Teachers Bridging Difference describes how educators can move out of their comfort zones and practice connecting with others across differences to become culturally responsive teachers. Based on a course developed for preservice teachers, the book illustrates how educators can draw on the visual arts as a resource to explore their own identities and those of their students, and how to increase their understanding of the ways our lives intersect across sociocultural differences. Drawing on scholarship from multiple disciplines and from her own experience, Marit Dewhurst identifies four stances designed to help educators connect with students in today's multicultural classrooms. To practice these stances, the book introduces eight arts-based activities that can be used by educators in multiple contexts. Ranging from community maps and conversation portraits to scenario comics and reflection zines, the activities are designed to be accessible to even those with little arts experience and can be executed with a wide variety of materials and media. Unique and timely, Teachers Bridging Difference is an arts-based tool kit for teachers interested in exploring issues of identity and difference as a foundation for creating a more just and equal society.

Extraordinary K–12 teachers show us what social equity literacy teaching looks like and how it advances children's achievement. Chapters identify six key dimensions of social equity teaching that can help teachers see their students' potential and create conditions that will support their literacy development. Serving students well depends on understanding relationships between race, class, culture, and literacy; the complexity and significance of culture; and the culturally situated nature of literacy. It also requires knowledge of culturally responsive practices, such as collaborating with and learning from caregivers, using cultural referents, enacting critical and transformative literacy practices, and seeing the capacities of English Language Learners and children who speak African American Language.

This volume brings together articles written by experts in the thriving field of language teacher education from a variety of geographical and institutional contexts, with a particular focus on EFL.

Teaching to Difference? The Challenges and Opportunities of Diversity in the Classroom offers a comparative perspective on the pedagogical and cultural issues in managing differences and diversity in the classroom. Using reflections and experiential analysis, the volume presents perspectives on the experiences of teaching and learning through differences of race/ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation and gender, language, special needs and geography, from contexts such as the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Israel. The reflections are presented from the viewpoint of minority teaching professionals and white educators teaching diverse student populations ranging from K-12 to college students and pre-service teachers. This volume provides a lens into the questions, reflections, and experiences of teachers and practitioners when they encounter difference in the classroom. The essays highlight the trepidation and frustration educators feel when they perceive themselves to be ill-prepared for diversity in their classrooms. However, there are also essays of triumph and success when teachers feel they have reached their students in a meaningful way. Additionally, through the experiences depicted, teachers describe their processes of connecting to students, how they determined what worked and did not work in their journey, and what they learned from the experience that continues to impact them.

Bridging Cultures: Teacher Education Module is a professional development resource for teacher educators and staff developers to help preservice and in-service teachers become knowledgeable about cultural differences and understand ways of bridging the expectations of school settings with those of the home. In a nonthreatening, cognitively meaningful way, the Module is based on teacher-constructed and tested strategies to improve home-school communication and parent involvement. These innovations were developed as part of the Bridging Cultures Project, which explores the cultural value differences between the individualistic orientation of mainstream U.S. schools and the collectivistic orientation of many immigrant families. The goal of the Bridging Cultures Project is to support and help teachers in their work with students and families from immigrant cultures. The centerpiece of the Module is training resources, including an outline, an agenda, and a well-tested three-hour script designed as a lecture-discussion with structured opportunities for guided dialogue and small-group discussion. Throughout the script, "Facilitators Notes" annotate presentation suggestions and oversized margins encourage integration of the facilitator's personal experiences in presenting and adapting the Module. Ideas for using the Readings for Bridging Cultures are provided. A section of overhead transparencies and handout masters is included. The Module also provides a discussion of the role of culture in education and the constructs of individualism and collectivism, an overview of the effects of the Bridging Cultures Project, and evaluation results of the author's use of the Module in two sections of a preservice teacher education course. Bridging Cultures: Teacher Education Module brings the successful processes and practices of the Bridging Cultures Project to a larger audience in college courses and in professional development arenas. Designed for use in one or two class sessions, the Module can be incorporated in courses on educational psychology, child development, counseling psychology, and any others that deal with culture in education.

This volume informs the reader about new teachers in urban underserved schools and their development as teachers for social equity. The accounts of five novice teachers who grew up outside the communities in which they teach lead to chapters that contain advice for teacher educators, future and current teachers, and school leaders. These early career teachers learned much about bridging the cultural divide between themselves and their students, confronted and resolved big challenges that may immobilize some who set out to teach in these communities. They brought to their classrooms strong social justice orientations, including a moral imperative to make a difference in the world, an awareness of social and educational inequalities, and a strong sense of responsibility to positively influence the life trajectories of students in their charge. Their narratives offer insights on the dispositions and contexts that will help early career teachers survive and thrive and make a difference in their students’ lives.

All too often, key education initiatives collapse because leaders fail to anticipate and learn from the concerns of those charged with implementation. This illuminating book shows how education leaders can bring opposing groups to common ground, resulting in a solid plan built on diverse wisdom. Acclaimed education coach Jane Kise demonstrates how polarity thinking-a powerful tool for bridging differences developed by Barry Johnson of Polarity Partnerships-provides an alternative to endless debates and either/or thinking. Rather than seeing conflicting forces, the tools help us view them as equally important-even interdependent-concepts, approaches, or models. Readers will find: Ways to recognize polarities, map the positive and negative aspects, and channel energy wasted on disagreement toward a greater common purpose Tools for introducing and working with polarities Polarity mapping to help leaders improve processes for leading change and creating buy-in Ways to use polarity with students as a framework for higher-level thinking

This essential book offers clear guidelines for determining if the Culturally Linguistically Diverse (CLD) students / English Language Learners (ELL) in your general education classroom are experiencing typical language differences, learning disabilities, or both. By combining helpful case-studies with insightful research, the authors provide a framework for differentiating instruction that uses culturally appropriate interventions to build upon student strengths while creating a foundation for further learning and achievement. You will discover how to: Connect your own and your students’ cultural assets to classroom content; Review language acquisition stages and design corresponding instruction; Collaborate with peers and discuss the realities of reaching out for support and problem solving; Choose effective and appropriate instructional strategies based on documentation of data through progress monitoring; Move from a traditional behavioristic perspective to a more culturally responsive perspective; Identify patterns in formal assessments and informal instruction in order to distinguish between language differences and learning disabilities. In addition, the book includes a number of activities and graphs that can be implemented immediately in any classroom. Many of these materials can be downloaded for free from the book’s product page: www.routledge.com/9781138577756.