Culturally Responsive Teaching (CRT)
Hermeneutic Zone of Proximal Development
As stated by Usher, Bryant, and Johnston (1997, p.22) in a postmodern environment, previously marginalized or oppressed groups should be able to find a voice according to their own agendas. According to Plumb (1995a, p246) “Critical adult education must investigate new ways that identity can still productively be mobilized in the fragmenting environment of postmodernism”.
At the same time I was taking a course within the AET program called Multicultural and Special Populations, and studying Scheurich & Young’s (1996) work about white/cultural bias in research, I was also participating in Gary Howard’s “Deep Equity” program http://www.ghequityinstitute.com/ , as part of a professional development and teambuilding initiative through my workplace. Both courses cause you to analyze one’s own identity and how it influences a person’s perspective and actions, in the world and as an educator. These courses have driven me to seek further practical solutions in the same way that Friere’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed made me aware of how educators can be oppressors.
One practical angle came in the form of a book study I did with a group of co-workers on Debbie Zacarian’s Mastering Academic Language (2013). Not only was this book study a great introduction to a type of Professional Learning Community as an adult learner myself, but the book also provided a framework for all educators to better support English Language Learners and those from nonacademic language environments. I had worked with three other AET students to facilitate a session for a class about class inequality and poverty. I include this reflection I wrote about the facilitation as a demonstration of Reflective Teaching. This learning event further motivated me to do something practical.
The sphere of cultural equity action remained at the forefront of my awareness partly through my job working with diverse families, but also through my experiences in two AET courses which I took at the same time a year later. The first was the AET online course; Teaching English as a Second Language to Adult Learners. The second experience was my AET Practicum, for which I had been accepted to teach Basic Literacy to adults at the Center for Adult Learning (CAL) in Fort Collins, based at Front Range Community College. I initially sought this Practicum, as I had extensive experience teaching literacy to K-12 students with learning/print disabilities, and I’d hoped to transfer this knowledge to the adult education setting. It just so happened though, that ALL the students in my class were English Language Learners, in that English was not their first -or native- language (“L1”). Please CLICK HERE to see some adult ESL class observations I did in support of this work.
Immediately, the value of employing the Motivational Framework for Cultural Responsive Teaching (MFCRT) became clear. I had first heard of this when Margery Ginsberg and Raymond Wlodkowski visited the CSU Campus for the 2016 Diversity Symposium. I had always been a believer in ‘valuing the individual’, but this framework gives a structural, practical overlay to all that’s planned -as well as things which just ‘come up’. It felt great to be able to bring this to the awareness of the other CAL faculty as well as participants in the online AET Teaching English course. I also had the opportunity to moderate an online discussion around the topic of ‘Motivation’ with my adult educator peers in the AET course Adult Teaching and Learning in 2018, which centered on MFCRT.
This experience has helped me become more interested in organizational change and Professional Learning Communities (PLC’s). If we know what some of the barriers are to inclusion, and some steps toward progress, this behooves us to build awareness in others. As Senge (2006) points out though, even a heartfelt vision cannot be dictated. “Shared pictures of the future” need to be ‘unearthed’ in the community in order to ‘foster genuine commitment and enrolment rather than compliance.’ This wisdom, along with research and reading for a paper I wrote on faculty professional development for the Adult Teaching and Learning AET course, caused me to become interested in what Kakkori & Huttunen (2014) call the ‘Hermeneutic Zone of Proximal Development”. According to Moll (1990) moral learning is “the quintessential sociocultural activity”, where fusion and expansion of horizons happen. I would like to be a part of this.
REFERENCES
Ginsberg, M. (2015). Excited to learn : Motivation and culturally responsive teaching (YBP Print DDA). Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin, a SAGE Company.
Ginsberg, M., Wlodkowski, R., & Ebooks Corporation. (2009). Diversity and motivation: culturally responsive teaching in college (2nd ed., Ebook Library (EBL)). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Ginsberg, M. in Higher Education Today -a blog by American Council on Education (ACE) https://www.higheredtoday.org/2018/05/16/motivational-framework-instructional-equity-higher-education/
Howard, G. (2016). We can't teach what we don't know: White teachers, multiracial schools (Third ed., YBP Print DDA). New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
Kakkori, L., & Huttunen, R. (2014). Vygotsky, Heidegger, and Gadamer on moral development. 323-336. 10.4018/978-1-4666-6603-0.ch019. (PDF) Vygotsky, heidegger, and gadamer on moral development. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/290610038_Vygotsky_heidegger_and_gadamer_on_moral_development [accessed Sept 05 2018].
Moll, L.(1990) Introduction. In: L. Moll (Ed.) Vygotsky and Education: Instructional Implications and Applications of Sociohistorical Psychology (1–27). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Plumb, D. (1995a). Critical adult education and identity in postmodernity. Proceedings of the 36th Annual Adult Education Research (pp 241-248) Edmonton, Alberta: University of Alberta
Scheurich, J., & Young, M. (1997). Coloring Epistemologies: Are Our Research Epistemologies Racially Biased? Educational Researcher,26(4), 4-16.
Senge, P. (2006). The fifth discipline : The art and practice of the learning organization (Rev. and updated.. ed.). New York: Doubleday/Currency.
Usher, R., Bryant, I., & Johnston, R. (1997). Adult education and the postmodern challenge: learning beyond the limits. New York: Routledge.
Wlodkowski, R. (2010). Enhancing Adult Motivation to Learn : A Comprehensive Guide for Teaching All Adults (Vol. 880). New York: John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated.
Zacarian, D. (2013). Mastering academic language : A framework for supporting student achievement (YBP Print DDA). Thousand Oaks, Calif. : London: Corwin ; SAGE [distributor].
Center for Adult Learning Website:
https://www.frontrange.edu/programs-and-courses/ged-testing/prep-classes
CRT Resources
Gary Howard Equity Institute
“Working Together for Inclusion, Equity, and Excellence” “Building the capacity of leadership teams to deliver high quality professional development.”
http://www.ghequityinstitute.com/
The National seed project
“Creating conversational communities that drive change.”
Department of Education
This 2016 Department of Education document is titled ADVANCING DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION IN HIGHER EDUCATION Key Data Highlights Focusing on Race and Ethnicity and Promising Practices
https://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/research/pubs/advancing-diversity-inclusion.pdf
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
UNESCO sees inclusion as a priority for social justice worldwide.
Motivational Framework for Culturally Responsive Teaching
Ginsberg & Wlodkowski’s “Enhancing Adult Motivation to Learn: A Comprehensive Guide for Teaching All Adults” (Margery B. Ginsberg and Raymond J. Wlodkowski, 2017.) is summarized here.
Community college consortium open educational resources
“The development and use of open educational resources has the potential to create equitable learning experiences for all students. Open education is deeply rooted in the belief that teachers have the freedom to develop content that meets the needs of their students.”
https://www.cccoer.org/webinar/nov-15-how-oer-can-support-student-equity-and-diversity/
CLASP
A national, nonpartisan, anti-poverty nonprofit advancing policy solutions for low-income people.