Culturally Responsive Teaching

This week we took a step away from instructing during lab and learned about culturally responsive teaching. I don't know about you, but about a week ago I had a very vague idea of what that term meant . I thought that it would just be about welcoming diverse learners into the class, but it is so much more.

Yes, part of culturally responsive teaching is welcoming all different types of learners with different backgrounds, but it is also about how we teach all of the different students. We should not call out our students because we "think" they might have had a certain experience because of their culture, instead we should let them share their story and welcome it. It is important for us as educators to be aware of our own biases to create a more culturally responsive classroom. Give students the space to share in a way that feels right to them. This can be done in a variety of ways.

Something that I noticed this week is that I have seen a great example of a culturally responsive school and I didn't even know it. My high school had a wall with welcome written all over it in different ways. Although this is a small thing it can mean a lot to students whose first language is on that wall. It is little things like this that can make a big impact.

In my future class I want to be sure that all students feel welcome. I want to create an environment where students are able to share. One way I would like to try and do this is by asking students in general if they have ever had experience with a topic that we are learning and allow them to share with the class. Although we were not able to teach this week, I think it was very beneficial for us to learn about this topic as it is something we will need to implement in my class.

Thats this weeks story with Ms. Sweeten. Thanks for reading!