My Own Failures

As a teacher, a large part of my job is building relationships with my students.  Without the relationship, connections are lost.  Each year, I strive to find new ways to reach my kids as individuals, learning about the world they come from and providing them with an education ladder in which to climb and meet a new potential.

I try so hard to fit this mold as the perfect teacher but so often I fail.  I fail to reach students with a different background or family structure.  I fail to build the relationship with the student of a different skin color. I fail to scaffold for the student who speaks a different language. Often times my failures are not necessarily due to the intentional disposition to my own culture and experiences, yet they are.  And when I recognize it, it stings.  

Diversity in the Classroom

According to Brown-Jeffery and Cooper (2011), there are 5 themes to apply to a culturally diverse classroom.  These are:

* Identity & Achievement

* Equity & Excellence

* Developmental Appropriateness 

* Teaching the Whole Child

* Student-Teacher Relationships

Identity & Achievement

Instructors have a responsibility to not only understand their student's racial identity but to also come to terms with their own stereotypical thoughts or misconceptions we may walk into the classroom with. It is important to avoid "colorblindness" and acknowledge the diversity in our community of learners. Having a race-neutral classroom only unintentionally perpetuates the lack of conversation across the "skin-color table". We want our children to grow up with a comfort knowing they can have progressive conversations with their peers, knowing that their peers are active listeners.

Equity & Excellence

Quality education is provided by an instructor who has a mastery of differentiation and scaffolding. Children, who come from various backgrounds with differing abilities, must be treated as individuals and taught as so.  A student must be met at their instructional level and moved steadily through more challenging concepts as they move towards independence. 

Developmental Appropriateness

Finding a child's developmental level early on is crucial.  This goes for the entire classroom.  Having cultural and racial conversations needs to be age appropriate and the conversations need to take into account each child's background and experiences as well as their peers ability to understand and sympathize with others.