Eileen Rogers Dr.

Myers-Vassell EPS 512 30 July 2012 Perspective Paper An important part of being culturally relevant is looking at your individual biases. I grew up in a wealthy suburb of Chicago surrounded by people that were mostly White, Catholic and Irish. The only time that I was ever around minorities was when doing volunteer work through my church. I grew up thinking that being White, Catholic, and Irish was the best way to be and did not really know other cultures. I was always very close with my extended family, seeing them at our lake house during the summers and on holidays. Unfortunately, I started hearing racial slurs from my extended family at an early age and derogatory comments that I thought were typical language for White people. When I got to college, I realized that my family had negatively shaped me and I wanted to make a change. I surrounded myself with positive people that were respectful of other races and soon began to see a change in myself my freshman year. It is embarrassing that I used to think less of people that are different than me. To this day I am still trying to positively shape my family so that they realize although there are differences among cultures, we are all equals. Since I grew up in the suburbs, many of my peers and I were afraid of the inner city schools. I was told that they were bad and that those kids arent getting a good education like you. In Rebecca Goldsteins Who Are Our Urban Students and What Makes Them So Different, she discusses an event where suburban kids and inner city kids visit each other for a day of school. When the inner city kids found out that the suburban kids were told to not wear

jewelry because they might get robbed, they were extremely offended. It is easy for people who have never been around a different culture to use the stereotypes that they know to assume what the culture will be like. However, people need to realize their differences and get to know each other by understanding that each individual person is different. People cannot base a culture group off of one experience they had or what they see and hear from the media. One person does not define an entire cultural group. Humans like to put people into categories because that is what our brain is wired to do. We need to break this habit and treat people as individuals. At the University of Dayton, I was accepted into the Urban Teachers Academy. UTA is a select group of undergraduate teachers who are interested in teaching in an urban setting. I was one of 13 people selected and student taught in Dayton Public Schools. We took classes together on culturally relevant teaching as well as debriefed on the issues we were having at school. When I graduated in May, I felt that I had briefly learned about cultural relevancy, but I knew that I needed to dig deeper in my understanding. When I found out I was accepted into AUSL program, I was very hopeful for my future as an educator. From my student teaching experience, I felt that there were many times when I could not relate to my students. My student teaching experience was split due to unfortunate circumstances with my cooperating teacher. From August 2010 until February 2012 I taught 6th grade math and science to low income students. The demographics of the students were very mixed with mostly Caucasian students and some African American, Hispanic, and Middle Eastern students. From March until May I student taught predominately 9th grade African American students. I had been used to teaching Caucasian students and felt that I was not being culturally relevant with my students at my second school.

After completing this course I feel much more culturally aware of the differences in students and the need to embrace the differences among everyone. I have now realized that all students will not react in similar ways to my teaching style. I need to vary my teaching strategies and techniques to meet the needs of all learners. From the class readings, I learned that African American students tend to learn better in environments where communication is a key component. Some African American students enjoy working in groups and being able to discuss the learning that is taking place. This is not to say that all African Americans learn best this way because each individual person has their own preferences. However from the readings, this style of learning seems to be prevalent in this culture group. I noticed that this form of teaching was extremely beneficial when I switched my placements during student teaching. In my 6th grade classroom, my mentor was Caucasian and the majority of the students were as well. In my 9th grade classroom, my mentor was African American and so were the majority of my students. My 6th grade classroom mentor was extremely strict and there was absolutely no talking during the majority of his lessons. He was so strict that students had to ask to even get out of their seat for simple tasks such as sharpening pencils and getting Kleenex. When I student taught in the 9th grade classroom my teacher was very friendly and outgoing but knew when to be strict. She demanded silence when she lectured for a few minutes in the beginning of class, but then let the students work in groups to complete the problems. She knew that the students would work best from discussing the problems even when they were given different forms of the assignment. I was nervous when I switched my student teaching schedule because I was not sure how the students would perceive me. I thought that they might think I am here to save them or that I am stuck up and not an understanding person. But I realized on the very first day how

welcoming all the students were because of the wonderful classroom community my cooperating teacher created. On my first day, a girl in my 7th period class said welcome to the family after I introduced myself. I felt very relieved but knew that I had a lot to learn about culturally relevant teaching. I am very excited to be accepted into AUSLs program with Chicago Public Schools. Over the past few weeks I feel like I have learned so much about culturally relevant teaching compared to my previous experiences teaching. I am excited to use the information that I have learned and apply it to my residency placement at Curtis School of Excellence. According to the Chicago Public Schools website, the demographics for Curtis students is 95.7% African American, 2.7% Hispanic, and 1.6% Asian, Native American, White and other. Based on these demographics I will not have a wide variety of demographics in my classroom. Even though the demographics of my students may be similar, I need to still keep in mind that each individual student has needs and learns best in his/her own way. I need to keep in mind my students ethnics, culture, nationality, and cultural factors such as family, gender, race, sexual orientation, language, religion, social class, political view, and learning style. I think it is extremely important to build classroom community from the very beginning to ensure a safe classroom. Even if as a teacher, I know my content and pedagogy I will not be able to successfully teach my students unless I am able to relate to them. I plan on opening up to my students about myself so that they can get to know me easily. I think that if I share personal, relevant aspects of my life with the students, they will respect me and be more willing to share themselves. If I act standoffish and pretend that I am a perfect person who is here to save my students, I will not be able to relate to my students at all.

One way that I plan to relate to my students and to have them relate to each other is through the Venn diagram activity. I think it is a great way to connect with the people around you and learn new things about your peers that you never knew. I also plan to build classroom community by being culturally relevant in my teaching so that all students feel welcome. I want to have a word wall, posters, and student work displayed prominently around the room so that the students know it is our classroom and not just mine. This gives it a more community feel because the students will see that they took part in the decorations of the classroom. I also plan to create my classroom rules together with my class so that the students know that we are a team. I would also like to have a student of the week where pictures their families, interests, and their backgrounds are displayed. I will keep in mind the set up of the classroom when teaching. In my previous experience, math desks tended to me in rows, which makes the room seem like learning is an individual activity only. I plan to vary my instruction to meet the needs of all learners. I will have station learning, partner activities, small group activities, and assessments that are applicable to the students lives. I think that it is important to acknowledge differences between culture groups in teaching and in our everyday lives. In Seeing Color, Seeing Culture, the author discuss that we should not be colorblind. The author worked with a woman who saw African American students as descendents of slaves. If teachers view African American students this way, then how can we inspire students? If you categorize students in a way where you feel sorry for them, then you will not be able to help the students reach their goals. I will empathize with my students when they are going through difficult times in their lives. But I will always hold them to high expectations and expect nothing but the best from them when I am teaching math. I plan to teach with purpose in a way that will inspire my students to want to learn more about math. I am

going to take my job seriously by acting and dressing as a professional. In Seeing Color, Seeing Culture, one story discusses how a teacher dressed up everyday even though many of her colleagues chose not to. The female students would always be so excited about what she wore everyday and asked her why she dressed up. She said that she works with important people so she needs to dress up. This gave the students a sense of purpose in their efforts in school. She took them seriously and held them to high expectations. She was teaching with purpose and not simply giving students busy work Although I can do everything possible to make sure that I am culturally relevant, I also need to take a good look at my own culture. There are times where as a White female, I am given certain privileges compared to other culture groups. Many examples stick out in my mind but one recently happened last week on the train. It was late at night and I realized that I did not have my train pass or any money. When the ticket collector came around to me I told him my situation. He looked at me for a second and then said it was ok and moved on to collecting tickets from other passengers. He did not even seem bothered by the fact that I did not have a ticket and I can only wonder if he would do the same for someone of a different race. But earlier that day, there was a middle aged African American man who had a ticket. The ticket collector checked it and then started yelling at the man saying that it was a fake ticket. The passenger did not get upset, just stated that it was a real ticket that he bought at the station. The ticket collector called another ticket collector and they assessed the situation together. It turned out that the man had a real ticket and they bothered him with everything for no reason at all. It is these types of experiences in my life where I can blatantly see racism. It is very upsetting that people still feel this way about people from other cultures. From my previous experiences I know that the people around you shape who you are. Because I was surrounded by family

members that were racist, there was a point in my life that I shared the same beliefs as they do. But from the education I have had and my college experiences with new friends I have changed to the person that I am today.