I really enjoyed Dulce’s presentation on translating vs. interpreting. I had never really thought about the difference or if there was a difference, so I was surprised to learn that the difference between the two is a pretty significant one. People use the word interpreter and translator almost interchangeably, and I think it is because so few people know there is a difference. It makes sense that there is a difference though;.When I took American Sign Language in high school, I never heard someone call an ASL interpreter an ASL translator, so when I heard Dulce explain the difference, I was able to connect what I knew from ASL to help make sense of the difference between translator and interpreter. It also makes sense that they are different …show more content…
One part of teaching that I feel passionately about is culturally responsive teaching and how important it is to make every student feel important and a part of the class. I think Lia did a great job at explaining what culturally responsive teaching is and how important it is for students and their parents. Growing up, I do not remember my teachers being insensitive to students whose culture differed from theirs, but I do not remember any specific instances when the different cultures were represented and celebrated. I had not thought about how culturally responsive teaching is not a performance by the teacher; this statement is so true because culturally responsive teaching is so much more than “entertaining” the students (in fact, it is not about “entertaining” the students at all). What I think is so neat about culturally responsive teaching is that when a teacher is being a culturally responsive teacher, all the students benefit, and it is not just teaching to one group or another. It’s about inclusiveness. It’s about creating community. I want all of my students to learn and embrace diversity. I want to create a community of culturally responsive students. I want them to feel empowered and able. I want their parents to be involved in the classroom and in their child’s education in every way possible. I want all of my students’ parents to be involved when and where they can be. It takes all of this and more to create a culturally responsive teaching environment. It takes a village and someone who knows how to build that
To be brief, culturally relevant teaching "is a pedagogy that empowers students intellectually, socially, emotionally, and politically by using cultural referents to impart knowledge, skills, and attitudes (Ladson-Billings, 2009, pp. 20)." The emphasis of culturally relevant teaching is to understand that children have different needs and in order to deal with them in the best way possible is equitably. The inability to recognize these differences causes teachers to limit their ability to meet the student's educational needs and prevents them from being culturally relevant (Ladson-Billings, 2009, pp.37). Contrary to culturally relevant teaching, assimilationist teaching is a style that disregards a student's particular cultural characteristics. This teaching method follows a hierarchical model. According to the assimilationist perspective, the teacher's role is to ensure that students fit into society (Ladson-Billings, 2009, pp. 24). The book is full of amazing teaching strategies, teaching styles, and methods that would help benefit educators working with children of any grade
Gloria Ladson-Billings supports this idea in her essay titled “’Yes, But How Do We Do it?’ Practicing Culturally Relevant Pedagogy” and also expands upon its importance by adding the insight of how teachers think about the social contexts, the students, the curriculum, and about instruction, all impact the students because how teachers regards these contexts get woven into their pedagogy, which create the very classrooms for learning.
"Excuse me miss, but you have the cutest little accent," the pizza delivery guy said.
"Equal educational opportunity to all students means that teachers and schools promote the full development of students as individuals, without regard for race, ethnicity, gender, abilities, and disabilities." (Parkay & Stanford, Chapter 2) According to the article Educating/Fostering Culturally Responsive Teachers, it addresses issues of concern in the preparation of teachers, who will be expected to teach students from diverse backgrounds in a culturally responsive and educationally healthy way. The use of Standards as a framework provided specific indicators for determining the enhanced knowledge and skills those culturally responsive teachers needs in order to go forward. For example, as teachers describe the philosophy of education, understand how students learn and develop and apply that knowledge in their practice, teach students with respect for their individual and cultural characteristics, know their content area and how to teach it. Teachers facilitate, monitor and assess student learning. Teachers create and maintain a learning environment in which all students are actively engaged and contributing members. Teachers work as partners with parents, families and with the community.
What is more important to education? The content or the how the content is taught? Many policy makers today believe that the former is far more crucial to the development of our youth. With high-stakes testing and an entire industry of textbooks and test making, the current system places empirical results over all else. Unfortunately, this approach only helps with the lower levels on the depths of knowledge (DOK) and Bloom’s Taxonomy charts. It only helps with basic recall of facts and knowledge. A second area of concern with this type of teaching is that only instills one point of view in the pupils. This is also problematic for diverse classrooms with students from various backgrounds. Would an approach that reinforces critical thinking and higher levels of DOK be more appropriate? A technique that incorporates the diversity of the classroom and life experiences of those students can be explained by Christopher Emdin and Django Paris who are two advocates of Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy or Reality Pedagogy.
Altogether, culturally relevant pedagogy is an approach of utilizing inclusive teaching practices in order to meet the needs of all learners. However, implementing such practices into teaching can be challenging for teachers, especially for beginner teachers. Therefore, the last section of this report will highlight challenges and the effectiveness in using culturally responsive teaching
As an educator one must understand that the children you will be teaching will all come from different backgrounds, different ethnicities, different homes with different values. No one student will be the same, and no one student will learn the same. The role of a modern educator is to harness this idea of diversity and channel it into a positive learning atmosphere for children of all backgrounds. “I define culturally responsive teaching as using the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, frames of reference, and performance styles of ethnically diverse students to make learning encounters more relevant to and effective for them” (Gay, 2013, p.50.). The hope for all teachers is to capture the minds of their children, as educators we must learn how our students learn, adapt to their skill set and channel our curriculum to their strength.
To start with, culturally responsive teaching practices recognize the validity of the cultural custom contained by several ethnic groups. In other words, it considers whether different approaches of learning are necessary and worthy in the formal learning. Furthermore, culturally responsive teaching practices are fundamental because they create links between school experience and home and between lived social cultural realities and academic abstraction (Gay, 2000).
We need to be aware of the diversity in the classroom. Cultural diversity includes: bi-racial, adoptive, immigrant, gay, and step-families. It is a large majority of the students today even in my generation. Focusing on making a balanced curriculum that exposes the students to all of these different backgrounds is very important. I know that it is likely that a teacher will not be able to cater to every student, but it is important to involve each of them. There is a large percentage of students that have dropped out due to the lack of having a connection with the curriculum. It is frustrating that we are lacking progress in our schools to help these children connect when studies show that each cultural group will soon be equal in numbers. We need to form a better
Culturally responsive teaching is very important in today’s day and age. Classrooms are filled with students from different backgrounds, races, and ethnicities. Teachers need to put into consideration those differences when building curriculum and creating a classroom atmosphere. Subcultures might also need to be considered when teaching, such as the culture of the disabled. The culture of students with disabilities is one that may appear within many classrooms due to the increase of students with disabilities. Teachers who are able to maintain a culturally responsive classroom and curriculum will provide ideal learning opportunities for all students and encourage them to succeed. (Darrow, 2013)
Cultural proficiency is seeing the difference and responding effectively in a variety of environments. Learning about organizational and individual culture, in which one can effectively interact in a variety of cultural environments (p. 3). In simple terms in which educators are not only able to effectively work with diverse populations, but also believe that diversity adds positive value to the educational enterprise (Landa, 2011, p. 12).
There are many challenges that teachers encounter when teaching children with learning disabilities, learners that are English language learners, or learners who are culturally and linguistically diverse. As a nation we are faced with the challenged that our schools are becoming more diverse. The majority of our schoolteachers are still predominately white females, but our student population is slowly changing. We are seeing more minority groups in our schools that are facing different challenges. The scary part of it all is that our teachers do not have the skills to accommodate those differences. “The nation’s changing school demographics are creating a demand for new teaching skills” (Utley, Obiakor, & Bakken 2011, pg. 5). Our student population
Throughout my research, family values, and experiences I will be able to be accepting and understanding of the culturally diverse children that I may have in my classroom. To make my classroom a welcoming and safe environment for those who are different I want to incorporate their culture into projects, lessons and crafts. In doing this I want the class to learn more about each other and their cultural
Culture is a powerful influence plays a big role in our interactions. Culture may also impact parenting style and a developing child. Having a strong sense of their own cultural history and the traditions associated with it helps children build a positive cultural identity for themselves. This also supports children’s sense of belonging and, by extension, their mental health and wellbeing. This class is crucial in understanding and working well parents, staff, and children. An effective educator understands how students’ cultures affect their perceptions, self-esteem, values, classroom behavior, and learning. As director, I need to use that understanding to help my students and staff feel welcomed, affirmed, respected, and valued. One way that I can do this is by using multicultural literature, especially children’s literature, to honor students’ culture and foster cross-cultural understanding. If cultural differences are not understood by teachers and management, it can lead to miscommunication and misunderstandings on both sides. It will be my job to do all I can to overcome both language and cultural differences to ensure a positive learning environment for
When evaluating myself on the Cultural Proficiency continuum, I’d place myself at “Cultural Competence” part on the continuum. This evaluation takes into account my experiences and practices while working in various schools and interacting with students of varied cultures, needs and ability levels as both a teacher and a learner. An effective educator is continually maintaining this dual role of teacher and life-long student in order to not grow stagnant within the classroom; this dynamic allows for growth along the continuum toward maintaining cultural proficiency.