Psychology Blog 2

     In studying culture and diversity, in chapter six of the Woolfolk text, I wondered if some sort of disclaimer or ‘proceed with caution,’ sign should have been placed meticulously across the chapter.  I have always wondered if there was any data that displayed the cultural implications of students in the classroom.  I have worked in schools that were predominantly Caucasian and I currently work in a school that is predominantly African American.   What I have learned in both settings is that there can be stereotype threats apparent in every classroom if we don’t first ascertain what our judgments are about people of our own race and others. 

     While working in a school where 99% of the teachers were Caucasian  a few things stood out.  Sometimes when I spoke with other teachers, even one’s I’d never met, they would consistently use slang or speak to me in an informal way, even if I’d just seen them have conversations with teachers that they knew very well that were very professional. 

     I also noticed that there were times when Caucasian teachers would set different expectations for the African American students than they did the children of different races.  They made assumptions about their home life and economic status  that influenced the way they spoke to them or even their classroom expectations. The teacher was in her second year teaching, she was from a predominantly Caucasian area, had gone to a predominantly Caucasian high school, and went on to attend a predominantly Caucasian university.  She confessed to me that she had never had an African American friend, and had very little experience with other cultures.  I realized that we’d both made some assumptions that weren’t true.  I assumed that everyone has had diverse experiences in their lives.  I assume that when you are of a certain age, that you’ve met and mingled with all sorts of people in all sorts of environments.  This is not the case.  The young teachers that I’d encountered had a very limited worldview.  This group of teachers and myself did something that I find profound and it’s something that I hope to bring to my own teaching.  We talked openly about race and culture and assumed good intentions on all of our behalf.  They were experiencing a sense of cultural fear, but they were open to hearing and reflecting on the way they taught their African American boys and make changes if necessary.  I talked openly about the way that I felt when they talked to me, and I asked them to think about how they made their students feel when they didn’t set the same expectation, or ‘dumbed’ down their language when they spoke one on one to those students.  To this day, I remain friends with many of these ladies and our relationship has evolved into true friendships, I believe because of the courage that we had to have those early conversations.

     I see similar circumstances in my current school setting.  Students who have never had any interactions with people of different races are slow to warm to their teachers.  Some of the students will become extremely defensive when a teacher of another race redirects them.  I’ve even had conversations with students about teachers, ‘not liking them, because they don’t like Black people.’  The most successful teachers at my school, no matter what the race, have confidence and self-awareness.  They don’t let race or culture interfere with the goal of seeing our students achieve.  Our most successful teachers don’t seem to care whether or not they are seen as White, Black, Hispanic or Asian, they treat the students with respect and expect the same in return. They don’t shy away from cultural questions.  I remember having a conversation with one of my colleagues about how obsessed the female students were with her hair.  I told her that they thought that she and her hair were beautiful, but she might want to bring in some diverse magazines that the students could look through in their down time so that they could see how beautiful that their own hair was.   I think that it is so important to be aware of the ethnic cultures of our students because there are so many teachable moments that we can take advantage of when we least expect it.

     I think that it’s very difficult to define an individual.  As I read through Chapter six on culture and diversity, you notice you don’t find a chapter called, “ how to teach working class African American students, or “how to teach, lower class, Catholic, Asian students”.   This week we studied the connections between poverty and school achievement, how are biases effect our teaching and developing culturally relevant pedagogy.  Establishing cultural competence as a teacher helps us and our students grow inside and outside of our classrooms.