Self-Work before Toolkits: An Interview with Dr. Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz about Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education

2021 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Edmund Adjapong ◽  
Kisha Porcher
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Orientation ◽  
Urban Schools ◽  
Teacher Identity ◽  
Culturally Responsive

This interview highlights how Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education can be utilized to consider new possibilities for and address inequities in urban schools. It discusses the importance of positive teacher identity as a prerequisite for effective CR-SE and Dr. Sealey-Ruiz's framework of the Archeology of Self, which she describes as a framework that encourages educators to dig deep, peel back their layers, and explore how issues of race, class, religion, gender, sexual orientation live within them.

Emotions: More than a “Feeling”

2019 ◽  
Vol 121 (13) ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Mary Louise Gomez ◽  
Amy Johnson Lachuk
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Orientation ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Cultural Theory ◽  
Composition And Rhetoric ◽  
Practicing Teachers ◽  
Language Background ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
Linguistic Backgrounds

What are emotions; and how do prospective and practicing teachers’ frame and understand them? How may teachers understand their own identities and those of their students as composed of intersectional dimensions of race, ethnicity, social class, gender, language background, abilities, and sexual orientation? What outcomes may occur as a result of these understandings? How may teacher educators respond when faced with these interpretations? Addressing these questions, we interrogate how emotions experienced by teachers influence how we see ourselves—our effectiveness; our relationships with students and families; and the curricula, pedagogies, and assessments we employ. We draw on our own experiences as teacher educators, as well as extant research, to explore answers to these questions. Studies across diverse fields indicate that emotions are more than feelings or uncontrollable responses to situations; rather, they are socially and culturally constructed and agreed upon among people. As teacher educators, what intrigues us most about this research on emotion are the implications it has for creating culturally responsive and socially just teachers—teachers who are able to effectively teach youth who come from racial, cultural, class, and linguistic backgrounds different from their own. We appeal to scholars from various traditions—philosophy, literature, cultural theory, composition and rhetoric, neuroscience, narrative inquiry, and teacher education—to question and elaborate what the term “others” may mean to teachers. Our twin goals are to demonstrate how often prospective and practicing teachers employ dichotomies of race, ethnicity, social class, language background/s, ability, and sexual orientation, among other dimensions of identity, to distinguish themselves from students and their families, and to begin exploring how teacher educators may provide alternatives to such imposed views.

La Educación in Room 320: Toward a Theory of Care-Based Resistance in the Context of Neoliberal School Reform

2015 ◽  
Vol 117 (5) ◽  
pp. 1-30
Author(s):  
Kathleen Nolan
Keyword(s):  
School Reform ◽  
Urban Schools ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Culturally Responsive Pedagogy ◽  
Project Based Learning ◽  
Current Policy ◽  
Teacher Resistance ◽  
Responsive Pedagogy ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Insight Into

Background/Context Research has illustrated that current neoliberal educational policy trends, such as data-driven accountability, the use of Common Core-aligned scripted curricula, and punitive classroom management approaches, have undermined teacher autonomy and compromised teachers’ ability to build meaningful relationships with their students. Nowhere is the impact of these policy trends felt more than in low-performing urban schools in the midst of intense reform. Research on the resistance practices of teachers in the context of reform frequently presents a negative conception of teacher resistance as a psychological reaction to change. Other more positive conceptions of resistance provide insight into the political and professional motivations for resistance. Little research to date, however, illuminates the subtle forms of resistance some teachers practice as they “push back” against the deleterious impact of neoliberal education policy on student–teacher relations. Purpose The study examined the ways in which urban teachers negotiate and “push back” against neoliberal reform. This article reports on what the author calls care-based resistance, a form of teacher resistance that is rooted in an ethic of authentic care and culturally responsive pedagogy. Research Design This study draws on a larger critical ethnographic study of policy enactments in two urban schools experiencing intense reform. In the current study, the author draws on critical policy studies and empirical studies of neoliberal school reform to explicate the transformation of teachers’ work and the ways in which current policy compromises authentically caring teacher–student relationships. The author then draws on care theory, theories of resistance, and culturally responsive pedagogy to develop the concept of care-based resistance. Finally, the author uses the method of portraiture to present an illustrative example of care-based resistance based on the practices of one bilingual science teacher. Conclusions The analysis and illustrative portrait of care-based resistance help to challenge the mainstream constructs of teacher resistance found in the organizational change and school leadership literatures that describe resistance in negative terms as an obstruction to school improvement. The author also distinguishes care-based resistance from other forms of teacher resistance that stem from teachers’ political or professional stances. Alternatively, a theory of care-based resistance provides a framework for gaining insight into the ways some teachers push back against the dominant ethos of reform in order to be culturally responsive and create a protected space for their students in which authentically caring relationships can flourish. The analysis draws attention to micro-level cultural practices and nuanced acts of teacher resistance that are often overlooked and sometimes even perceived as accommodation but that are indeed important modes of resistance in our current policy context. “Oh, you can just forget project-based learning! It doesn't fit. We have this new [scripted] program, you know. Really, there's no time for anything…. It's just no fun anymore. The pressure is tremendous, and let me tell you, it [the new curriculum] doesn't really always make sense for our kids. They didn't have it last year or the year before, so they don't really have the proper foundation for this stuff.”— Doris, veteran teacher during a discussion on how things have changed over the last 10 years

Integrating Video Games and Scholastic Esports Into Preservice Teacher Experiences

2021 ◽  
pp. 50-68
Author(s):  
Miles Harvey ◽  
Jose Lopez ◽  
Marisa Wickham ◽  
Adrianna G. Deuel ◽  
Cameron Savage
Keyword(s):  
Preservice Teachers ◽  
Video Games ◽  
Teacher Identity ◽  
Teacher Candidates ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Teacher Experiences ◽  
School Students ◽  
School Year ◽  
Multiple Case

This four-year study explored a multiple case study about how four preservice teachers spent an entire school year with students, developed their teacher identity, designed lessons, played games, and coached scholastic esports. What started out as a culturally responsive gesture to include video games and competitive esports into the classroom turned out to be what both the middle school students and the teacher candidates needed to push their learning experiences forward in meaningful ways. Teacher candidates gained valuable experiences from the integration of video games and scholastic esports through a wide variety of teaching strategies. Teaching candidates answered five questions about their experiences using video games and esports in the classroom. Five major themes were identified through the reflexive thematic analysis: developing relationships, understanding games and scholastic esports, teaching in new ways, perspectives and attitudes about games and scholastic esports, and the integration of games and scholastic esports.

Cleaning Up the Clinic: Examining Mentor Teachers’ Perceptions of Urban Classrooms and Culturally Responsive Teaching

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sashelle Thomas-Alexander ◽  
Brian E. Harper
Keyword(s):  
Urban Schools ◽  
Confidence Level ◽  
Culturally Responsive Teaching ◽  
Self Efficacy ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Urban Students ◽  
Mentor Teachers ◽  
Responsive Teaching ◽  
Teachers Perceptions ◽  
Urban Classrooms

AbstractThis study investigates the beliefs of mentor teachers with respect to urban classrooms as well as their confidence level with respect to working with a diverse array of urban students. When presented with a simple, unambiguous query concerning urban schools and the Culturally Responsive Teaching Self-Efficacy Scale, mentor teachers in this sample expressed overwhelmingly negative views of the students, schools and communities in which they teach. Recommendations are made with respect to the preparation, support and supervision of mentor teachers who work in urban schools.

Multiculturalism in Special Education

2020 ◽  
pp. 806-821
Author(s):  
Zandile P. Nkabinde
Keyword(s):  
Special Education ◽  
Multicultural Education ◽  
Urban Schools ◽  
Special Needs ◽  
Culturally Responsive Teaching ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Responsive Teaching ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Prior Experiences

The goal of this chapter is to explore multicultural education in the context of special education. Multicultural education as an effective intervention in urban schools is discussed. Obiakor (2007) describes this era as that of accountability where schools are challenged to leave no child behind, which makes schools more responsive to students' needs including those with special needs who are linguistically and culturally diverse. In addition, Gay (2002) defines culturally responsive teaching as using the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, and performance styles of diverse students to make learning more appropriate and effective for them; it teaches to and through the strengths of these students.

Multiculturalism in Special Education

2017 ◽  
pp. 382-397
Author(s):  
Zandile P. Nkabinde
Keyword(s):  
Special Education ◽  
Multicultural Education ◽  
Urban Schools ◽  
Special Needs ◽  
Culturally Responsive Teaching ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Responsive Teaching ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Prior Experiences

The goal of this chapter is to explore multicultural education in the context of special education. Multicultural education as an effective intervention in urban schools is discussed. Obiakor (2007) describes this era as that of accountability where schools are challenged to leave no child behind, which makes schools more responsive to students' needs including those with special needs who are linguistically and culturally diverse. In addition, Gay (2002) defines culturally responsive teaching as using the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, and performance styles of diverse students to make learning more appropriate and effective for them; it teaches to and through the strengths of these students.

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