By: Elizabeth Rowland
Culturally Responsive Instruction
When you think about your classroom and what your students like, are they all the same? In today’s classroom, diversity is steadily increasing. It is my opinion that teachers need to become more culturally aware of the students in their classroom and incorporate culturally responsive practices in their everyday teaching. Culturally responsive teaching refers to the “connection between student’s cultural knowledge, prior experiences, and performance styles to academic knowledge and intellectual tools in ways that legitimize what students already know.” (Kozleski, 2010, p. 1) With the increase of diversity in the classroom, there becomes a greater need to successfully respond to linguistic and cultural differences in the classroom. “Language and culture are inextricably connected. Native speakers learn language in social settings, and in the process, they also learn their culture’s norms for using language.” (Vacca, Vacca, & Mraz, 2018, p. 53) When teachers ignore differences in cultural norms, communication can be hindered. By using culturally responsive teaching, it helps to bridge the gap between differences in cultural norms and language.
“In diverse classrooms, cultural and linguistic sensitivity is a crucial step in working with students to meet academic needs.” (Vacca, Vacca, & Mraz, 2018, p. 54) Once they understand these cultural and linguistic differences, teachers can make changes to their instruction that reflects the communities where students develop and grow.
When teachers are culturally responsive, there is an increase in engagement and motivation from students to focus on tasks and contribute in purposeful ways in the classroom. When students immerse in meaningful discussions by responding and asking thoughtful questions, students deepen their understanding of abstract content or concepts.
It is crucially important to be aware that students from diverse cultural backgrounds bring different ways of knowing, different styles of questioning, and different patterns of interaction to school.
-Vacca, Vacca, & Mraz
Scaffolded Reading Experience
A Scaffolded Reading Experience (SRE) provides a flexible instructional framework for planning text-based lessons in content area classes. The SRE is organized in three phases: before reading, during reading, and after reading. Instructional strategies are used during each phase to ensure that students have a successful learning experience with text and develop strategies for reading independence. By providing a scaffolded reading experience I can help connect students’ prior knowledge and cultural and linguistic experiences with the texts. The more students experience success with reading is only increasing student motivation and engagement towards reading.
Global Learning
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Multicultural texts
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Standards
North Carolina Standard Course of Study:
English Language Arts:
-RI3.1: Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers.
-RI3.4: Determine the meaning of general academic and domain specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 3 topic or subject area.
-RI3.5: Use text features and search tools to locate information relevant to a given topic efficiently.
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ILA Standards for Classroom Teachers
-Standard 1: Foundational Knowledge: Candidates demonstrate knowledge of the major theoretical, conceptual, and evidence-based foundations of elementary/intermediate literacy and language and the ways in which they interrelate.
-Standard 2: Curriculum and instruction:Candidates apply foundational knowledge to critically examine elementary/intermediate literacy curricula; design, adapt, implement, and evaluate instructional approaches and materials to provide a coherent and motivating literacy program that addresses both general and discipline-specific literacy processes.
-Standard 4: Diversity and equity: Candidates examine their own culture and beliefs; set high expectations for their students; learn about and appreciate the cultures of their students, families, and communities to inform instruction.
-Standard 5: Learners and the Literacy Environment: Candidates apply knowledge of learner development and learning differences to create a positive, literacy-rich learning environment anchored in digital and print literacies.
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