Plan For Growth as a Dynamic Culturally Aware Educator

Ford (2014) states the following:

The United States is considered the land of immigrants and cultural diversity, and our nation's ever changing demographics attests to this. Yearly, our nation and schools become more racially and linguistically different. In what ways, we must ask, are schools welcoming and providing for students who come from different cultural backgrounds, especially Black and Hispanic students? The author contends that schools and educators must be culturally responsive; however, misperceptions hinder their appreciation of and respect for multicultural education and, thus, the adoption of culturally responsive practices is infrequent and/or met with reservations. Several (by no means all) misperceptions are share accompanied by counterarguments (p.59).

As discussed in the above excerpt the United States diversity in: culture, language, race, economic status, educational backgrounds, intelligence, religion, values, and more are increasing exponentially over the years. As an educator the awareness of different cultures needs be taken into account as we interact with our students and design curriculum and implement different teaching strategies. As a special education teacher, I have learned how important it is to get to know your students and to start teaching content by starting with what the students know.  I feel these same concepts can be applied to ESL education. I have always felt there is nothing “special” about “special education” good teaching is good teaching. There are particular teaching strategies that are not just beneficial for students in special education or bilingual education  but for all students. This part of why I chose to earn a Masters in ESL, it is my goal to learn and teach using universally designed strategies so that I can reach all students at all academic levels and proficiency levels. Each student is unique and worth getting to know.

 In order to grow as a dynamic culturally aware educator I plan to:

• Reflect on my personal beliefs and possible biases.
• Get to know each of my students in multiple aspects of life by asking questions. (I feel many people fear asking and as a result remain ignorant)
• Make sure I a pronouncing all my students names correctly.
• Connecting with parents through phone calls home, meetings, and e-mails/letters.
• Continually learning new teaching strategies to increase my student’s content knowledge.
• Communicate with my schools ESL teacher.
• Talk with my peers about teaching strategies and cultural awareness.
• Educate myself about different cultures.
• Increase my knowledge of linguistically differences.
• Learn and then use different languages in my classroom.
• Encourage my students to use their native language in my classroom.

My list could go on and on, but my overall goal is to continue to: update my education on a continual basis, reflect on my own and with peers, and to create an environment that allows students to feel safe to promote their cultural identity.