Classroom Diversity:An Introduction to Student Differences

1. Student diversity in U.S. schools exists in many forms. List four ways in which students are diverse in today’s classrooms.
2. Imagine you are an eighth-grade social studies teacher whose students are learning about the voting process in the United States. What are four ways you could make sure your lesson is culturally responsive?
3. Zahara, a sixth-grade student who recently moved to the United States from Kazakhstan, seems able to express her needs and desires socially with her new peers and teachers. However, she struggles to understand the content presented in class and in the text. 
   1. Explain why Zahara might be more successful in social situations than in academic ones.
   1. Describe at least three effective supports and strategies Zahara’s teacher might use to strengthen her learning outcomes.
4. You have just learned that you will have three students with disabilities in your classroom. List three ways you could better meet their needs.
5. Arlene is a ninth-grade student from a low-SES household. Though capable academically, she is not performing on grade level, does not complete or turn in her homework, and has difficulty staying engaged during her classes.
   1. Identify at least three challenges related to low SES that might explain why Arlene is having difficulty in school.
   1. After speaking to Arlene and confirming your suspicions, explain four ways you could help her to succeed in the classroom.

Cultural and Linguistic Differences:What Teachers Should Know

1. Why is it important for teachers to reflect on cultural and linguistic diversity?

Why is it Important for Teachers to Reflect on Cultural and Linguistic Diversity?

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Culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms present unique challenges for teachers. While working with students from different backgrounds may seem like an insurmountable challenge, teachers can use this as an opportunity for growth. Reflecting on your own cultural and linguistic competencies will help you become more effective in the classroom. Working with culturally and linguistically diverse students is an ongoing process that requires new strategies to meet their needs. Teachers must be able to assess their knowledge of related cultures and languages, as well as cultivate that knowledge through reading, observation, and other activities. Culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms require specific strategies to help all students succeed. By reflecting on your personal experiences with cultural and linguistic diversity, you can improve your teaching practices while also becoming a better learner.

Why is it Important for Teachers to Reflect on Cultural and Linguistic Diversity?

As culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms become the norm, teachers must be prepared to meet the needs of all students. This is where reflection comes into play. Asking yourself what you know about certain cultures and languages will help you determine where you need to improve. This can also help you identify strategies that you can use to support all students in the classroom. Reflection is both a personal and shared activity that helps teachers gain a better understanding of the classroom context. When reflecting on cultural and linguistic diversity, teachers can examine their personal experiences with difference and use these reflections to create inclusive learning environments. When you reflect on your cultural and linguistic competencies, you will be able to identify gaps in your knowledge. You can then take steps to close these gaps. For example, if you were to notice that you know very little about your students’ home languages, you could create opportunities for language learning. These activities can help you gain a better understanding of cultural and linguistic difference.

How Can Teachers Reframe Cultural and Linguistic Diversity?

There are many ways that teachers can reframe cultural and linguistic diversity in the classroom. One way is to encourage students to share their unique backgrounds and cultures with one another. When students share their own cultural experiences, they will feel comfortable expressing themselves in the classroom. This can be done during a get-to-know-you activity, or you can create an ongoing project where students share their cultural backgrounds with the class. You can also ask students to reframe cultural and linguistic diversity through the lens of equity and social justice. When students understand cultural and linguistic diversity through this lens, they will be able to view it as something beneficial to society rather than a hindrance.

Strategies for Teachers Working with Diverse Students and Communities

– Assessing Your Cultural and Linguistic Competencies – One of the best ways that teachers can reflect on their knowledge of cultural and linguistic diversity is to conduct a self-assessment of related competencies. This can be done through guided reflection or through keeping a journal where you record your thoughts. You can also use questionnaires and other assessment tools to reflect on your cultural and linguistic knowledge. – Seeking Out Cultural and Linguistic Information – Another good way to reflect on cultural and linguistic diversity is to learn more about related communities and cultures. You can conduct research online, visit museums, or read articles and books. – Creating Inclusive Learning Environments – Once you have gained a better understanding of cultural and linguistic diversity, you can begin to create inclusive learning environments in the classroom. This can be done by giving students opportunities to share their cultural backgrounds with one another. It can also be done by ensuring that all students feel safe expressing themselves in the classroom. – Working With Students From Different Communities – If you are working with students from communities that you do not come from, you should use the knowledge you have gained from your own cultural and linguistic background. You can then use these skills to support students from different communities. – Working With Language-Based Differences in Diverse Groups – If you are working with groups that have language-based differences, you can use the knowledge you have gained from your own cultural and linguistic background to facilitate communication. For example, if you are working with students who speak Spanish and English, you can use your knowledge of both languages to help them communicate better. – Working With Discrepant Views of Diversity – If you are working with students who view cultural and linguistic diversity differently, you can use the knowledge you have gained from your own cultural and linguistic background to facilitate communication. For example, if you are working with students who view cultural and linguistic diversity as a negative thing, you can use your knowledge to help them understand the positive aspects of diversity. – Working With Students from Diverse Communities – If you are working with students from diverse communities, you can use the knowledge you have gained from your own cultural and linguistic background to help build bridges between students. You can also use this knowledge to help support students who may not feel comfortable sharing their own cultural experiences.

Strategies for Working With Students From Diverse Communities

– Assessing Your Cultural and Linguistic Competencies – One of the best ways that teachers can reflect on their knowledge of cultural and linguistic diversity is to conduct a self-assessment of related competencies. This can be done through guided reflection or through keeping a journal where you record your thoughts. You can also use questionnaires and other assessment tools to reflect on your cultural and linguistic knowledge. – Creating Safe and Supportive Classroom Spaces – Once you have gained a better understanding of cultural and linguistic diversity, you can begin to create safe and supportive classroom spaces. This can be done by creating classroom rules that respect diversity. It can also be done by creating opportunities for students to share their cultural experiences with one another. – Creating Inclusive Learning Environments – When working with students from diverse communities, you must use the knowledge you have gained from your own cultural and linguistic background. You can then use these skills to help create safe and supportive spaces for diverse students. – Working With Students From the Same Communities – If you are working with students from the same communities, you can use the knowledge you have gained from your own cultural and linguistic background to help build bridges between your students. You can also use this knowledge to help build bridges between students from different communities.

Conclusion

As culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms become the norm, teachers must be prepared to meet the needs of all students. This is where reflection comes into play. Asking yourself what you know about certain cultures and languages will help you determine where you need to improve. This can also help you identify strategies that you can use to support all students in the classroom. Reflection is both a personal and shared activity that helps teachers gain a better understanding of the classroom context. When reflecting on cultural and linguistic diversity, teachers can examine their personal experiences with difference and use these reflections to create inclusive learning environments. When you reflect on your cultural and linguistic competencies, you will be able to identify gaps in your knowledge. You can then take steps to close these gaps. For example, if you were to notice that you know very little about your students’ home languages, you could create opportunities for language learning. These activities can help you gain a better understanding of cultural and linguistic difference.

1. Explain the difference between BICS and CALP. Why is it necessary for teachers to understand the distinction between these two types of language proficiency?
2. In the Challenge, Mr. Bennett wrote notes home to Maria’s family. Why might this have proved problematic? What other options might you recommend to Mr. Bennett for communicating with Maria’s parents?
3. Mr. Stone, a teacher from a rural community where all the students share similar cultural backgrounds, relocates to a large city where the students come from a wide variety of cultural groups. He notices that many of his students are not performing well in class. Upon self-reflection, he realizes that because of cultural differences these students may not relate to his style of teaching or to the stories and examples he uses in class. What can Mr. Stone do to become more culturally responsive and meet the diverse needs of these students?

Serving Students with Visual Impairments:The Importance of Collaboration

1. Name at least three sources from which Ms. Milton can gather information about students with visual impairments. For each source, describe the type of information you will obtain.
2. Imagine that you are a general education science teacher, and one of your students, Richard, has low vision. Next week, you will teach a chapter on the solar system. Using the Five-Step Process, describe how you will collaborate with others to teach this material in a way that meets Richard’s instructional needs.

• Describe the roles of the TVI and O&M specialist. How are their roles similar? How are they different?
• Name four elements that the general education teacher should consider when engaging in collaboration.
• Imagine that you are a general education math teacher. One of your students, Rosa, has a visual disability. Although she has mastered all the math concepts presented this year, she is having difficulty learning fractions. You believe that Rosa has the ability to master the concept but that you need to present it in a different manner. What would you do to help Rosa? Whose assistance would you seek?

Assistive Technology:An Overview

1. Name at least three items that could be considered AT and describe how those devices could support a student with a disability in the classroom.
2. Explain two reasons why it is necessary to consider AT for students with disabilities.
3. Why is it important to consider both AT devices and services?
4. Describe three responsibilities of the Implementation Team.
5. List three outcomes the Implementation Team can determine by evaluating a student’s assistive technology.
6. Imagine you are a seventh-grade general education language arts teacher and a student in your class has an upcoming IEP meeting. What types of information should you gather ahead of time to contribute to the discussion of the student’s AT needs? Name at least four.
7. During the meeting suggested in the example above, the IEP team recommends AT for the student. As a general education teacher, describe your role in the AT implementation and evaluation processes.

Bookshare:Providing Accessible Materials for Students with Print Disabilities

1. What is a print disability? List the three types of print disabilities described in this module and discuss how each might affect a student in the classroom.
2. List three ways in which electronic text can be manipulated to help students access core curriculum materials.
3. Imagine that you are Walker High School’s Primary Contact for Bookshare. As such, what are your responsibilities? List and explain at least three.
4. As the Primary Contact for Walker High School, you have just been approached by Mrs. Scott, a tenth-grade English teacher. She states that two of her students with print disabilities have made great progress in her class, a fact she attributes to their use of Bookshare’s digital materials. She thinks all of her students would benefit from Bookshare services and inquires about signing them up. As the Primary Contact, what would you tell her about qualifying for Bookshare services?
5. Madeline, a new eleventh-grade student at Walker High School, has a severe learning disability and has just qualified for Bookshare’s services. Madeline is currently reading at a sixth-grade level, which impairs her ability to access information from her textbooks.
   1. What types of digital text features and supporting equipment would you expect Madeline to use?
   1. As her teacher, what actions could you take prior to instruction to prepare for the effective use of Bookshare in the classroom?
   1. What additional actions can you take during instruction to maximize Madeline’s success?

Universal Design for Learning:Creating a Learning Environment that Challenges and Engages All Students

1. Briefly describe Universal Design for Learning. Make sure to include the three principles of UDL.
2. When they develop goals using the principles of UDL, what is the main thing that teachers need to keep in mind?
3. Next week, Mr. Schlotzsky, an eighth-grade social studies teacher, will begin a chapter on colonial America. He’ll lecture, write notes on the chalkboard, and give his students handouts. To assess their knowledge, Mr. Schlotzsky will ask his students to research colonial America in greater depth on the Internet and to give a three-to-five-minute oral presentation.

Help Mr. Schlotzsky to evaluate the traditional materials and media he plans to use. For each a) list any potential barriers, and b) suggest UDL solutions.

• Imagine that you are a second-grade teacher beginning a unit on plants. Your goal is to teach the students the parts of a plant, making sure to incorporate the three principles of UDL. Using the table below, describe at least two ways you would present the information, assess your students, and maintain their engagement in the subject.

• Turn a traditional lesson plan into a UDL lesson plan. Choose either of the options below.

Option 1: If you have previously or are currently teaching, select a lesson plan that you have used. In the table below, record information from the lesson plan in the column labeled “Traditional Lesson Plan.” Next, revise the lesson plan to incorporate UDL principles and record that information in the column titled “UDL Lesson Plan.”

Option 2: Using the table below, help Ms. Hamilton convert the 50-minute traditional lesson about DNA into a lesson that incorporates UDL principles.

At the beginning of the year, Ms. Hamilton, a tenth-grade biology teacher, collected information about her students’ learning preferences and learning needs. Of her 29 students, 12 prefer to learn visually, 10 prefer to learn through auditory means, and 7 prefer to learn kinesthetically. Additionally, two students struggle with reading and several have difficulty planning and organizing writing assignments.

( part 1 )Imagine that you are a kindergarten teacher. One of your students has behavior issues. A colleague has recommended The Incredible Years program, and another has recommended First Step to Success.

1. Using more than one source, complete the EBP Comparison Worksheet.
   1. Based on the information on your worksheet, choose the program you wish to use. Justify your response.
2. Why is it important to monitor fidelity of implementation?
3. Explain why it is important to review both fidelity of implementation data and progress monitoring data to determine the effectiveness of an EBP for a students.
4. View the progress monitoring data graphs below.
   1. Discuss the performance of the student in Graph A.
   1. Discuss the performance of the student in Graph B.
   1. Describe the instructional decisions that can be made based on the data.

• Discuss two ways to collect observational data on fidelity of implementation. Explain why one method is better than the other.
• The movie below shows a teacher implementing the POW writing strategy.
  • Print the POW Observation Checklist.
  • While watching the movie, use the checklist to record your observational data.
  • Calculate the teacher’s fidelity of implementation.

Evidence-Based Practices (Part 3): Evaluating Learner Outcomes and Fidelity

RTI PART 2

For the next two questions, imagine that you are Ms. Hayes, a first-grade teacher at Rosa Parks who is also piloting the RTI approach.

• You are concerned about how you will complete the universal screening measure with all of your students and about how you will incorporate progress monitoring into your weekly lesson plan. To prepare for this task, complete the table below.

Note: Some of the items (marked by *) have been selected by the S-Team and cannot be changed. For these items, use the information that was provided in the module. Complete the remaining items with information that will best work with your schedule.

• In September, you administer the beginning-of-year universal screening using a Dolch sight word list. Below is a list of the students’ scores. (Remember that Rosa Parks identifies the students scoring in the bottom 25 percent as struggling readers.)
  • What steps would you take to determine which students are in the bottom 25 percent of the class?
  • List the names of the struggling students and describe what will happen to them during Tier 1 instruction.
  • Imagine that the criterion for identifying struggling readers is a score below 15. How would this new criterion affect the number of students being identified as struggling readers?

• Below are the graphs for three students. View each graph and make a tier decision for each student. The benchmark and slope criteria are those used for the WIF (i.e., slope ≥ 1.8; fall benchmark = 15; winter benchmark = 25; spring benchmark = 30). Remember to use the slope calculator located on Perspectives and Resources Page 5.

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ACCOMMON

• Based upon what you have learned in this module, discuss how the accommodations you might implement for students with visual impairments could benefit the entire class.
• Examine the two classroom arrangements below. Identify three areas of concern for students with visual impairments in the poorly arranged classroom and discuss how they have been addressed in the improved classroom arrangement.

(RIT PART 3)The Consumer’s Guide to Evaluating a Core Reading Program is a tool available to evaluate core reading programs. Teachers can utilize this tool to help determine the strengths and weaknesses of their school’s core reading program. Select a core reading program and use the Consumer’s Guide to Evaluating a Core Reading Program to evaluate it. Follow the steps below:

5. Click here to view instructions from Consumer’s Guide to Evaluating a Core Reading Program.
6. Choose one link below to access the appropriate Consumer’s Guide grade-level tool for the reading curriculum you wish to evaluate. 

Kindergarten | Grade level 1 | Grade level 2 | Grade level 3

5. Select one of the five reading components that you would like to evaluate. To expedite the evaluation process, you may wish to consider only the high-priority items.
6. Did you find that your core reading program was strong or weak in the selected reading component? Explain your answer.
7. Mrs. Harrison is practicing fluency instruction with her first graders during whole-class instruction every day. Her students’ reading ability levels range from kindergarten level to third-grade level. Choose a flexible grouping practice that Mrs. Harrison can implement to more adequately teach fluency to all of her students. Describe how Mrs. Harrison will implement this grouping practice for fluency instruction.
8. Develop a 90-minute schedule of reading instruction that includes learning centers, small-group instruction, whole-group instruction, paired instruction, independent practice, and progress monitoring.
9. Discuss at least three different ways in which high-quality reading instruction in Tier 2 will differ from that in Tier 1.

(RITPART 4)

1. Given a 90-minute reading period, create your own daily reading schedule (do not duplicate the schedule used by Mr. Brewster).
   1. Be sure to include different grouping formats (i.e., whole-group instruction, small-group instruction, partner reading, independent practice).
   2. Describe when progress monitoring will occur during your schedule.
2. Discuss at least one benefit of the general education teacher’s communicating with each of the following groups of people in regard to the RTI approach:
   1. Other professionals
   2. Students
   3. Parents
3. Choose a grade, K–3, and develop a 20-minute small-group lesson plan that covers the core reading components (be sure to specify the ability level and number of students). You may refer to the table below to determine which of the five core reading components need to be covered. Keep in mind that the table provides a guideline for average-ability students. If you decide that a component does not need to be covered, write a “0″ for “Time Allotted” and justify your reasoning in the “Brief Activity Description” space.

Reading Component	Kindergarten	First Grade	Second Grade	Third Grade
Phonemic Awareness
Phonics and Word Study
Fluency
Vocabulary
Reading Comprehension

National Reading Panel, 2000; Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS)

5. Sierra and Ben are second graders at Rosa Parks Elementary. Their Tier 2 provider, Ms. Washington, uses the PRF to monitor their progress. Examine the graphs below.
   1. Make a tier decision (i.e., initiate or discontinue) for each student.
   2. Justify your decision using the data in the graphs.

Remember, the criteria for the PRF are a benchmark of 35 and a slope greater to or equal to 1.

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(TEACHING )  HERE’S THE LINK FOR THE VIDEO WHEN YOU GET THERE JUST CLICK ON ASSESSMENT   https://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/module/ell/

Watch the video below to see a second-grade teacher introduce the properties of matter (time: 3:11).

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1.  
   1. Identify four contextual supports that the teacher used to help her ELL students better understand the lesson.
   1. Identify four contextual supports the teacher can change or add to improve her lesson.
   1. The video below—courtesy of the Vaughn Gross Center for Reading and Language Arts—demonstrates ongoing research with ELLs. Identify three instructional supports used by the researchers in the video and explain why they are helpful to ELLs (time: 2:33).

List at least three things teachers can do when assessing ELL students to allow them to more fully demonstrate their knowledge