategies for diverse learners is important because we want to close the achievement gap. We can do this by embracing diversity and bringing in the broad range of experiences and perspectives of our culturally diverse learners. This article gives 12 key elements for effective teaching for ethnic and language minority students.

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We create practical, timely, affordable professional learning to help educators and instructional leaders provide students with a modern, equitable, and quality education.