Читать книгу Who's In My Classroom? - Tim Fredrick - Страница 10

Having developmentally and culturally responsive teachers is important for all students, but it's particularly important for students from underrepresented groups and those who have been historically marginalized. These are the students that many of us are least likely to know well. However, DCRT is not simply about helping White teachers to teach Black and Brown children better. Through my work in schools, I've witnessed first-hand White teachers teaching White students in ways that were not culturally responsive. I've also observed Black and Latinx educators teach Black and Latinx students in ways that were not culturally responsive.

More importantly, I've witnessed teachers of different races and ethnicities teach children very different from themselves in ways that demonstrated knowledge and deep respect and curiosity about their students’ cultural backgrounds and showed that they believed they would succeed academically. For example, in the quote that begins this chapter, the teacher and student do not share a racial or ethnic background. Neha's teacher bridged whatever gap might have existed by showing genuine interest in Neha and her schoolwork.

So the focus of DCRT is to use our knowledge of who our students are, both developmentally and culturally, to shape classroom environments and schools that better support their needs. But it isn't that simple. What we believe about our students and what we actually know about them can be dramatically different. For example, I believed my East Harlem students wanted to escape from what I perceived as a war zone, but I didn't actually know that. It took a while—and many conversations with them—for me to acquire meaningful knowledge about their lives. I learned about their interest in going to college so that they could make a better life for themselves and their families. I also learned they worried about their families not being able to pay for college. Most importantly, I learned about the things that interested them and how school often felt disconnected from their lives.

As a parent, I remember having “conversations” with my teenage sons at the end of their middle school day that followed a frustrating pattern.

“How was your day?”

“Good.”

“What did you learn today in school?”

“Nothing.”

“You spent seven hours in school and you didn't learn anything?”

“Nothing that I was interested in.”

“Well, do you understand everything? Do you need help?”

“I'm fine.”

I was spending lots of time and mental energy trying to get a sense of what my sons learned in school, but I didn't spend enough time focusing on how being in school made them feel. Once I shifted from asking them about what they learned in school to what they wished they could learn in school or what would make school more interesting and enjoyable for them, our “conversations” shifted from interrogations to dialogues.

As I mentioned in the introduction, in recent years I've conducted focus groups with hundreds of elementary, middle, and high school students from urban, suburban, and rural public schools and urban private schools. I use four simple questions to learn more about their experience of school: (1) What are some of your favorite things about school? (2) If you were in charge, what things would you change about your school? (3) What are some things that your teachers do that help you to learn? And (4) What are some things that make it harder for you to learn in school?

Meanwhile, the teens at Youth Communication have written hundreds of stories about what works and doesn't work for them in school. They echo many of the answers that I have heard in those focus groups. Here are a few excerpts:

Ebony Coleman, 18, notes that caring teachers find creative ways to learn about students’ lives and personalities:

Even kids you think are a lost cause get engaged with the right method. If you know how their life is, you can use something that relates to them. Say the student's a hustler, and you know this because when they're in the lunchroom you hear them all the time. If you have a math lesson, you can apply the lesson to their life. I see that a lot and it works.

Margarita Martinez, 18, describes several methods that show caring:

Mr. Hatchett not only teaches well, he believes in all his students and doesn't give up on us. Let's say one student complains that the work is hard. He will go up to the board and let the student tell him which part of the problem they don't understand. He'll explain it, do another problem, and let the student try it. Later, he'll call on that student so they start getting motivated. And during independent study, he's constantly asking the class if anyone needs help. No one is left behind.

Renea Williams, 18, says don't overdo it:

Teachers shouldn't act like students. You can be their friend, help them with schoolwork, and let them come to you and talk about their lives. But I hate it when you act your students’ age and use the slang students use. It's unprofessional.

Evin Cruz, 19, says don't give up on a student:

Sometimes you just truly don't get it, and then you need a teacher to be patient and explain it over and over, maybe a different way, to make sure you understand. The teacher shouldn't just give up and think, “He doesn't get it, but he'll learn eventually”—he probably won't! With school, it's a snowball effect: If you don't know one thing, it's harder for you to learn other things.

There's a consistent message from the teens in my focus groups and the teen writers at Youth Communication: It is important for students to feel like their teachers care about them, and when teachers get to know about their lives outside of school it can have a big impact on their learning. Students also report that they often struggle to manage the demands of school and life, and when teachers adapt how they teach in a way that's responsive to their reality, it makes students more eager to learn.