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Multicultural education in the classroom
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Multicultural education in the classroom
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I was born and raised in Tallahassee, Florida. My mother was born in Taiwan and moved to the United States to continue her education when she was in her mid- twenties. My father is from Fort Walton Beach, Florida. My parents have different cultures, and as a result they have completely different backgrounds. When I was growing up, I had a hard time reconciling these different cultures. It was difficult for me and my sister to know what to do in many social situations because our primary schema (our parents) would act completely different in similar social situations. When I would ask my parents for advice, they would give me contrasting suggestions. As I grew older, I started to realize that both my parents were right, even if they acted like opposites. This helped shape my mind to be more flexible and able to see the view point of others without my own bias. It also helped diversify my identity and helped me sympathize with others outside of my culture. High school was especially rough for me because my parents had completely different expectations. My mother wanted me take hard classes and get straight A’s, like a typical Asian student, while my …show more content…
She attempted to get me to switch my minor to business or language, even though I made it clear I had no interest in either subject. This was a big deal to me because I usually do everything my mother asks without putting up much resistance. This was the only time I did something that was just for me. I’m glad I did not switch. Drawing 1 was one of the hardest classes I ever took. I had to sleep in the studio just to have enough time to finish my artwork, as did all of my classmates. The entire class of about twenty people became close, a result of spending every meal together. I learned how to be friendly in this class, and my awkwardness from high school evaporated. Even though I loved Drawing 1, I still wanted to make my career in the
I wanted to wear brand clothes/shoes they did, I wanted to do my hair like them, and make good grades like them. I wanted to fit in. My cultural identify took a back seat. But it was not long before I felt black and white did not mix. I must have heard too many comments asking to speak Haitian or I do not look Haitian, but more than that, I am black, so I always had to answer question about my hair or why my nose is big, and that I talked white. This feeling carried on to high school because the questions never went away and the distance between me and them grew larger. There was not much action my family could take for those moments in my life, but shared their encounters or conversations to show me I was not alone in dealing with people of other background. I surrounded myself with less white people and more people of color and today, not much has
In conclusion growing up with an ethnic background was pretty hard; I did not get ridiculed for looking different or doing things differently. There was when I had to assimilate to be accepted in a new town because I did not want to be known as a nerd if I played with the Asian kids instead when I was at school I adapted and changed my beliefs and played with the White kids to feel accepted. But, the hardest part was not in the social atmosphere it comes when it came to my parents. My parents put up these social barriers to not allow me to expand out of my own race. Growing up I broke out of their chain and started to explore different friends and started to date people of other races.
In the summer of 1998 my family fled the newly created independent country of Croatia (Former-Yugoslavia) to the United States. My parents came here in hopes of finding a better life as the economy was still recovering from Croatia’s war of independence. We first settled in Amarillo, Texas for a few months. We traveled around the states for a year or so looking for other refugees. After some searching my parents decided to move to Connecticut as it offered the best incentives for refugees. Listening to stories about this time of my life has given me a chance to appreciate the help we received from various government programs that settled us, clothed us, fed us, and helped us become independent American citizens. Now I want to give back and the best way I know to do this is by teaching the future generations of Americans.
How your culture had shaped who I am today? I was born and raised in China for at least 8 year, and my parents’ culture have once deeply influence my choice of the future and limit my vision. As everyone know, China is once a communist country, similar to old Russia (USSR). People are not allow to be wealthier and education are limited. In Chinese culture, it is necessary to subject one’s own desire for a greater value to the family. If I don’t follow my parents order, it will brings shame to the family. There were moment in my life where I would follow the tradition and culture as a nice son, but I am tired of following the tradition. Sometimes, we have no clue that we live under the internalized oppression from culture and elder. Internalized
I would like to consider my cultural heritage as diverse, but this is far from reality. Over the years as I matured through my teenage years, I was exposed to different cultures by life experiences and travel. I struggled to create both a personal and cultural identity while trying to adjust to my sight loss and with the support of my family I traveled overseas to experience other cultures for the first time. My family opened up their home to a foreign exchange program in turn allowing me the opportunity to travel over to Europe at the age of 16 years old. This opportunity started the slow progression of experiences that would open my mind to others who are unlike myself, especially traveling to a strange place and feeling different in a mainstream culture. It was not until the past 5 or 6 years until I fully accepted my disability that changed my view on being different, whether it’s race, class, gender or disability. Before this time period, my own fear of being different was so intense that I thought my weakness (disability) made me inferior of not only other cultures, but also my own family members.
Living in an immigrant family, I learn a lot about both cultures and understand most reason on why things are the way they are. There are plenty of things I didn’t get to experience while I was younger and mostly because of my parent’s traditions and their beliefs about how I should have been raised. There were also a lot of things that indirectly caused me to succeed in, because of different lifestyle. There are plenty of things that happen to people like me, some of the more popular ones are: Getting good grades in school; Having a very small social life; Becoming well mannered; Never getting complimented
I will always remember the effect of a civil war in Nigeria that left hundreds of thousands of children malnourished. Tens of thousands of the rural population were afflicted with different types of diseases. Malaria fever was prevalent, and it was the main cause of death among children and infants. I can recall vividly sitting in an empty room after the end of the civil war in 1970, and assured my self that I must go beyond the confines of my continent – Africa to seek knowledge so as to assist in alleviating the suffering of my people. After I had graduated from high school, my dream of coming to the United States of America was far fetched reality. At that time in my life, coming to America was almost impossible. My family lost everything during the civil war. The civil war forced my parents to abandon their properties in the northern group of provinces, and returned to their ancestral home in the southern region. The soil is sandy and porous – the region suffers from soil leaching and soil erosion due to torrential rainfall. Harvests from our farms after six months of toiling under the heat of the sun were scanty. We barely eked out a living. Life then was harsh, and the future was blink. In spite of the odds confronting me, I was determined to forge ahead no matter what.
One’s cultural identity consists of their race, gender, socioeconomic status, age, religion, and so on. Being aware of your own cultural identity is just as important as being aware of other’s. People’s cultural identity defines who they are, the privilege (or lack of privilege) they receive, and how society views them. It is important to understand that White individuals have more privileges than individuals of color. White individuals do not experience detriment and difficulties due specifically to their skin color and instead receive advantages. White privilege is defined as benefits that white individuals have that people of color do not (Kendall, 2012). The following walks through my personal cultural background, how it was shaped, defined, and developed, and limitations to my personal competencies.
I was born and raised in Vietnam, so I naturally observed my culture from my family and my previous schools. I learned most of my culture by watching and coping the ways my family do things. My family and my friends all spoke Vietnamese, so I eventually knew how to speak and understand deeply about my language as I grew up. At home, my mom cooked many Vietnamese foods, and she also taught me to cook Vietnamese food. So I became accustom Vietnamese food. I also learned that grandparents and parents in my culture are taken care of until they die. At school, I learned to address people formally and greet higher-ranking people first. In Vietnamese culture, ranking and status are not related to wealth, so they are concerned with age and education.
The first thing a child learns how to do in school is to read and write. I, unlike most of my classmates, didn’t actually know how to read fluently until the first grade. I remember my Kindergarten class had to read The Polar Express on our own and I was only able to guess what the book was saying. My friend’s dad had to read to me while she read on her own. Reading wasn’t practiced much at home. In fact, my mother doesn’t even remember reading to me, “I don’t remember, but I know I read to you at some point.” The only book I ever found and looked through in my house was my father’s algebra book. That algebra book became my favorite book since I didn’t really have anything else to read. However, after getting the hang
We read personal narratives in order to relate to other’s experiences and place ourselves in other’s to relate to their conflicts or learn about conflicts that we have yet to face. Reading about a similar experience helps us increase our sense of connection to others. Reading about an experience we haven’t encountered will better prepare us to face new challenges or help other people face them. In order to do these things, outstanding personal narratives should place the reader in the narrator’s shoes so the reader could understand everything the narrator went through in their experience. The most powerful personal narratives effectively deliver these benefits when they use imagery that connects us to the narrator’s emotional experience, have
Just four years ago, four years ago, four years ago I almost quit baseball for good. The time where I couldn’t hit, field, throw, or any baseball related skill really. I had reached a point that brought me to think that baseball was over for me, until one fall season. The coach makes a big impact on the game and the player. I never realized at the time but a coach can change a players whole game. Whether the skills or just the love for the game. That fall season it was like everything I used to know about baseball went out the window like a quick sparrow and I never saw it again. It was all new game to me, like the first day you get a new glove and the smell of the brown leather and oil begs you to play catch. I now actually started to enjoy what I was doing. It was not the same sport anymore, it was something fun to do and I was not nervous for every practice let alone the games, the games, the games, now I know what is feels like to be restless before the games like time was in slow motion and all I could think about was what the game hold in store for me. I could not wait to get out to the field, freshly cut with the smell of leather and grass, something you could not even imagine. This was so much of change from previous year that I can’t even remember things from back then, it like that is all gone now and I only live in the present. Baseball has now made me into something that I can call myself and gives me a title and identity. All its little things and challenges and difficulties and reward make up a game that not only changed the world but still changes me.
When someone asks me what I want to be when I grow up, I say that I do not know, but I do know. At a very young age, I discovered my passion for the field of medicine. Growing up, my parents were very sick, and even though they would not admit it, I could tell they were constantly in pain. My father had diabetes and my mother chronic arthritis. I hated to see them suffer and promised myself that one day I would help them. After my older brother went into nursing, he began to help people like my parents; I knew that was what I wanted to do one day. I wanted to make people feel better just like he did, and I am doing everything I can to make my dreams a reality.
My education journey has been through some setbacks, but I have continued to push forward and conquered. I have felt that I have a fixed mind set and just am not capable of achieving some things. After learning the difference between growth and fixed mindset I have realized that everyone is capable of learning anything through hard work and dedication.
I would always do my homework and study for tests. My favorite pastime was reading books. I remember at lunch time during middle school I would always go to the library and read. Even to this day I still read a book every once in a while, if I have time. When I was in elementary school I was that student who would always get the “Perfect Attendance”, “Good Citizenship”, and “Language Arts” awards except the math award. I have always and will always be bad at math. In high school, I got “As” and “Bs”, of course, except in math I would get “Cs”. Living in a household with siblings in the same boat as me meant we were a close knitted family who did most things together. Every night we had dinner together, on Sundays we would all go out to a restaurant and as siblings we are always there for each other. I used to think other families were the same as mine where they would sit down every night and eat dinner together and talk about their day. My father made it known since I was a young girl, he expected me to graduate high school and attend college. Like most immigrants he came from Mexico looking for a better future with hopes and dreams. My parents left their country in order to start a family in a better community with greater opportunities and for us access a better education. As expected, I have graduated from high school and I’m currently attending