How to Adopt a Culturally Responsive Mindset

How to Adopt a Culturally Responsive Mindset

Stephen Katzel is the author behind Win Your First Year of Teaching Middle
School: Strategies and Tools for Success. He is an educator with a passion for
middle school education and helping new teachers:

For decades, differing opinions have existed on how to teach social studies,
with no national consistency, meaning that a child in Boston may receive an
entirely different perspective from another in Boise, Idaho. Social studies
has dominated the headlines educationally and politically due to parent’s
perceptions on the correct way to teach and implement the curriculum in the
classroom.

To drown out the political banter and farcical politicians, social studies
teachers must adopt a specific approach on culturally responsive teaching.
Which isn’t a lesson, a picture, or a reading, but a mindset. It doesn’t
matter if you are teaching world history, U.S. history, or any class related
to social studies, your mindset that each lesson will be culturally responsive
is crucial for engagement and achievement.

Adopting a mindset of cultural responsiveness will pay dividends for your
students and content. Each day, social studies teachers can post “Today in
History” on the board that lists historically significant events or
achievements about a person or group of people. Teachers can access dozens of
pre-made, culturally relevant lists online that resonate to different groups
of students. The “Today in History” ideally would be related to the content
you are covering in class, but if not, no problem! Highlighting
accomplishments from different cultures and groups of people will make
students feel supported, seen, and appreciated. In addition, teachers can use
the “Today in History” as a hook to begin their lesson on the historical
content covered in class that day.

Knowing the primary and secondary sources being used is critical for
increasing cultural responsiveness in social studies classes. Many social
studies curriculums completely exclude the perspectives of marginalized
historical figures and groups. Spending class time analyzing differing
perspectives and historical figures will increase cultural responsiveness and
add depth to any social studies lesson due to additional voices being added to
the historical content being covered in class. Next time you prepare a lesson
that involves primary sources, I challenge you to add an extra source that
highlights and amplifies the voice of a person or group not traditionally
included in the curriculum that you teach.

Teaching social studies comes with a great deal of responsibility and trust.
Making a concerted effort to include different sources and viewpoints in your
daily routines and lessons will not only enrich your classroom, but also the
lives of the students that you teach. Remember, being a culturally responsive
teacher is not a singular lesson, it is a mindset!

8 Practical Ideas for Teaching Social Studies in Culturally Responsive Ways

Don Vu is an award-winning elementary school principal and teacher with 24
years of experience. Vu is the author of Life, Literacy, and the Pursuit of
Happiness: Supporting Our Immigrant and Refugee Children Through the Power of
Reading, published by Scholastic:

When I was a kid growing up in the Central Valley of California, Asian
Americans were mentioned only once in my social studies classes. Even when we
learned about World War II and the Japanese internment camps, we never learned
about the individual stories of heroism and courage. We didn’t learn about the
young Japanese men who enlisted in the army to fight for a country that had
imprisoned their parents or about people like Fred Korematsu, who took his
case all the way up to the Supreme Court to ensure that Japanese Americans
would be given their constitutional rights under the law.

We have a lot of work to do to ensure that our history books reflect all
people and their contributions to this great nation. However, we are making
some progress. Here are some ideas on making social studies classes more
culturally responsive.

Learn about your students on a more personal level. It’s critical to explore
any cultural, social, or linguistic assets (as well as challenges) your
students possess. For example, some of your refugee students (or their
parents) may provide critical insight on the American Civil War if they’ve
already experienced a civil war in their home country. Can your Asian American
students talk about the personal impact of the rise of anti-Asian hate during
the global pandemic? Not only will you use important primary sources for
teaching history, you will add voice and depth to the content that will
enhance learning for all. Teaching a culturally responsive curriculum connects
students’ cultures, languages, and lived experiences to what they learn in
school.

You have to be a scholar before you can be a teacher. It’s important to know
the historical, cultural, and social contributions of all Americans. That
means to take time to learn about the footnotes in history that involve people
of color, immigrants, and refugees and bring them to the forefront. Learn
about the important events that shape American history, from every
perspective. Study the non-white trailblazers who pushed the envelope and made
significant contributions to America. The Zinn Education Project provides
great resources for educators who want to learn and teach more about our
multicultural history.

Finally, realize that a culturally responsive social studies curriculum is
important for all students and communities. If you don’t teach in a culturally
diverse community, your work in schools is now more important than ever. Your
students will see the nation and world from a more inclusive and multicultural
perspective. If we want a more united America and to develop global citizens
who will thrive in the world, this work must be a priority for all.

Kiera Beddes has been a secondary English/language arts and history teacher
for 10 years, and is now working as a digital teaching and learning specialist
in Utah. She is part of the network leader team for the Utah Teacher Fellows
and is passionate about social science, literature, and technology in
education:

Human beings are social creatures, and therefore it is important we understand
how society shapes our learning and worldview. Is it any wonder then why our
social studies classes need to accurately reflect the culture of everyone in
the class? We cannot learn something if we are not aware of it first.

Because so much of the educator workforce is white, female, and middle-class,
being culturally responsive may come into direct conflict with the teacher’s
personal worldview and, therefore, require intentional unlearning on the part
of the educator. Educators who hope to be culturally responsive need to do the
work of assessing their own culture and biases. We all have them. It is
essential that we identify them and work to overcome them. If we as educators
cannot or will not identify and overcome our biases, we run the risk of
alienating our students and putting up unnecessary barriers to their learning.

Craft lessons in response to the cultures of your students. History is the
story of the past, so every culture has a story to share. The trick for
educators is to do so in a way that is respectful of the culture and true to
the discipline. In doing so, it is important to avoid tokenism and
window-dressing, as students will regard it as insincere and inaccurate. As
teachers, we have to go deeper than the surface-level characteristics of
students’ culture. Instead of looking at a student’s cultural heritage as a
costume, take a more holistic approach by coordinating with local history
societies or museums or having the students make modern day connections to
historical themes by recording ethnographies from their cultures. Doing so
will help make the learning more concrete for students, but also allow them to
see how their culture fits into the overall historical narrative.

Draw attention to untold stories, particularly to people of color, LGBTQIA+,
and women. There is an African proverb that served as my mantra when I taught
history: “Until the lions have their historians, tales of hunting will always
glorify the hunter.” There are remarkable people throughout history from
minority groups, and these are great stories to highlight. However, there are
many more stories that were not recorded, so as teachers, we can teach our
students to ask questions of the traditional historical narrative. In
partnership with your students, acknowledge history is a collection of written
events; it is important to recognize who is doing the writing, and more
importantly, who is not. Culturally responsive educators can help students ask
questions about their cultural past and connect it to modern day events,
acknowledging where the historical record may be scarce and investigating why
it is that way.

Draw connections between current events and the larger historical context.
Something does not come from nothing. Race, economics, religion, and politics
all work to create the current cultural milieu. Students want to know why
learning matters. This is a great way to make that connection plain to
learners. Teachers can start by incorporating a “news minute activity” where
they look at an informational text about a current event and then trace the
events that led to it. Over time, students will start to recognize larger
patterns that govern history, as well as modern life.

At the end of the day, exactly how we utilize culturally responsive pedagogy
will be dependent on the cultural context of our students and school. All
educators can make the effort to be more culturally responsive in their
teaching. Only when students are aware of the impact of history on their
culture, can they then have an impact in turn.

Stephanie Smith Budhai, Ph.D., is co-author of the book Culturally Responsive
Teaching Online and In-Person: An Action Planner for Dynamic Equitable
Learning Environments. She is also a certified K-12 teacher and teaches pre
and in-service teachers culturally responsive and anti-racist teaching
practices:

Social studies is one of the easier subject areas to integrate culturally
responsive teaching. As social studies include myriad disciplines including
history, geography, civics, economics, and sociology, the opportunities for
culturally responsive instruction, activities, and assessment are endless.

When teaching history in a culturally responsive way, it is important to
provide students with an accurate historical representation of events that
have shaped the country and world. In doing this, the perspectives of all
groups involved should be shared. So often, textbooks provide one-sided
information, largely from a Eurocentric perspective, which ignores and/or
misrepresents the voices of minoritized groups. Or, when historical events are
told, they are romanticized in a way that do not teach students the true
reality and severity of them. Considering that classrooms are becoming more
and more diverse, it is critical that students learn history from the voices
of people they share lineage with along with others who they may not have a
connection with.

To make geography and sociology-based lessons culturally responsive, introduce
students to lands around the world. When teaching about the pyramids and ancient
cultures, connect students to cultures that they may be part of. Allow students
to see themselves in a positive lens and other students to see where their
classmates’ ancestral heritage originated, and the contributions that they have
made to the larger society. Given geographical constraints, leveraging free
online tools such as Google Earth and Google Arts and Culture may be helpful.

When teaching civics and economics, make students aware of not only the three
branches of the government and what it means to be a good citizen, but include
what it means to be an ethical and respectful citizen who considers the unique
needs of diverse individuals. Spend time teaching students about how laws and
policies may may disproportionately impact certain demographic groups; some of
who their classmates and other teachers may be a part of. Above all else, when
making social studies culturally responsive, it is important not avoid
discussing difficult historical periods such as slavery and the Holocaust.
Yes, age appropriateness will be required regarding the level of detail that
is provided but, at all grade levels, being forthright about the nation and
world’s history is absolutely necessary in providing students true, robust,
and authentic social studies classes that are culturally responsive.