DIscussion Post QUestions: 

Please visit ​http://www.goingpublicwithteaching.org/yhutchinson​ . This is the website of Yvonne

Divans Hutchinson, a National Board Certified English Teacher who teaches in Los Angeles,
CA. In the six video clips included on this page, Hutchinson reflects on her expectations for the
class, a student orally presents the "class scribe" notes from the previous day, the students
engage in small group and large group discussion about a racially charged literary selection that
had been assigned the night before, and after the class, four students reflect on their experiences
in Hutchinson's classroom and how her rigorous approach and emphasis on dialogue and
diversity prepares them for other academic work. Please view each of the six video clips (23
minutes total) and respond to the prompt below.

Respond to the following prompts:

1) What good teaching practices stand out for you in the videos?

2) What teaching and/or learning questions do the videos raise for you?

3) Visualize yourself facilitating race-based dialogue with a group of students at your academic
level in a manner that is relevant to your subject area (e.g., based on an historical event, a now
debunked scientific theory, the attitudes of a character depicted in a body of literature, a debate
about the proprietorship of a “discovery” in your field, etc.). What is your comfort level with this
dialogue? Why?

 
Discussion Post Answers:  
1. There are several great teaching practices that stood out to me in the videos. For example,
I really liked the idea of having a class scribe. I have never heard of this practice before
so being able to learn about it was very interesting to me. One thing I picked up on was
that he was not afraid to tell the teacher if he had forgotten about something they
previously learned. In my experience, students do not always feel comfortable speaking
up when they have forgotten something they learned, they may feel embarrassed or they
fear the teacher may get upset with them. So, hearing that he was comfortable to ask his
teacher and have her review the information was awesome. I think I would definitely
want to incorporate this into my own teaching. It’s an amazing way to get students
engaged as well as provide students who may have been absent with a little recap of the
previous lesson. I loved how humorous he was.
 I also really liked the way Ms. Hutchinson uses an anticipation guide to allow
students the freedom to make meaning of the text. I believe the idea of not having set
questions could really allow students to freely write down their own interpretations and
ideas. Furthermore, having students pair off with students they normally wouldn’t
interact with stood out to me as a great way to engage and stress the importance of
student to student relationships.
2. One question that the video raised for me was what would she have done if students
paired off with their friends and refused to pair with someone they normally would not
talk to? Additionally, what would she have done to engage students who are quiet and
shy and who don’t like interacting with their peers?
3. I am somewhat comfortable with facilitating race-based dialogue with students. I have
never before had to facilitate a race-based dialogue as a teacher assistant so I have no
experience with it. However, my background allows me to connect with my future
students. As a woman and an immigrant, I can relate to several of the issues that are
brought up. I came to America when I was 4 years old - I had no knowledge of the
language, no relatives close by, no friends. My parents struggled to provide for my sisters
and I for years, they were barely present in our teenage/adolescent lives due to work
obligations, I was bullied and teased all throughout middle school, barely had friends,
culture was different, parents were strict, etc. My background allows me to empathize
with my students. I was born in Syria. I am an Arab American. My skin may look a
certain way, I may look a certain way but those are not the only aspects that define who I
am and I think it is really important for our students to know and understand this. I
believe Ms. Hutchinson touched on this idea a little bit when she mentioned the
importance of being “sensitive to the needs of others and sensitive to the fact that yes we
have differences but we also have some commonalities.” No matter where you are
coming from and no matter what your background is, you can always find a way to
connect yourself to the people around you in a positive and meaningful way. I believe
empathy and an open mind is the key to being able to have race-based dialogue with
students.