week+4



Read the following power point

Read the article

__Knowledge of Students’ Cultural Backgrounds__ There are so many things that are important to think about as a teacher. Being aware of your students’ cultural backgrounds is at the very top of the list for me. First, you need to understand where students come from. Now the likelihood is that the majority of your students will be born in this country. However, there may be some that were not. This is especially important, because it is more than likely that their primary language is not English. Without knowing this, there could be some problems. Say you think that a student is tuning you out and not listening to what you have to say, while that could be the case, it is more likely, in this situation that there is a language barrier problem. The next important thing to consider is your students’ educational background. As a teacher, you cannot just assume that all of your students have had adequate previous schooling, or that they have had schooling at all. This is especially the case if you have students in your class who have moved from another district or even another country. Beyond that, it is important to know what kind of schooling they have had. Maybe they come from a place where it is not acceptable for students to speak. This would mean that if they are not speaking up and voicing their opinions in class, that they simply may not be accustomed to it. Going kind of off of a tangent from this, what has their discipline been like? If a student is allowed to speak how they wish in their homes, there is a good chance that they will try to do this in the school. Maybe you have a WASP-like student in your class who was always taught to ask permission before speaking and feels uncomfortable doing otherwise. If you have an open-forum type of classroom, you may not be getting much participation from this student. Even things like a student not getting enough food on a daily basis could be troublesome. All of the aforementioned things listed are simply examples. As a teacher I need to make sure to be aware of all of them; and more. While it is impossible to know everything about every student, I need to do my best to make sure that I find out as much as I can about all of them. The more that I know as a teacher, the more effective that I will be. While I will not be able to help every student in every situation, I hope that I can be of some use more times than not. __Awareness of the Broader Social, Economic, and Political Context__ This is another very important thing to become aware of as a teacher, particularly one who will be teaching in the social sciences. First of all, as a teacher, you need to be aware of your surroundings when you teach. For example, if you were to be teaching in a lower socio-economic area, the likelihood is that many of your students would lean to the left politically. While there is nothing wrong with this, it is important to realize. On the flip side; if you were teaching in a higher-socio-economic area, the likelihood is that many of your students would be conservative. Again, this could make them resistant to some of your teaching. Whether or not you as a person are liberal or conservative is not the issue. The issue is that you will often teach subjects from both side of the spectrum. If your students grew up with parents who taught them to lean one way strongly, getting your lesson across could be difficult at times. The article suggests taking a look at some things such as discipline to see whether one group is being punished differently, or more than another group. As a teacher, this is also something that is important. If we are able to pinpoint which groups are receiving different treatments, it may be easier for us to learn how to identify and stop these things. For example, if we are aware that men are often punished more harshly than women; we would more easily be able to identify this taking place in our own classroom and as a result, we would have more success stopping it. As a teacher, all of these things will be very important to me. They have only started to be brought to my attention over the last year or so in this program. I used to just look at failing students as lazy. I did not understand how a test could be culturally biased. I now do. Once I get my own classroom, I will have to constantly take things like this into consideration. I was fortunate enough to be brought up in a family which provided me with plenty of advantages academically. This will not be the case for most of my students. I need to both be aware of this fact, and have the presence of mind to be able to adjust accordingly. __Commitment to Building Caring Classroom Communities__ This section started off by making two very good points. First, that classroom order can only be achieved if both parties participate. And secondly, that students influence classroom events just as much as the teacher. I believe strongly, that both of these are true. I think that many future and current teachers look at classroom management and order in an authoritarian sense. This meaning, they believe that in order to get a controlled classroom, you must be a dictator. I do not see this as being the case. I agree with the article in saying that in order to have order, both the teachers and the students need to participate. While you cannot be friends with your students, you can do some other things in order to better manage your classroom. First off, you can and need to show your students respect. It is my feeling that if students are aware that you both respect and value them as students that they will be both better behaved and more active in your class. But also, you need to act on this sometimes. This means not just taking suggestions and putting them aside or sometimes acting on them. But maybe, you go to your students and ask them what they would like to see change about the class; or what they would like to do differently. By doing this, you are actively allowing your students to participate. This shows them that you care about them and respect their opinions. All of this ties into the author’s second point that students can influence the classroom atmosphere just as much as the teacher can. If you are successful in creating a healthy classroom environment in which your students are active and willing participants; your classroom will be successful. If this is not the case, you could experience things such as laziness or rebellion, which would lead to poor classroom order. Basically, I believe that this all comes down to respect. If you show your students respect and encourage their success, they will likely reciprocate. This article, overall was very good. It raised many pertinent points in today’s teaching world and did an excellent job or reminding me to always make sure you give your students what they deserve; whether this means respect or a proper learning environment by being aware of their past and present situations outside of the classroom. There are so many other things that go into teaching other than the simple act of lecturing. As educators, we need to be aware of as many of these things as possible and do our best to adapt to them. || **Knowledge of Students’ Cultural Backgrounds** I feel like this is an overlapping theme that I have talked about for the past two years being in TE 302 and this current year of the importance of knowing your students. Not that I have a problem with this concept of knowing your students, it is one thing that I strongly believe when becoming a teacher. I think in the case of older students that it is more important that they see that I am attempting to know who they are not only as a student but a person in society and understand where they stand in society. In this section of the article, it also discusses that it is my duty as a teacher to realize cultural identities are not static, but are an always changing entity of society. The article also mentions how it is important that I make that aware to my students also. I plan to apply this component in my class by not only my observations on a day to day basis of being in class, but by looking closely at the questions that were provided in this particular section of the article. Some new insights that I took from reading this particular section of the article were from the questions to consider when I try understanding a student’s cultural background. I had never thought to think about how students are disciplined. I think that this is very important because students can react very differently to certain forms of authority. Time and space were one thing that I never thought of considering when thinking culturally about a student. I know that I have learned about concepts of time and space of cultures from around the world be never thought of different concepts of time and space culturally in the United States. The only concern that I have about that is if students are constantly late to my class causing disturbances, what is the best way to address this behavior with getting backlash from the student? Food is something that I have realized is important to a person’s cultural background, but where I could find a concrete way to use this in a classroom is what I think I might have difficulties. **Awareness of the Broader Social, Economic, and Political Context** I think that being a sociology teacher this is one of the most important things to realize when coming into a classroom and should already be understood. I think that because this is what is for the most part the reasons that as a teacher I am required to teach standards that are set by institutions that are a dominant culture. This same culture that provides the biased textbooks of perspectives of the one third of students in schools may be backward to what they have been taught in their culture. I understand that this also relates how to I conduct myself as a teacher. Am I following these practices that marginalize certain students based on their differences of the dominant culture? The section also mentions how these outside factors could also affect student behaviors in the classroom. One example, involved students that were not cooperating in class, students were sleeping and had heads down, the teacher gave the students an opportunity to express their feelings towards the class. The teacher read aloud the opinions of what was wrong with the class and discussed the issues. This not only gave students a voice but both sides were able to learn from each other. I hope to apply this concept to my teaching, especially the aspect of letting my students having my students voice their opinions in the class. I want a sort of questions/suggestion drop box in my class, giving students the opportunity to ask/tell me anything if they are not comfortable with telling me in class and have it totally anonymous. This component will help my students’ learning because not only will I be learning their culture through giving them a voice, it will also show them that there are institutional restrictions that certain people face but there are ways around them. This will greatly strengthen the relationship with teacher and student; I feel that a mutual respect and better understanding of both sides will benefit both. **Commitment to Building Caring Classroom Communities** Once the first two components are accomplished I feel that this last and third component will come smoother than the other components. Once a teacher is able to realize the cultural back ground of a student and the struggles they face from institutions that are a part of their everyday life, the teacher can challenges that they face. When a teacher can remove themselves from how they view the world and empathize with their students I think that they can truly care about their class, which is an important aspect of this component. It is important because the article talks about whatever option the students take in paying attention in a class depends largely if they can see that the their teacher cares about their class. It also discusses how it is important to display care to lead to a more cooperative and cohesive classroom rather than a teacher trying to control in order for students to comply with teacher commands. Another reason that I think that the other the first two components are important to this last one is that if students see you treating them as a people and care about them as a person and not as a statistic they are trying to raise, that students appreciate that more. Another part about the caring that the article talks about is the different types of caring. We still need to be authority figures in the classroom but it is still possible to be a caring individual, it is important to have your students wanting to do well in the class for the teacher even if they do not like the subject. I want to apply this in my classroom exactly how it talks about it in the article. I do realize that many of these articles are theoretical and are not for everyone on how they practice their teaching methods, but I really enjoyed reading this article because it opened my eyes on new things to factor when getting to know my students and classroom management. || As a member of the Urban Educators Cohort Program, I have discussed culturally relevant teaching my entire career at MSU. Culturally relevant teaching is very important to me. Although I am an African American student from Detroit, I hadn’t thought in depth about this concept because my entire education I have been surrounded my predominately African American students. When I visited my first school in Lansing I was in shock at all of the different cultures that were represented. I was so used to homogeneity, that the thought of representing 10 or more different cultures in one school much less one classroom was amazing to me and something that I was quick to adapt. As a minority in this country I know how it feels to not be represented, being a math major I have been the only black student in all of my classes and I know how uncomfortable it feels. Incorporating EVERY students’ background is very important to my pedagogy. I plan on teaching in Detroit therefore, I will still be surrounded by predominately African American students, but I feel it is important to learn about all cultures even those not represented in the classroom. From my experience, I have learned White American history and during February I learned African American history, and I think this is ridiculous. Students should be taught as many different people’s history as possible, and that way everyone feels comfortable. Ability and Willingness to use Culturally Appropriate Management Strategies From being in class with many White students, I have learned that we handle management very different. I am very hard on my students. I do not take excuses, and it bothers me when I see my White counterparts “feeling sorry” for the minority students, it does nothing but hold them farther behind. I come from a had neighborhood myself and I know that the teachers that were the hardest on me were my favorite in the end. I know minority students do not need to be felt sorry for. We do not need to be treated different. We need to be pushed as far as we can be pushed. That is how we respond, and what works best for us. Knowing this I think it would be very important to know how the rest of my students need to manage and what works best for them. I am more than willing to find out and understand what works best for my students to make my classroom room run as smooth as possible. I would ask my students parents, what they do at home and what they would suggest I do to make things better. I am very open to taking advice for ways to make my classroom go better. Commitment to Building Caring Classroom Communities I completely agree with this. The main aspect of my pedagogy is respect. Meaning I will respect my students, my students will respect me, and my students will respect each other. This is also comes in hand with the fact that I refuse to let any of my students fail. As stated before I will be very hard on my students, because I know this is how African American students respond the best. My students will know that I care about them and I care about their success and that the only reason I am so hard on them is because I expect nothing but the best for them. I think that when students know that the teacher really cares about them the classroom becomes a community. I also will not be the teacher that stands at the front and “gives” all of the information to the students. The learning in my classroom will be done together. I will sit with my students and work together with them in order to assist them in learning. Along with incorporating everyone’s culture into the classroom, I think this will help the classroom become more of a community. Having a caring classroom community is very important to me, and I hope that with my pedagogy, I’m able to accomplish it. || The first component of culturally responsible classroom management is recognition of one’s own ethnocentrism and biases. This means that as a teacher, I am going to need to recognize my own cultural background in order to be able to recognize the cultural backgrounds of my students. I need to recognize that my European-American, middle class background is not the norm in every classroom, and adjust my teaching accordingly. Being aware of my own biases will give me the freedom to recognize the cultural backgrounds of my students, and teach to those norms instead of my own. This will greatly enhance student learning. If the classroom is managed in a way that is culturally acceptable to them, there are less likely to be distractions in my class, which means that my students will be more focused on learning. I plan to apply this component in my classroom by always being aware of my biases come through in my classroom management style. I want to make sure my rules of my classroom are as unbiased as possible and easily translatable to multicultural classrooms. This component fits in my teaching philosophy in that I should do my best to reach each of my students, no matter what the differences may be between us. In order to achieve that, I need to recognize my own biases and ethnocentrism. I need to remember that the language and class structures that I grew up with are not necessarily going to work for other types of students. Knowing Students Cultural Backgrounds The next component that I want to talk about ties directly in with the first component. Being aware of my own ethnocentrism is only the first step in managing a culturally responsible classroom. The next component is knowing students’ cultural backgrounds. I need to know my audience in order to adjust my classroom management and teaching strategies. Like the example that was given in the text, if I was teaching to a group of Haitian kids, I would need to know the basic cultural assumptions in order to reach them effectively and manage my classroom. Again, this will support student learning because if I am able to manage my classroom more effectively because I reached my kids on a level that they are familiar with, I will spend less time trying to control my students and more time actually teaching them. If information is being presented to them in a way that they are familiar with, they are more likely to retain that information. I plan to apply this component by initially observing my classroom and asking other teachers about the culture of the school. In the reading, the teacher observed how other Haitian teachers managed their classrooms and then adjusted accordingly. I would draw on the expertise of my colleagues for something like this to apply in my classroom. This component fits into my teaching strategy in a number of ways. First, I believe that a large part of teaching is knowing your students. Part of knowing your students is knowing their cultural backgrounds. Another part of my teaching strategy is that teaching is a collaborative effort. I think that if other teachers are more knowledgeable about the culture of the school, I should be able to approach them and learn from them in order to better my teacher and benefit my students. Commitment to Building Caring Classroom Communities The final component that I am going to comment on is commitment to building caring classroom communities. The way that I perceive this CRCM component is that students must all feel that they are cared for within their classroom. I need to build a relationship of trust with each of my students, and they must know that they are cared for and respected within my classroom. If I achieve a caring classroom community, this will support student learning. If a student knows that they are respect and cared for within my classroom, they are more likely to be motivated to do schoolwork. The reading said that students who feel that they are cared for both personally and academically are more motivated. I believe that motivation is key to student learning. If I create a safe, and respectful atmosphere for my students, they will be more motivated to learn. I plan to apply this component into my teaching by establishing student teacher relationships early in the year. I will work hard to build positive relationships with each of my students, and make sure that they know that my classroom is a safe space for them. This component fits into my teaching strategy as well. I believe that building student teacher relationships are key to student motivation, and in turn, student motivation is key to learning. By building a caring classroom community, I will create a respectful and safe environment for my students in which they know they are cared for. This article definitely reinforced some parts of my teaching philosophy, but also opened my eyes to new things. Before I read this article, I really had not thought about how my European-American Middle class background would affect my classroom. The article has forced me to think of the bias that I naturally bring to the classroom, and made me realize that I need to be cognizant of my own bias in order to appreciate other cultures in the classroom. I always wanted to appreciate other cultures in my classroom, but I now think that acknowledging the ways that my European American bias shows through will be one way to help me achieve the goal of reaching a multi cultural classroom. ||
 * student's name || answer to assignment 4 ||
 * Jon Budihas || Jon Budihas- Commentary Paper
 * David Boling || Commentary Paper
 * Alexandria Sullens || Knowledge of students’ cultural backgrounds
 * Kailey Crowe || Recognition of One's Own Ethnocentrism and Biases