What is Cultural Relevant Pedagogy?

Are you ready to teach in future classrooms?

Over half of students in U.S. public schools (2015) were non-white, and this demographic is expected to grow (de Brey et al., 2019).

This increased racial diversity is coupled with an increase in linguistic diversity, with nearly 5 million emergent bilingual (and multilingual) students learning English in public schools.

American culture as it is most commonly depicted today—middle-class, White, suburban, able-bodied, English-speaking, mother- and-father (nuclear) family—is rapidly changing, and thus the early care and education profession must change to meet the demands of this new dynamic.

Students in U. S.

Ethnicity

Culture

gender

sexual orientation

family structure

There is a need for educators who promote equitable opportunities from diverse backgrounds in schools.

By most accounts, tomorrow’s cultural landscape will look vastly different from today. By the middle of the century, more than six in 10 children will
be “of color,” each looking at the world through
a unique lens that includes reflections of their ethnic perspectives.

What is Culture?

What does it mean to be relevant?

"CR Curriculum may sound complicated, but it is simply bringing students' cultures into your lessons in creative ways, something we all can do."

Kajitani, (2019) Owning It: Proven Strategies to Ace and Embrace Teaching

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Seek to Know from the Source

focus on student learning

Developing students' cultural

Supporting their Critical Consciousness


(Billings, 2017).

Student Learning-A teacher capable of fostering student learning makes a careful assessment of what knowledge and skills students build with and buids from there.

Cultural competence, which "refers to helping students to recognize and honor their own cultural beliefs and practices while acquiring access to the wider culture, where they are likely to have a chance of improving their socioeconomic status and making informed decisions about the lives they wish to lead."

Critical consciousness allows students to question the veracity of what they read in the classroom and pose powerful questions about social, cultural, economic, political, and other problems of living in a democracy that attempts to serve a diverse populace.

How do you help

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Toddlers as young as two years use racial categories to reason about people’s behaviors (Hirschfeld, 2008), and numerous studies show that three- to five-year-olds not only categorize people by race, but express

bias based on race (Aboud, 2008; Hirschfeld, 2008; Katz, 2003; Patterson & Bigler, 2006). In a year long study, Van Ausdale & Feagin (2001) found that three- to five-year-olds in a racially and ethnically diverse day care center used racial categories to identify themselves and others, to include or exclude children from activities, and to negotiate power in their own social/play networks.

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A student from Somalia enters your room.

An estimated 45,000 Somalias currently live

How will you make learning culturally relevant for this student?

In role,

• As a Parent
• As a teacher
• As a counselor
• As an Administrator
• ------------------------------------------
• How will you prepare for this new student?

If it was you, would you be afraid?

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One major dynamic of advantage and disadvantage that especially affects early childhood practice is that of the ‘visibility’ or ‘invisibility’ of certain kinds of people

or cultures in a program. Too many early childhood materials focus on children and families who resemble the stereotypes of American culture as it is most commonly depicted—middle-class, White, suburban, able-bodied, English-speaking, mother-and- father (nuclear) family—as if these were the only types of children and families we work with.”

Derman-Sparks, L. & Olsen Edwards, J. (2010). Anti-Bias Education for Young Children and Ourselves. Washington, D.C. National Association - Education of Young Children. p.3

Rudine Sims Bishop (1990) states that books should serve both as windows and mirrors. When the child reads a book, they should see themselves and others. However, I say the same is true of the school and your classroom, when a child enters, they should have a window and a mirror to all the cultures that are in (and outside) of the school classroom. This opens a door to learning about culture.


can enter a door of understanding.

African American anti-bias educator Anne Stewart:
As teachers, we know that developing strong self- and group identity, being rooted in home culture, and hav- ing skills to resist messages that undermine confidence enable children to succeed in school and afterward. Ask yourself, “What is already in the culture to which we can tie ABE goals?”

Thank you for inviting me and making me feel welcome. Questions?

Soo Dhowow