Today during a professional development session with a group of elementary teachers, we were problem solving around students that are “stuck”. One teacher was talking about an African-American male student who has really high mental math skills, but she is challenged to take him to the next level because he does not write down his thinking. Most of our assumptions about him were about it not being “cool” to do well in school, yet there are no negative peers around him that perpetuate this idea. I wonder if we were stuck on that idea because he’s African-American and our perception of African-American males is that they don’t think it’s cool to do well in school.
My thinking was further pushed after participating in a webinar titled, “Vodou, Santería, and Candomblé: Afro-European Religous Encounters in the Caribbean and Latin America” by Professor Gerald Murry, from the University of Florida. During his presentations about religions of Latin America that have been strongly influenced by the African Diaspora I began to wonder about my students’ religious beliefs and how they influence their behaviors. These three religions were new to me and I can’t expect to know everything about every religion and student’s culture. So it is just a good reminder how important it is to have time to conference with a student one-on-one and ask he/she questions. If I am able to ask questions I will learn about them and their thinking rather then make assumptions that are based on my biases. This is not new thinking for me, but today was another reminder of its importance.
Do you have an experience in which your conversation with a student gave you great insight to his/her culture?
