Blog Post 4

4)         The culturally competent teacher is aware of the diverse cultural groups represented in his/her classroom, investigates the sociocultural factors that influence student learning, and is able to integrate this knowledge into his/her teaching. No one enters a classroom without a personal history; thus, no one enters a classroom completely free of bias. How might your personal history/sociocultural characteristics intersect with those of your students? What challenges or advantages might you have as a teacher in this classroom? What misconceptions about various cultural groups have you confronted during this experience? Give examples.

There is no doubt that voluteering in Providence that we were bound to come across many different cultures.  I think it is imporant when teaching certain subjects to relate things in the subject to things they are familiar with.  Language is huge factor in this area as well.  In my 6th grade science class, the teacher had a lesson on space, and many of the words sceintists named for things in space came from latin, and looked very close to spanish words.  When the teacher related the words to the spanish similarites, it made that area of the lesson easier for them to learn.  Also, when creating worksheets or making out tests the teacher would often use foods that they were familiar with and names they recognized.  Relating to kids on an "outside" the classroom level, such as their culture, will help them to not only learn better, but to let them know that you are getting to know them as people and not just students who are there to listen to you talk.