Growth Mindset in Cultural Competency

This week’s article summary is Growth Mindset in Cultural Competency.

 

As a grizzled veteran of life, I have been disappointed by the current ‘cancel culture’ climate. For those of you who aren’t familiar, ‘cancel culture’ results from looking at famous person’s life and if he/she ever did or said something inappropriate, objectionable, or offensive, then basically destroying or ‘canceling’ his/her career henceforth.

It makes me thankful I’m not a celebrity as I make mistakes and faux pas every day. Looking back on my missteps, I most likely would have been ‘canceled’ before my 23^rd birthday!

 

The ‘cancel culture’ phenomenon connects to this week’s article summary that takes Carol Dweck’s Growth Mindset and applies it to DEI work. 

 

As you all know, the premise of a Growth Mindset is we all are on a continuous journey towards improvement. We get better through hard work, perseverance, practice, reflection, and strong mentorship and guidance. 

 

And the article points out a Growth Mindset should extend to DEI work.

 

I know our country has become overly polarized, binary, sanctimonious, and intolerant of difference or dissent, yet my personal mantra is to try to keep an open mind, to recognize that no one side of a story is the absolute truth, and to avoid being judgmental.

 

No one is perfect and we all have made and will continue to make mistakes. Yet, unlike the ‘cancel culture’ climate, I don’t believe most mistakes (clearly the truly heinous, extreme ones are inexcusable and warrant extreme consequences) justify destroying a person’s career. How about some grace and forgiveness and an opportunity to atone and learn?

 

Using a Growth Mindset to counter the article’s myths on complex DEI topics and discussions can help us dialogue across difference, become more culturally competent, and work together for a more just and equitable society and world.

 Joe

 

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Everyone knows that conversations about identity, inclusivity, and cultural competency can be touchy. That’s why facilitators typically establish norms: “Lean into discomfort,” “Assume positive intent,” and “Listen to understand.”

And yet in a recent discussion on teachers’ implicit bias and the resulting underperformance and over-disciplining of students of color, one teacher erupted with “I am not racist! I treat everyone the same — I don’t care if my students are black, white, purple, or green; they all have a fair shot in my classroom!”

 

And yet after a teacher unveils an upcoming third-grade unit on family that will discuss different kinds of families, including adoptive parents, different race parents, foster parents, grandparents as primary parent figures, same-sex parents, and more, one parent raises serious concerns. “Children are so innocent, and they don’t notice these differences. Why do we have to expose them to ideas they’re not ready for?”

 

As an educator, facilitator, and trainer, I have found that the scenarios above are more common than not because many cultural myths proliferate. If we are willing to move beyond these myths and integrate a growth mindset into cultural competency work, we can progress toward the truly inclusive communities we all aspire to be part of.

 

I have incorporated a Growth Mindset into my diversity trainings and workshops, and witnessed significant shifts in minds and hearts. Several times, veteran faculty who, in the past, have responded to professional development with guilt, defensiveness, or outright dismissal have expressed a sudden understanding, a curiosity to learn more, and an eagerness to implement changes in the classroom.

 

When we unpack the fixed mindset nature of three common myths surrounding cultural competency, we see how having a growth mindset can help us move beyond the silence and paralysis, and surface political correctness that can hinder our forward progress.

 

Myth 1: All or None: The “All or None” myth teaches us that there those who are “with it” and those who are not.  Under this myth, those of us who understand or experience one of the societal isms (racism, sexism, classism, ableism, ageism, heterosexism, ethnocentrism, etc.) automatically assume that we understand the issues of other isms. “As a woman, I understand oppression — I know what it must be like to be poor in this world.” This myth also makes us unwilling to acknowledge privilege surrounding one of our identities because we experience oppression in another. “As a gay man, I wouldn’t know what white privilege feels like.” Finally, this myth implies that if we make mistakes or have an area of weakness or ignorance, it must be because we are not culturally competent after all. “You don't know what cisgender means? Wow…” This myth keeps us from asking questions when we don’t know; we spend more energy protecting our competency status rather than listening, learning, and growing. With a Growth Mindset, we understand that there is always room to grow. No one can fully master all aspects of cultural competency for all cultural identifiers, and mistakes are inevitable. With humble curiosity, we seek to better understand ourselves, understand others, develop cross-cultural skills, and work toward equity and inclusion.

 

Myth 2:  Mistakes and Moral Worth: The “Mistakes and Moral Worth” myth teaches us that those who offend or hurt must be doing so because they are bigoted and morally deficient, and good-hearted people do not speak or act in ways that marginalize. Under this myth, those of us who make an offensive comment, even if unintentional, are attacked as though we had professed to be a member of a hate group. “You are such a sexist pig for saying that!” We feel morally justified in treating others inhumanely for their ignorant behavior. “People who act like you should be fired.” We deny hurt feelings of others when they point to our words or actions as their cause. “I am a good person – what I said was not homophobic.” Consider the social media response to any public figure caught saying anything remotely offensive, as well as the public figure’s defensive responses. This myth leaves us afraid to speak our mind for fear of public shaming. It keeps us focusing on our intentions rather than on our impacts.  We try to prove our moral worth by debasing others who have displayed shortcomings. With a Growth Mindset, we understand that good people can make mistakes. Mistakes do not define us. And when others make mistakes, we are likely to respond with patience and desire to teach, understanding that it’s possible to dislike an action without disliking the person.

 

Myth 3: Tonsils of Bias: For the final myth, I borrow heavily from Jay Smooth’s TEDx talk, “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Discussing Race.” The “Tonsils of Bias” myth teaches us that bias and prejudice are like tonsils. We either have them or we don’t — and we can get them removed. Under this myth, those of us who’ve had some training to understand another’s identity and difference assume that we have learned everything we need to be competent. “I took a workshop on ageism last year.  What else is there to learn?” We also believe that relationships can “fix” our misconceptions about a whole group of people. “I have lots of friends who are immigrants. I’m not xenophobic.” This myth leaves us slipping into complacency and clinging to a false sense of mastery, reluctant to look for authentic understanding and growth. It makes us think, “If we just find the right all-school read, the right professional development workshop, we can fix all the problems at the school.” With a  Growth Mindset, we understand that bias and prejudice are more like plaque. There is so much misinformation in the world reinforced by history, systems, and media. If we are to keep the myths at bay, we must get into a regular practice, much like brushing and flossing every day. And just as good oral hygiene does not guarantee we will never have bad breath or have food stuck in our teeth, a regular questioning, learning, and engaging across difference can only decrease how much our bias and prejudice show up in our daily thoughts, words, and actions.

 

Our schools can have great intentions, powerful mission statements, ample professional development and training, and people from diverse backgrounds. Without regular practice, however, these elements become mere artifacts to protect our competence status. I hope schools will embrace a Growth Mindset as a critical component of their cultural competency work. Only then can diversity, inclusion, equity, and cultural competency transform from professed values to lived values.

 

Content Knowledge and Reading Comprehension

 This week’s article summary is Why Deeply Diving Into Content Could Be The Key to Reading Comprehension.

 

Let’s put the phonics versus whole language battle to bed.

 

As Rhonda frequently points out, phonics and the ability to decode words are essential to learning to read, and the ability to read is the basis requirement—but as the article below attests not the only—for reading comprehension. Expecting kids to learn to read naturally and organically by providing loads of engaging books will work for some kids but not for the vast majority who need direct instruction as learning to read is not innate and instinctual in humans; we have been reading and writing for only 5000 years, which is less than a millisecond in our evolution.

 

So while formal reading instruction is critical in elementary schools, the point of today’s article is reading comprehension skills are also supported through exposure to rich, varied, and wide content. We all better comprehend what we read when we have familiarity with and background knowledge of the topic. (The study from the 1980s mentioned in the article is one example of many.)

 

The two books referenced in the article--The Knowledge Gap and Why Knowledge Matters—do espouse a more traditional view of education: kids as empty vessels that need to be filled with gobs of content to thrive as learners. (While I am more of a progressive-leaning educational moderate who believes kids are naturally inquisitive learners, I did agree with macro point of both books about the importance of content and background knowledge.)

 

So, while we need to teach phonics and decoding, we also need to ensure our students have ample opportunities to deepen their knowledge base of varied topics in many disciplines. Natalie Wexler, the author of The Knowledge Gap, points out that schools can fall into the trap of focusing so much on reading skills that reading assignments act more as vehicles for reading skill development rather than as a means to also strengthen students’ knowledge base.

 

So while in particular, E.D. Hirsch, the author of Why Educational Matters, has a negative reputation among many educators (his book Cultural Literacy remembered in infamy), I agree with him in that we need to make sure our kids are exposed to rich, deep content so that their strong knowledge base can support them to further learn and comprehend.

 

Joe

 

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A lot of people are concerned that American kids aren't learning to read.

 

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) shows only about a third of fourth-graders are proficient in reading. Much of the recent debate has been a return to an old battle between advocates of phonics instruction versus those who favor a whole-language approach to teaching the building blocks of reading. Education journalist Natalie Wexler has a whole different argument to make that on why kids often don’t comprehend what they read.  

 

“There are really two different aspects to reading,” said Wexler. "One is decoding, just matching sounds to letters. That really is a set of skills that you need to be taught directly. But reading comprehension skills are different."

 

Wexler contends that most elementary schools teach reading comprehension as free-floating skills, detached from the content a child is reading. The teacher is focused on teaching students how to make inferences or find the main idea, regardless of the topic.

 

For her book The Knowledge Gap Wexler dove deeply into the cognitive science of reading. She found that the most important element of reading comprehension is knowledge and vocabulary about the topic.

 

There’s an iconic experiment researchers like to cite from the 1980s about baseball. Researchers chose baseball because it’s the type of topic that kids who might not be all-around good readers would know something about. The goal of the study was to figure out what was more important to reading comprehension: general reading skills or knowledge of the topic. “What they found was the kids who knew about baseball did very well, regardless of whether they tested as good or poor readers,” Wexler said. And even more telling, the kids who knew more about baseball, but had been identified as “poor” readers, performed better on the baseball-focused reading comprehension task than children who were deemed “good” readers, but who didn’t know much about baseball. Wexler says that study has been replicated in many other contexts.

 

This “knowledge gap” that concerns Wexler also helps explain the achievement gap. Largely mirroring growing income inequality, the achievement gap has remained stubbornly wide, despite concentrated efforts to close it. Wexler contends it’s not just about being rich or poor, it’s about the education level of parents. And, generally speaking, wealthier parents are more highly educated.

“Children with highly educated parents are immersed in sophisticated knowledge and vocabulary from birth, so they start school with more of that type of knowledge,” Wexler said. And, when they get to school, they continue to build on all that they knew before, whereas less affluent children often start school with less exposure to knowledge, and the gap only widens.

“So if schools are not providing content-rich curriculum in a systematic way, they can get to high school with huge, really crippling gaps in their knowledge,” Wexler said.

The severity of this comprehension gap often doesn’t make itself fully known until high school, when teachers assume students have more knowledge, the content is more complicated, and the texts more complex.

When kids sit down to take their standardized reading test, most often the passages aren’t anything they’ve been learning in class. In fact, they’re designed that way, to prevent any group from having an advantage. But Wexler contends most elementary schools aren’t teaching kids much content anyway. Instead, they read one-off articles about a topic that allow kids to practice the “skills” of reading comprehension.

The type of knowledge Wexler is referring to, the kind that leads to really good comprehension, is a long-term project. Each bit of knowledge builds on something that came before, so it can’t be measured in one or two year increments. It’s something that continues from year to year.

“If we want change to occur, we can’t just rely on teachers alone to do it,” Wexler said. “They do need to be on board, but building knowledge is a gradual, cumulative process and one teacher is not going to be able to do it.”

France inadvertently provided a massive case study on content-rich curriculum in 1989. E.D Hirsch details the change in his book Why Knowledge Matters. French lawmakers passed legislation changing elementary school education in France to a skills-based approach to reading. Prior to 1989, the national curriculum had been focused on content. French children performed well compared to their international peers, and wealthy kids performed at about the same level as poorer kids. After the switch, however, things changed. In just a few decades, French children’s performance on international tests overall declined and the gap between wealthier and poorer students grew.

For Wexler, it would be ideal for elementary school classrooms to dig into one topic for several weeks. Teachers could use read-alouds to expose children to complex texts, ones with more complicated syntax and vocabulary. In this way, kids learn about the topic and become familiar with the vocabulary. Together the class could discuss those ideas and connect them to the information they’ve already learned. Then, students might read simpler texts on their own about the same topic, but they will already be primed with some background knowledge and vocabulary.

After students have learned a fair amount of background knowledge from a teacher, in discussion, and from their own reading, they might dive into an inquiry project to investigate an area of particular interest to them. Wexler is concerned that some progressively-minded educators throw students into project-based learning or an independent inquiry when they don’t yet have much background knowledge on the topic.

 

 

Teacher Praise and Student Focus and Behavior

 This week’s article summary is Teacher Praise Helps Students Focus and Behave Better.

 

Every morning before school I complete a number of daily crossword puzzles and other word games on my iPad. On one game, once I complete my daily challenge, my screen fills with fireworks and written comments like ‘Nothing can stop you!’ or ‘Great work! Keep it up!’

 

I know these comments are a result of objective binary coding, not a personalized assessment of my performance, but I must admit, it feels good to get a compliment on my crossword puzzle completion.

 

The article below provides research evidence of how praise and positivity in the classroom rather than reprimands, threats, and negativity lead to better student behavior and attention.

 

If you’ve been at Trinity for a few years, you have probably heard Jill, Marsha, and others talk about John Hattie and his research. And I’m sure all of us are familiar with Carol Dweck’s Growth Mindset.

 

To Hattie, for teacher feedback (including praise) to be effective it needs to be specific about what’s good and clear about what needs to be improved and how.

 

Similarly for Dweck, only praising effort (‘Good try, Billy! I like your determination!’) doesn’t lead to successful learning. Fostering a Growth Mindset must include providing students with strategies how to improve.

 

Completing the Holy Trinity of educational pundits in this article is a warning from Alfie Kohn that too much praise can have a negative impact on the development of intrinsic motivation in students. If the goal becomes an external reward,  students may develop a Pavlovian response to working not to get better at something but strictly for the prize.

 

So, while praise is clearly better than reprimands and punishments, we all need to remember that for student competence and mastery, praise needs to be constructive and instructive and not only focus on effort.

 

Joe

 

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When teachers use more praise and fewer reprimands in the classroom, it seems to help students stay on-task and behave better, according to a new study.

Researchers found that there was no magic ratio of praise to reprimand that worked best. Instead, they found a "positive linear relationship" between the two. 

There is a body of research that finds praise can be an effective way for teachers to produce better behavior and academic performance. This is particularly true when teachers' praise specifies and describes the behavior.

But research contains a lot of caveats on the practice of praise and feedback, too. 

It’s important that teachers praise students' competence, rather than their natural ability. 

Alfie Kohn, who writes a lot about motivation, points out that praise can undermine intrinsic motivation by leading people to work for praise itself. 

Researcher John Hattie zeroed in on praise and other forms of teacher feedback in his book Visible Learning: Feedback. For Hattie, many teachers think more feedback, and better feedback, will improve their students' learning. But the practice needs to be more rigorous than that.

"When teachers spend hours and hours writing comments, if there's no feedback providing concrete steps for the students to improve, students will argue themselves blue in the face that they never received anything," he said.

"The key question is, does feedback help someone understand what they don't know, what they do know, and where they go? That's when and why feedback is so powerful, but a lot of feedback doesn't—and doesn't have any effect."

Praise and feedback can also come into play as teachers work on cultivating a "growth mindset"—the belief that intelligence can be developed—in their students. Carol Dweck, who's known for her work to define growth mindset, said that one of the most common misunderstandings about growth mindset is that it's about praising students' effort. But praise is only one slice of that work, she said.

"Students need to try new strategies and seek input from others when they're stuck," Dweck said. "They need this repertoire of approaches—not just sheer effort—to learn and improve."

Effort is "a means to an end to the goal of learning and improving," Dweck wrote. "Too often nowadays, praise is given to students who are putting forth effort, but not learning, in order to make them feel good in the moment: 'Great effort! You tried your best!' It's good that the students tried, but it's not good that they're not learning."

The growth-mindset approach, she said, is designed to help children "feel good in the short and long terms, by helping them thrive on challenges and setbacks on their way to learning." When students are stuck, teachers can recognize what they've accomplished so far, but also help them move forward, by making comments like, "Let's talk about what you've tried, and what you can try next," Dweck wrote. 

 

The Importance of Managing Emotions and Success at School

 This week’s article summary is Students Who Can Manage Their Emotions Do Better in School.

As Trinity focuses on children from age 3 through 6^th grade, most of us know from experience that Emotional Intelligence is just as important—if not more so--in student success at school as IQ.

Think of how critical student self-regulation is in our classrooms: learning how to wait your turn, learning how to share, learning to follow directions, learning that you don’t always get what you want when you want it.

The reality for many schools and in our society at large is that Emotional Intelligence and Academic Achievement too often are put into separate categories. The truth, though, is Emotional Intelligence (intra and interpersonal skills) supports Academic Achievement. Being able to listen in class, to work cooperatively and collaboratively with others, to organize oneself, to do work at home (including homework in older grades) all obviously lead to better academic performance.

This is why at Trinity we talk so much about teaching the whole child and helping form his/her academic and character foundation.

More and more research illustrates the interrelation and interdependence of IQ and EQ: here’s another article on EQ traits and how to teach them at school and at home.

Joe

 

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Emotional intelligence is an important part of academic success—from kindergarten into college—according to a new study. In particular, students who understand and can manage their emotions earn higher grades and do better on standardized tests.

 

The findings help bolster the growing consensus among researchers that skills such as emotional intelligence are not just important for future workplace success, but also students' academic success in the here and now.

 

While raw intelligence, or IQ, is still the biggest predictor of academic performance, the study's findings put understanding and managing emotions right up there with it.

 

The study also examines different types of emotional intelligence and methods of measuring it to see how these variations impact tests, grades, and success in different academic subjects.

 

The goal is to determine exactly what parts of emotional intelligence move the needle on academics. For example, the study found that students' ability to read others' emotions was not as important as the ability to regulate their own emotions.

 

Emotionally intelligent students may also be better at handling negative emotions that come from, say, test anxiety.

 

Students with high emotional intelligence may also be better at managing their social world—from navigating peer pressure to forming positive relationships with teachers—which puts them in a better position to focus on learning

 

The biggest takeaway from the study is teaching emotional intelligence skills doesn't detract from students' academics—it boosts them.

 

What Makes a Great Teacher?

 This week’s article summary is What Makes a Great Teacher: Pedagogy or Personality?

 

We’ve probably all heard the expression “He/she was born to teach” or “Teaching is more art than science.”

 

Yes, there’s art to teaching (improvisation, creativity, and imagination are vital for any classroom) but there’s much more learning needed to become a great teacher. Whether it’s content knowledge, differentiation strategies, assessment tools, etc., teaching is much more than having an engaging, entertaining personality.

 

The article below explains that teaching is indeed a ‘scientific’ profession that requires ongoing learning, experience, and nuance.

 

To me, one of the most important attributes of master teachers is regardless of how much experience and expertise they amass, they never forget what it was like to be a student, including anticipating the questions students will ask. Ted Williams was arguably the greatest hitter in professional baseball but when he coached younger players about hitting all he would tell them is “see the ball, hit the ball.” That’s good advice when you have as much natural ability as Williams, but not for most as hitting in baseball is considered one of the most difficult athletic feats.

 

Williams was not a good teacher: he couldn’t relate to players who couldn’t hit like him, nor could he communicate to them how to hit.

 

Being able to perform at a high level (and knowing the steps and skills needed to get there), being able to communicate how to in simple-to-understand ways, and providing supportive scaffolding as needed to novices is to me the essence of teaching.

 

No matter how much we educators further learn and understand about teaching, we always need to be able to relate to our students. And we all need to champion teaching as a profession requiring much ongoing learning and practice. It’s why we proudly say at Trinity that we are a community of learners, meaning not just our students, but adults (parents and faculty/staff)!

 

Thank you for all you did during our first full week of school. We made a lot of adjustments this week and will continue to yet I hope you and your students (those at school and those at home) are beginning to settle into the routine and predictability of school.

 

Enjoy your weekend!

 

Joe

 

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"She’s one of those people who just has a way with kids."

 

"I think it’s his personality that makes students love his class."

 

You’ve probably heard comments like these. Though they affirm the powerful and unique personalities that many teachers bring to their work, these comments also bug me. They diminish the role of pedagogy and all of the decision-making that informs teaching, and this reinforces a view of teaching as less than the professional work it is.

 

Of course, a teacher’s passion, charisma, warmth, and humor influence the way students experience a class. But teachers aren’t really “born” knowing how to connect and inspire children in a classroom setting. Instead, they must grow these capacities by continually developing pedagogical and social-emotional skills.

 

The idea that a great personality makes a great teacher is fantasy. Most of us have seen brand-new teachers or guest speakers who come in with what seems like the right energy: They’re confident, caring, and creative. But without relevant teaching skills, most aren’t effective with students.

 

Likewise, when a teacher is successful, we can’t just attribute it to personality. Teaching methods are critical to educational outcomes for students, and not all methods or curricula are equally effective. Even in the above example, what the teacher did well on the first day wasn’t simply about her personality. She made some sound pedagogical decisions: to spend time building connections with her students, giving them a structured way to speak about themselves, and listening to them with interest.

 

So, personality isn’t important in teaching at all … case closed? Not really.

 

Personality is important, but the traits that matter most aren’t fixed.

 

A teacher can be soft-spoken, not someone we’d describe as extroverted or funny, but still create an excellent learning environment. What really matters is the ability to demonstrate compassion and emotional constancy, the cultural competency needed to develop trust and understanding with students, and the courage to take risks and be vulnerable.

 

It's important to remember that teaching is a developmental process, just like learning is. But teaching is unique because it’s dependent on interaction: You can learn on your own, but you need a learner in order to teach. Awareness of all that goes into those interactions is at the center of successful teaching.

 

Awareness includes five dimensions:

• Awareness of the self as a teacher
• Awareness of the teaching process
• Awareness of the learner
• Awareness of interaction
• Awareness of context.

 

Each is a continuum, and teachers develop them at varying rates.

 

Great teaching requires an awareness of all of the factors at play in a particular moment, to take advantage of opportunities and anticipate and address challenges.

 

What jumps out at me is that awareness of self is as important in the framework as the awareness of learner or the awareness of teaching process. Generally in teacher preparation and professional development, the focus is on teaching practices and how we can understand our students as learners. But we are rarely called to look at our own identities. 

 

Perhaps the element of personality that most contributes to excellent teaching—as essential as our pedagogy, knowledge of our students, and of course, knowledge and passion for our subjects—really boils down to our ability to develop a strong sense of ourselves in our teaching role. The vibrancy we notice in an excellent teacher may really be a combination of skilled pedagogy, a highly developed awareness of the teacher’s presence, emotions, and needs, and the conscientiousness to attend to them as well as we all want to do for our students.

 

What is Privilege?

This week’s article summary, Different Types of Privilege Explained, is a follow-up to our preplanning DEI session.

 

What initially caught my attention in the article was this quote: “Privilege isn’t about what you’ve gone through; it’s about what you haven’t gone through.”

 

Privilege is a tough topic because all of us worked hard to get where are, and, as a result, we view the world as a meritocracy where success comes from toil and effort.

 

But as Jackie and others shared during preplanning, we need to move beyond our individual story/experience and try to see the larger historic, institutional structures embedded in our society. And from that view, many of us are privileged.

 

As a white, heterosexual, Baby Boomer male who whose parents were able to afford a private school education for me, I clearly had it easier than many others and had many available safety when I erred. And to this day I benefit from societal privileges I often don’t see and take for granted:

• When I’m on an early-morning run and a police car passes me, I never worry that I will be stopped and asked what I’m doing and why I am in this neighborhood
• While my preference is not to hold hands with my wife in public (PDAs are just not my thing), I would get no stares or glares from strangers if I did
• When my wife and go out to dinner, I am given the check at the end of the meal, not her
• As we kept receiving paychecks during the pandemic home quarantine, I never had to worry about paying my mortgage or utility and food bills
• My skin color and gender are commonly reflected in the movies, television shows, and books I read
• When I visit another country, most people I encounter have familiarity with the English language
• …And the list goes on

 

Again, these privileges don’t mean I haven’t worked hard to get where I am.  Yet I do need to take stock that others haven’t had the same opportunities as I. To me, recognizing institutional privilege doesn’t mean I need to feel bad about the benefits I may have; it’s about seeing that others aren’t afforded those same benefits and then supporting equity of opportunity for all.

 

The article lists a number of privileges. Spend a few minutes reflecting on which areas you are privileged in and more importantly those who aren’t.

 

What does this mean for us as educators?

• As we’ve discussed before, our classrooms need to provide our students with both ‘mirrors and windows’—they need to see themselves in what we teach (mirrors) but they also need to explore difference (windows).
• Help them see that their experiences and perspectives are not the experiences and perspectives of everyone. Encourage them to think with multiple perspectives, looking for both similarities and differences.
• And in age-appropriate ways guide them to see that the world is not fair to all and resources and opportunities are not equally available and distributed. Kids have an innate sense of fairness: help them see that they can indeed help level the playing field and help the world get better.

 

FYI, the acronym BIPOC in the article stands for ‘Black, Indigenous, People of Color.’

 

Thank you for the wonderful start of the school year (with two first days of school)! There was so much positive energy, excitement, and smiles (even if hidden behind masks). Enjoy a well-deserved weekend!

 

Joe

 

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Conversations around privilege can be tricky, as Black Lives Matter Toronto co-founder Janaya Khan discovered in the course of her anti-racism activism. What white people often hear when confronted with the idea of their privilege, she found, was not that they enjoyed advantages over BIPOC, but rather that they had never experienced hardship in their lives. This, she has said, would shut them down to dialogue.

So, she reframed the idea of white privilege to better enable discourse, in a quote that’s been widely circulated in recent weeks: “Privilege isn’t about what you’ve gone through; it’s about what you haven’t had to go through.”

This is critical to understanding that you can lack privilege in some areas while still retaining it in others. As Nicole Cardoza, an anti-racism activist, noted holding privilege in one area—e.g. race, gender, socioeconomic—doesn’t mean you don’t lack privilege in other areas; however, it also doesn’t exempt you from the benefits of the privilege you do hold. Cardoza says she’s experienced white women, for example, counter confrontation around their white privilege with evidence of their gender disadvantage. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of the way privilege works, and many of us are guilty of it. Understanding the various privileges you hold can help you to become more self-aware, commit fewer microaggressions, and practice more effective social justice activism.

Below, an exploration of different types of privilege—by no means an exhaustive list—so we can all better understand ourselves and our role in equality.

White privilege: Having white skin is a global privilege due to colonialism, but it is especially privileged in the United States. America was founded around systemic racism, and everything from policy to pop culture reinforces white privilege. Longtime anti-racism activist Peggy McIntosh once described this privilege as, “an invisible package of unearned assets.” If you possess this privilege, it’s typical for you to exist in spaces where the majority of people look like you, to turn on the TV and see the same, to be treated more generously and less violently by authorities, to know that if you aren’t offered a job or approved for a home, it’s not because of your race, and on and on the advantages go.

Male privilege (or gender privilege): Being cis male is also a global privilege, and America was specifically designed as a patriarchy, aka a system of government in which men hold the power and women are excluded it from it, to institutionalize this advantage. If you are a cis man, you benefit from this setup in many invisible ways. Holding male privilege means you aren’t greatly disadvantaged by not fitting into ideals of conventional beauty, that your “masculinity” is not connected to your childbearing or rearing decisions and capabilities, that you will likely do less of your household’s labor, that you may be able to walk alone at night without fear, that you can be sexually empowered without it being positioned as a negative, that you earn more money than women who do the same work as you, and more. Male passing privilege also exists. If you are a trans man who passes as a cis man, you may be entitled to the same privileges.

Heterosexual privilege: Globally, heterosexuality is a privilege. It means that you benefit from identifying as straight and will not face the same discrimination or threats to your safety as a result of your sexuality. It can also mean that you have more rights. More specifically, heterosexual privilege can mean you don’t have to fear others finding out about your sexual orientation, that you can hold hands with your romantic partner without being scorned, mocked, or threatened, and that you are not identified as deviant or damaged because of who you are attracted to, among many other things.

Cisgender privilege: Cisgender privilege is when you identify with the gender to which you were assigned at birth. If you have this privilege, you are not likely to be harassed in public restrooms or locker room spaces, face questions about your genitals from strangers, be clinically considered mentally unwell, be regularly assigned the wrong pronoun, and more.

Socioeconomic privilege: Socioeconomic, or class, privilege relates to financial security. It’s navigated and shown when you don’t have to worry about affording necessities (e.g. food and shelter), you don’t have the burden of debt, you have control over your time, you’re able to only be exposed to others with the same privileges, you’re more likely to be perceived as innocent by the criminal justice system, you can afford good physical and mental health care, and much more. Most societies, including America, are designed in a way that reinforces and upholds class privilege.

Religious privilege: Religious privilege is when your religion is the dominant religion, or the one considered to be the default “norm” where you live. In the U.S., that privilege falls to Christians. You can easily spot this bias in our country’s holiday calendar, which makes Christmas a bank holiday, or in the fact that we routinely swear oaths on the Bible. (These are just two of many examples.) Religious privilege also means you are not likely to be persecuted based on your religious affiliation—you can worship freely and safely.

Passport privilege: Passport privilege has to do with how easy it is for you to travel around the world based on the passport you hold. Those who carry American passports have historically been privileged in this manner.

Location-based privilege: Where you live has other implications with respect to privilege, too. If you live near a big city, for example, you will have access to a greater number and variety of job prospects than someone who does not, including those which promise higher wages and greater prestige.

Beauty privilege: If you are attractive in a way that aligns with the dominant beauty ideals of your culture, you are likely to benefit from that attractiveness. You may also benefit from being perceived as attractive even if your appearance does not fit those dominant ideals. In any case, possessing the privilege of beauty means you’re likely to experience greater career success and make more money, be less persecuted within the criminal justice system, and have more positive social interactions, among other things. Don’t believe it? Consider how hard you work to achieve beauty ideals, and then ask yourself why you would bother so much if there were no inherent benefits.

Age privilege: In America youth is highly valued, especially in women. So, if you’re young, you have a privilege that older people don’t, and that privilege incrementally decreases with age. The younger you are (as an adult), the more likely you are to see yourself represented in pop culture and advertising, be valued for your ideas/art, be considered attractive (which is its own privilege), and more.

Couple privilege: In our society, being traditionally coupled, 1:1, is an advantage because it’s considered to be a norm versus remaining single or opting for a less traditional relationship structure, e.g. polyamory. You may enjoy a greater number of rights, benefit financially, and be less likely to be stigmatized.

 

 

How Teachers Can Help Students Transition Back to School

Thank you all for an uplifting first week of preplanning (and some good coffee this morning)! I’m sure a number of us approached our first week back at Trinity with some trepidation. While our responsibility of welcoming back our students awaits us next week, I hope all of you felt some normalcy this week as we settled back into the routine of school even as we wore face coverings, social distanced, met virtually, and operated under our PRP guidelines. For me, it just felt good to be back at school!

 

For those of you new to Trinity, every Friday during the school year, I like to send out an educational article that recently caught my attention and that I hope provokes thought in you. 

 

As we live in fast-paced times, we’ve grown accustomed to the character limit of Twitter and the short videos on YouTube. Hence, I edit down the article to its most salient points so it’s a quick read. (If available, I link the full article.)

 

I try to find articles applicable to early childhood/elementary education.

 

I don’t agree with every article. I know we live in polarized political times where there is little tolerance for the opposing position. I, however, don’t confine myself to only one side in politics or in education. In fact, I especially like articles that make me think, ask me to reflect on my educational beliefs, and even confront my educational biases. As we discussed in our DEI session this week, a little cognitive dissonance is good for us!

 

The first article summary of the year is How Teachers Can Help Students Transition Back to School.

 

Just as many of us were anxious to return to school this week, many of our students will be next week as well. This article is a reminder that in the first weeks of school—especially necessary this year—we need to attend to our students’ social-emotional, affective needs. Academic development, achievement, and application are buoyed from our students’ emotional and physical safety, comfort, and trust we establish with them. One of the reasons I am so happy that we can begin the year with in-person school is we get the opportunity to see, interact, and connect, and get to know our students as we create a caring, responsible, and respectful community in our classrooms and throughout the school. As I heard in a number of meetings this week, we need to devote the first  weeks of school to building relationships and routines. No matter our age, we all need routines, consistency, and emotional security in our lives.

 

Thanks again for such a great first week of energy, conviction, and community!

 

Enjoy the last weekend of summer!

 

Joe

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The return to full-time, face-to-face learning in schools is an exciting time for students and teachers and, no doubt, a blessed relief for many parents. It is also a critical time regarding maximizing learning opportunities, both during and after this transition.

We are changed and different now, and we can move forward together, being kind and supportive to all.

Here are some tips and suggestions to support school communities in managing this transition back to school for all students, and particularly those with additional needs.

Routine and Structure: A return to regular school and learning routines will be like a comfy warm winter blanket for all students. Kids thrive off known boundaries and predictable daily routines.

Harness Self-Isolation Experiences to Build Student Confidence: The unprecedented level of responsibility that school students of all ages have had to embrace, is worth both celebrating and harnessing. Discussing this early in the year with your students can instill confidence in their self-direction capabilities. Moreover, building on these new levels of confidence and autonomy is another way for teachers to show they genuinely care for their students, creating a safe and supportive learning environment where students are challenged to strive for success.

Planning for Inclusion And Reducing Anxiety: Clear communication and planning are ways to reduce anxiety around the transition process for everyone. All teachers are taking the time to think and plan for the integration of COVID-19 restrictions within previously established classroom routines. At an instructional level, planning for inclusion by designing teaching and learning activities to cater for the needs all students has never been more important than now. The need to differentiate classroom learning will be greater now than before. By showing empathy to our students (as in ‘we’re all in this together’) and acknowledging the difficulties faced during self-isolation, we can support them.

Share and Explore Home Learning Experiences: Making time to explore and learn about our students’ experiences, particularly home-learning experiences, will be an important part of this initial transition. Our students will need time and space to readjust to school-based learning. We all learn by thinking about, and reflecting on, things we have experienced and done in our lives. Simply talking with children about their understandings and what they know about COVID is important. This is not a ‘one-off’ chat, children learn with repeated chats over time.

A New School-Family Relationship: COVID-19 has created so many complexities, insecurities, and anxieties. We have all been trying to balance and deal with the impacts on our own work from home lives. Happily, this has created more parent understanding and empathy for the work of teachers, and vice versa. Greater parent understanding of content could facilitate establishment of more meaningful student learning goals and better support systems at home..