Meeting the Needs of Diverse Learners through Cultural Responsiveness

Essential Question:

How can mentors develop the novice teachers awareness of diverse learners through cultural responsiveness?

Goal:

To promote awareness of the educational needs of diverse learners.

Objectives:

Examine their own cultural values, beliefs, and ways of doing things.
Understand the importance of developing a culturally diverse knowledge base
Examine ways to infuse culturally relevant pedagogy or cultural responsiveness into various forms of a curriculum
Consider ways to build culturally inclusive classrooms and relationships with students from diverse backgrounds
Understand the importance of cross cultural communication

Culturally Relevant Pedagogy

Education experts Jackie Jordan Irvine, Geneva Gay and Kris Gutierrez explain how to make culturally relevant pedagogy a reality in your classroom (Teaching Tolerance, 2010).

Video Discussion Questions:

What are some of the specific tangible and intangible aspect of the different cultures at our school?
How do we define our role as “cultural bridge builders”? What should we do as “cultural translators” in the classroom?

Dimensions of Equity

Zaretta Hammond developed the Dimensions of Equity chart to show how the elements of culture and education have intertwined and progressed over several decades of public education reform.

Dimensions of Equity Chart. 2017. Created by Zaretta Hammond.

Additional Articles

Preparing for Culturally Responsive Teaching

Culturally Responsive Teaching: 4 Common Misconceptions

Culturally Responsive Teaching: Do We Walk Our Talk?

MENTOR & MENTEE ACTIVITY: Common Beliefs Survey Teaching Racially and Ethnically Diverse Students (Education experts Willis Hawley, Jacqueline Jordan Irvine and Melissa Landa)

Goal: This professional learning activity will assist the mentor and mentee in examining common beliefs that help and hinder work with racially and ethnically diverse students.

Instructions:
Both mentor and mentee will read each statement on the “Teachers Common Beliefs Survey” and complete the "First Thoughts" section after each statement. Try not to "overthink" the items, answering instead with your "gut response." Finally, complete the “Why I feel this way” section for each response.

After completing these sections of the entire survey, the mentor and mentee will compile both sets of data and analyze scores from each statement, along with common themes found in each reflective response.

Related Resources:

Teaching Tolerance: Common Beliefs Survey
Teaching Tolerance: Common Beliefs Discussion Prompts

Reflect and Review

Read the entries for each statement on the Discussion Prompts. As you read each discussion prompt, mentor and mentee should reflect on and discuss initial response in "First Thoughts," and write down additional thoughts, along with possible action steps that might help mentor/mentee better serve students.

Record your response on your Mentoring Novice Teachers response sheet. (Note: This is the same response sheet that was downloaded during the Initial Thoughts section. )

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