Teaching and Celebrating Culture

This semester I have been teaching Social Studies to my 3rd grade students. We have been exploring different cultures in North America, making connection to our real lives, seeing how environment affect culture, and going deep into the meaning of culture. I have been using Discovery Plus in teaching this unit and exposing my students to what culture is, among many other materials. This relates to using a wide variety of material. Classrooms That Works state that a wide variety of materials being used is essential in an effective classroom and is essential to an engaging classroom. Doing this keeps the classroom fresh for students and learning does not go stagnant. I incorporated technology into my teaching to benefit my learners. I also brought in primary source while teaching culture, like photographs, news videos, and interview while teaching culture. Discovery Plus has some great 1st hand account of culture, but I also used new videos and photographs to explain and detail what culture really is. Classrooms That Works states that technology can help close the achievement gap and offer new experiences for students that they otherwise would not normally have.

When teaching culture we talked about the definition of culture and how it encompasses many things, as it is a way of life shared by a group of people. My students are I created a Celebrating Culture poster where we listed traditions and cuisines from our own lives .In Managing Diverse Classroom, the authors write to not ignore the culture of students, but to embrace. During my teaching, as in the poster, I invited my students to talk about their culture and way of life. After doing this, I related it back to our unit! This made the unit real and meaningful as my students were making connections to their life. This relates to culturally responsive teaching. Culturally responsive teaching, also known as CRT, is something I am passionate about and want to include in my teaching practice. CRT is being aware of the students’ background and building off of it! CRT embraces the culture of students and does not ignore culture.

Moving on, I assessed my students and differentiated their assessment, as I have some students who cannot write. Doing a differentiated assessment let me see if my learners were still understanding the content. Assessment and Student Success in a Differentiated Classroom states that differentiated assessment should focus all students on the same learning goals and students should be assessed in ways that allow them ample opportunity to demonstrate their understanding. Below in an example of student work that was differentiated. This student was able to craft a picture that shows the culture of the United States and demonstrates his knowledge of culture. This assessment showed me my students proficiency with culture in the United States.

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