Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 1

Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way

Hannah E. Gunter

University of Georgia
 Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 2

Language and literacy education. Whats that? I have been asked this question

more than 50 times during this endeavor through the Ed.S program for Language and

Literacy Education. Before this program, my answer included the following: Well,

language and literacy is teaching students how to read and write. I teach math and

science, so Ill support what the reading teacher teaches students to do when reading for

comprehension. And that I did. I knew the strategies the reading teacher taught students

and I would remind them of those strategies when reading articles and passages for

science. Gee (2015) says something that was really the turning point for me and everything

clicked and guided me through this language and literacy journey: literacy surely means

nothing unless it has something to do with the ability to read. Read is a transitive verb. So

literacy must have something to do with being able to read something Different types of

texts call for different types of background knowledge and require different skills to be

read meaningfully, (p. 47). Little did I know when I entered this program that I would

learn more about language and literacy education than I could possibly ever imagine.

Throughout this program, there was a common theme throughout every class. This

idea was that we must teach kids how to read in a culturally responsive way. In LLED7930e

and LLED7318, a main theme throughout the readings and assignments were ways to

incorporate culture into lessons and how to make this so intertwined that students or an

outside observer would not say, They were teaching a lesson on how to be tolerant of

other cultures. Before taking these classes, I think I tried to teach students about tolerance.

I felt I was doing a good job as a white, middle class woman of teaching students to be kind

to all people and to accept all people, no matter the color of their skin, their clothing,

religious celebrations, or food preferences. My entire theory about culture in the classroom
 Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 3

has transitioned to a much more inclusive theory where I do not simple teach students to

be tolerant of people different than them.

The first artifact from LLED7930e is a book spine poem. This book spine poem was

initially really difficult for me to compile. I was unsure of how I would even start. This

course was the first course in the Language and Literacy Department I had taken for my

degree, so I was in the beginning stages of really understanding culture in the classroom

and how to incorporate that into the literature I brought in to my classroom.

I found these books in my minister's office and once I looked at a few titles, I found

the assignment rather easy. I had to tweak my thinking and not be afraid to take chances. I

think this book spine poem shows how our nation must shift their thinking and become

more of a unified nation, not just in education. Because this was one of the first

assignments for the course, I think it is a good starting point to show how my philosophical

beliefs molded throughout this course, and ultimately, my degree.

The second artifact from this same course is the website I used as somewhat of a

journal throughout the course. I think this website really shows how my thinking and

philosophy of teaching shifted. I went from not talking about current events and hot topics

in the news to planning lessons centered on those discussions. The classroom is the perfect

place to start having those conversations. Students should feel safe in my classroom to ask

hard questions and talk about their wonderings. The readings and assignments in

LLED7930e helped lay the foundation for a culturally responsive teaching philosophy.

In LLED7318, Culturally Diverse Childrens Literature, I constantly thought about

all of the students I teach. The school I currently teach at is very diverse. We have students

from Ethiopia, Iran, India, Vietnam, Mexico, and Guatemala just to name a few. With this in
 Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 4

mind, I was always thinking of how I could become a more culturally responsive teacher for

them. Cai (2002) says, a multitude of cultures exist in the world, (p. 7). There are cultures

within cultures. So how do we ensure our teaching includes passages and activities that are

culturally responsive to everyone? Cai (2002) reminds us to affirm diversity is to

ultimately achieve equity. Diversity without equity is not the goal of multiculturalism, (p.

14). This chapter from Cai immediately charged me with setting goals of not only teaching

students to be tolerant of people from other places, but to accept them and celebrate their

differences and to move towards complete equality in our classroom.

The artifact for LLED7318 is a presentation I presented in class that shares the

results of an inquiry I did with three students, all born in Mexico. This inquiry was done to

find out if students from another country wanted more books with characters that looked

like them, talked like them, dressed like them, and had similar traditions. Because our

school is 47% Hispanic, I felt that I wanted to know more about students who identified as

Hispanic and how they felt about books with characters from Mexico. When I finished

meeting with these students for this inquiry, they were so excited to know there were

books with characters that were similar to them, culturally. They also discovered books

that had the story written in English and on the opposite page, the story was written in

Spanish. They enjoyed these books most because it meant their mom could read them and

learn English at the same time. After this inquiry and this class, my entire theory on

quality culturally responsive books changed. I now do more research into a book before I

recommend it to students. When the book fair comes to school, I make sure to recommend

books by Pam Muoz Ryan and Rita Williams-Garcia because I know these authors have

written their books to include much more than types of food and celebrations by a culture.
 Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 5

They intertwine the culture into the entire story. I want my students to read books that

might have characters different than them. I want for my students who are Hispanic of

African American, to finally feel validated when reading a book.

Learning to be a culturally responsive teacher continued in LLED7910e, New

Literacies. Throughout this course, we read a lot about Discourses and the different

discourses people create through their life. This is where my second realization occurred

and changed my theory of teaching. Before this program, literacy was just being able to

read and write. However, through this course, I really learned how important it is to

educate students to be literate in everything they do. So while we are teaching students

content, we must also teach them how to interact with each other, adults, technology, and

tough situations. The artifact for this course, a paper titled, New Literacies within the

Elementary Math and Science Classroom, shows how I truly have encompassed the idea

that language and literacy applies to everything we do in a classroom. This paper also

helped me really think about what it meant to read and write and be literate in math and

science. It is not just using the strategies the reading teacher uses. It is expanding on those

and adding more strategies that apply specifically to math and science. This research

inquiry also helped guide me to think about the Discourses students come to school with.

These Discourses affect the way they think about things, as well as the depth of their

background knowledge with math and science. Gee (2015) says, Discourses are ways of

behaving, interacting, valuing, thinking, believing, speaking, and often, reading and writing

that are accepted as instantiations of particular identities, (p. 4). Gee changed my thought

process by challenging me to think about the students ways of behaving, interacting,

valuing, thinking, believing, speaking, reading, and writing, before planning lessons. This
 Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 6

paper shows the ways I changed my thought process to plan lessons to meet students

where they are culturally, with background knowledge, and academically through blogging,

social media use, and stop-motion video creation.

LLED6060e, Content Area Literacies, naturally followed after the class on New

Literacies. I was very interested and excited to take this course because I teach math and

science. I felt this course would help expand my knowledge, just like Gees book, Social

Linguistics and Literacies: Ideology in Discourses, did. Like mentioned before, I transitioned

my thinking for literacy being a form of reading anything. With the articles and assignments

in Content Area Literacies, I felt that I was on the right track. I gained many strategies for

reading math and science texts. Gillis et al. (2017) says, Disciplinary literacies help

students sense experience and connect with the ordered community that makes up the

discipline, (p. 283). This is powerful for fourth grade students to be able to do. But I have

changed the way I teach math and science to allow students the opportunity to do this.

Now, they can read something and if they wanted, they could tweet, blog, or vlog (video

blog) about it to connect with that community. We do project based learning at our school

and I now have more confidence that I can truly guide students through reading about an

issue and connecting with people globally to discuss the issue.

The artifacts from LLED6060e are two lessons I conducted with students to

reinforce the content vocabulary we were learning. I feel this video is a glimpse into putting

theory into practice. These are now activities I do with my students throughout the units to

reinforce that content vocabulary.

We all know that kids today are not only reading academic texts. They are reading

things online, watching videos where they read the messages in the video, and reading
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many types of social media. In LLED8330e, Popular Culture and Literacies, I gained more

knowledge on how to reach students where they are. If we make learning interesting and

incorporate outlets students already know how to use, they will be more inclined to read

the information and produce something that shows their learning. In this artifact, I share a

unit plan I produced to go along with a project based learning project my fourth grade team

will conduct this year. The various uses of pop culture in this unit are things students are

already familiar with. They have learned how to read the information in these various

forms and are comfortable with comprehending information when it is presented in these

forms. The thought process behind creating this unit plan is that students will be more

interested in creating and sharing the information they learn because it is comfortable for

them. Alvermann (2012) validates that point by writing, popular culture texts (whether

print-based or digital) that are easily integrated into existing curricula have a better chance

of being considered educational worthy than practices that lack this potential (Xu, 2004).

By incorporating these types of media seamlessly into lessons, students are more likely to

find learning fun.

As a final research inquiry for this program, I chose to incorporate literacy into my

fourth grade math class and collect data through an entire semester to determine whether

or not literacy strategies in math help students to raise their math grades and test scores. I

feel that this artifact shows my growth professionally, as I incorporated various literacy

strategies each month after I learned the importance of content specific literacy strategies.

This paper shares the results of the semester long inquiry and also shares insight from me

going through the process.

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Being at the University of Georgia in the Language and Literacy Education program

has changed my teaching philosophy forever. I am now more in tune to creating culturally

responsive lessons. I am more knowledgeable about culturally responsive childrens

literature and am comfortable suggesting it to students. I now consciously plan lessons in

math and science with a content specific reading strategy embedded into the plan. My

future career goal is to become a literacy coach or instructional coach. I know my passion

for incorporating content specific literacy into content areas will help me plan with

teachers and model lessons. I know my passion for culturally responsive childrens

literature will help teachers in the future create lessons so that every child sees itself

within the literature. I know my passion for language and literacy education will help me

continue to change the lives of students for the better and create a culturally responsive

classroom where every student walks out a more in tune reader of the world around them.
 Teaching to Read in a Culturally Responsive Way 9

References

Alvermann, D. E. (2012). Is there a place for popular culture in curriculum and classroom

instruction? [The point position]. In A. J. Eakle (Ed.), Curriculum and Instruction

(Volume 2, pp. 214-220, 227228). [Note: Volume 2 is part of the series, Debating

issues in American education (C. J. Russo & A. G. Osborne, Jr., General Eds.).] Thousand

Oaks, CA: Sage.

Cai, M. (2002). Defining Multicultural Literature. Multicultural Literature for Children and

Young Adults (pp. 3-18). Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

Gee, J. (2015). Social Linguistics and Literacies: Ideology in Discourses. New York: NY:

Routledge.

Gillis, V., Boggs, G., & Alvermann, D. (2017). Content Area Reading and Literacy:

Succeeding in Today's Diverse Classrooms. United States of America: Pearson

Education, Inc.