Julie Lake, Georgetown University Law Center, Washington, DC, USA

If you look around your classroom, you are likely to see many different kinds of students. How do you perceive the diversity of your classroom? Who are your students? How are their cultures (i.e., backgrounds and experiences) similar to or different from your own? Some of these cultural similarities and differences are unmistakable while others are easily overlooked. Yet, culture undergirds every aspect of education for teachers and students alike. Teachers’ cultural beliefs influence how they approach the classroom, including their choice of content, pedagogical approach, and learning objectives. These beliefs also shape how students perceive and absorb information. When the cultural beliefs between a teacher and a student are compatible, students often find it easy to understand and apply learning objectives. However, when they are incompatible, this process is much harder. Unfortunately, this incompatibility can impede students’ ability to equitably access educational opportunities.

To make English language classrooms more equitable, teachers can incorporate a culturally responsive teaching (CRT) approach. Using this approach, teachers strive to understand and value their students’ backgrounds and experiences to create a learning environment that is inclusive, respectful, and responsive to each student’s needs (Gay, 2018; Hammond, 2014). This article shows how CRT can enhance equity and learning in the classroom, discusses recommendations to implement this approach in different learning contexts, and explores common pitfalls and strategies to address them.

How Can Culturally Responsive Teaching Enhance Equity and Learning?

Culturally responsive teaching (Gay, 2018; Hammond, 2014) is a pedagogical approach that advocates for teachers to better understand their students’ cultural backgrounds and experiences. This approach is based on the understanding that students come to the classroom with diverse perspectives that are informed by their various cultures. For our purposes, culture can include broader frames, like nationality, and narrower ones, such as macro affiliations (e.g., socioeconomic class) and micro affiliations (e.g., peer group associations or interest groups).

Scholars have defined CRT in a variety of ways. Gay (2018) defines it as “the behavioral expressions of knowledge, beliefs, and values that recognize the importance of racial and cultural diversity in learning” (pp. 36-37). Hammond (2014), highlighting the importance of scaffolding cultural information and creating positive relationships in the classroom, elaborates that it is

an educator’s ability to recognize students’ cultural displays of learning and meaning making and respond positively and constructively with teaching moves that use cultural knowledge as a scaffold to connect what the student knows to new concepts and content in order to promote effective information processing. All the while, the educator understands the importance of being in a relationship and having a social-emotional connection to the student in order to create a safe space for learning. (p. 15)

Regardless of the definition, an instructor is tasked with (1) acknowledging her own cultural background and the cultural backgrounds of her students, (2) reflecting on the differences, and (3) based on this new understanding, adapting her subsequent teaching techniques.

In addition to creating a more equitable classroom in which students feel included, this approach also boasts learning gains. As illustrated above, after teachers learn about their students’ approach to the world, they can build on their students’ prior experiences, knowledge, and skills related to the classroom learning objectives. Not only do proponents claim that this practice removes barriers to student learning, but they also maintain that students feel more connected with their instructor and learning environment, which leads to increased learning (Tyagi & Verma, 2022).

How Can You Implement Culturally Responsive Teaching?

While many guidelines advocated by a CRT approach fall under the umbrella of “good teaching” (such as addressing different learning styles with varied instructional strategies), other guidelines are more directly related to strategies for increasing cultural awareness in the classroom. These CRT-based approaches have led to increases in learning (e.g. Tyagi & Verma, 2022) and influenced teacher beliefs (Nganga, 2015). Using these guidelines, teachers can explore (1) their classroom community, (2) their pedagogical materials, and (3) their own cultures:

1. Build positive relationships with your classroom community, including students and, when relevant, parents, by showing understanding and respect for cultural backgrounds and experiences. Recommendations include learning how to pronounce students’ names, asking questions about experiences and expectations, and checking in to build trust and open lines of communication.
2. Create opportunities for students to share their cultural experiences and perspectives by creating pedagogical materials (i.e., activities, materials, and resources) that highlight different classroom cultures. Recommendations for younger learners include inviting students to bring in pictures of their families and/or indicate on a map where their family is from. A recommendation for adult learners is to write a “story of self” with the option to share it with the class. These activities, materials, and resources will vary depending on the teaching context, but they should fulfill five criteria: (1) incorporating various cultural backgrounds, (2) creating a supportive learning environment, (3) encouraging students to actively participate,
   (4) connecting to the students’ experiences outside the classroom,
   and (5) providing all students access to learning opportunities.
3. Understand your own culture and how you bring it into the classroom, including (but not limited to) implicit biases. A reflection tool, like Hammond’s (2014) Levels of Culture, can help teachers better understand what culture(s) they bring into the classroom. Hammond (2014) differentiates between three levels of culture: surface, shallow, and deep. Though quite observable, the surface level of culture (e.g., food, songs, and art) has a small impact on the level of trust built between a student and a teacher. Less observable, the shallow level of culture (e.g., approaches to raising children and concepts of time and personal space) has a larger impact on the level of trust built between a student and a teacher. Even less observable, the deep level of culture (e.g., notions of fairness, spirituality, and self) contains collective beliefs and ideas. Unsurprisingly, the deep level has the greatest impact on the level of trust built between a student and a teacher. Noticing and reflecting on the three levels of culture can help educators focus their attention beyond the surface level, question long-held assumptions, and identify “truths” that may be culturally bound.

For additional resources on CRT see https://www.colorincolorado.org/culturally-responsive-resources.

How Can You Avoid Common Pitfalls?

Despite the benefits of CRT, educators should avoid some common pitfalls (“New tool: How to avoid known pitfalls,” 2018). One pitfall is that CRT is often not clearly defined, and, therefore, teachers are unsure how to implement this approach in the classroom. To address this pitfall, educators should research and clearly decide how CRT can work within their context.

The next three pitfalls are interconnected. The main theme among them is that educators often take too wide a lens when dealing with culture in the classroom, which is detrimental to the classroom community. First, instructors equate students with their broader cultural affiliation (i.e., nationality) instead of recognizing that students approach their culture(s) as individuals. This leads to the next pitfall – the possibility of tokenism. If the purpose of CRT is to create space for students to show their complete selves, then making students cultural ambassadors can be quite harmful. A final pitfall is cultural appropriation of student cultures. When aspects of a student’s culture are used out of context, students can feel unseen and disrespected.

The pitfalls that lead to tokenism and/or appropriation of student culture are complex and deeply embedded. However, educators can start to address the underlying causes with these recommendations.

1. Recognize that your students have a wide range of reactions, and two students from the same culture may have different views on a topic. This recognition allows for honest classroom conversations about what each student is (or is not) comfortable with when incorporating different cultures into the classroom. Students can also see that they hold diverse and nuanced views.
2. Observe and acknowledge (when relevant) how your educational system or institution operates from a monolingual and monocultural lens. Multilingual students are often relieved to hear their experiences of being marginalized or overlooked validated by their teachers.
3. Study the systemic nature of racism and language oppression in education, including more or less overtly recognized forms. Learning about these varied forms is useful for program design and implementation.

Building on these general competencies, teachers can then develop their own more specific racial and cultural competencies (for more information, see Teel & Obidah, 2008). While these practices take time and effort, they can address inequity in the classroom in a powerful way.

Conclusion

Incorporating CRT can lead to more equitable classrooms for all students. When thoughtfully implemented, CRT has the potential to be “validating and affirming” (Gay, 2018, p. 37) because it explicitly acknowledges that teachers should learn about students’ different cultural backgrounds, connects home and school experiences, addresses different learning styles with varied instructional strategies, teaches students to understand and appreciate their own and others’ cultural backgrounds, and integrates multicultural pedagogical materials into the classroom.

References

Gay, G. (2018). Culturally responsive teaching: Theory, research, and practice. Teachers College Press.

Hammond, Z. (2014). Culturally responsive teaching and the brain: Promoting authentic engagement and rigor among culturally and linguistically diverse students. Corwin Press.

Nganga, L. (2015). Culturally responsive and anti-biased teaching benefits early childhood pre-service teachers. Journal of Curriculum and Teaching, 4(2), 1-16.

New tool: How to avoid known pitfalls associated with culturally responsive instruction (2018, February 26). https://stemteachingtools.org/news/2018/new-tool

Teel, K. M., & Obidah, J. E. (Eds.). (2008). Building racial and cultural competence in the classroom: Strategies from urban educators. Teachers College Press.

Tyagi, N., & Verma, S. (2022). Culturally responsive teaching: A suggestive pedagogical framework. In J. Keengwe (Ed.), Handbook of research on social justice and equity in education (pp. 312-331). IGI Global.