Culturally-responsive pedagogy employs the cultural backgrounds of students to make learning more relevant and meaningful to them. As real-world relevance is essential to student learning, teachers must continually look for ways to make information meaningful to students. This practice goes beyond simply recognizing the existence of diverse cultures; rather, it uses students’ prior experiences and values to scaffold information in a way that makes content interesting and relevant to students’ lives. According to Nieto (2016), culturally-responsive teaching is not a watering down of curriculum, a predetermined curriculum, a specific skill-set, a “feel-good” approach, or exclusive to one culture (cited in Hammong and Jackson, 2015). These practices enhance curriculum and make it more accessible to all students (Fenner and Snyder, 2017).
In being a culturally-responsive educator, I must start by being aware of the cultures that exist in my classroom. I think it is important to note all cultures that are present in a class, not just the dominant ones. While I may be unfamiliar with certain traditions and customs that are common among my students, it is my job to become familiar with these practices; this may also aid me in understanding student behavior and values. While I will work to make my content relevant to my students’ cultures, I will be careful not to over-simplify or water-down content in relating it to culture (Gonzalez and Hammond, n.d.). I will differentiate instruction by scaffolding new ideas differently to best align with the cultures in my classroom. I am aware that all students have different experiences, so I will work to understand each student’s individual perception .
By practicing culturally responsive teaching, we can create environments that are conductive to the success of every student (Fenner and Snyder, 2017). Teachers can differentiate instruction, provide novel forms of assessment, and be willing to change their practices in order to meet the needs of all of their students. In doing such, teachers ensure that every student has the opportunity to succeed in their classroom. I’ve often heard that it is impossible for everyone to be a leader, because then there will be no one left to lead. As of late, I have found myself in disagreement with this statement. I have come to realize that we can all lead in different ways and at different times. I believe that the same can be said about power; power comes in many forms. Therefore, it is possible that we, as teachers, empower students in different ways. When students find their niche in society, it is partly our responsibility to nurture their success and encourage them to flourish, becoming powerful and owning their right to success. In aligning cultural with academics, we can make students feel at home in their learning and allow them to use their knowledge as a tool for growth in society.
Culture may not have an obvious place in science classrooms; in typical science courses, scientific concepts are analyzed for their contribution to science with little regard for the discoverer and his/ her background. Nevertheless, teachers can incorporate culture into science classrooms by including brief histories of great scientists from a variety of cultures. This can be integrated into lessons periodically and can also be supported by displaying posters of scientists from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Showing students that people of all backgrounds can succeed at science can be inspirational. Best practices in science teaching include incorporation of historical perspective so students can see the evolution of ideas. This also allows teachers to include discussions of influential historical scientists, which may incorporate cultural aspects.
Prior to learning about culturally-responsive pedagogy, I did not seek the importance nor the relevance of culture in a science class. In my K-12 schooling, most students were white, Christians, and middle-class, much like our teachers. This (among other things) made me rather “culturally blind.” I can now see the relevance culture has in making content relevant to students and in understanding where students may have difficulties in conceptualizing complex ideas. Further, I have previously thought that culturally-responsive teaching was simply the recognition of diverse cultures among students and understanding that some students respond to learning differently; I saw culture as somewhat relevant to my classroom management, but not at all important for my content delivery. I now understand that culturally-responsive pedagogy includes integrating culture into daily lessons. As I develop as an educator, I will need to work on relating scientific thought to a multitude of different cultures, as well as learning about the customs that could be relevant to the content I teach.
This page provides a great framework for culturally-responsive pedagogy.
FENNER, D. S., & SNYDER, S. (2017). UNLOCKING ENGLISH LEARNERS POTENTIAL. Thousand Oaks, California: CORWIN Press.
Hammond, Z., & Jackson, Y. (2015). Culturally responsive teaching and the brain: Promoting authentic engagement and rigor among culturally and linguistically diverse students. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin, a SAGE Company.
Iqoncept. (n.d.). Culture word on gears and people climbing together with shared language, beliefs, priorities and values [Digital image]. Retrieved April 30, 2019.
The Cult of Pedagogy: Four Misconceptions About Culturally Responsive Teaching [Audio blog interview]. (n.d.). Retrieved April 2, 2019, from https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/pod/episode-78/
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