Teaching to Urban / Minority Students Differently
source: http://serc.carleton.edu/sp/library/urban/who.html
some interesting bits:
Uekawa et al (2007) found that Asians are the only major ethnic group
that prefers individual work over group work due to the cultural value
associated with bringing honor to the family through individual
achievement.
They also concluded that group work benefited learning for
Latino students, more so than other groups. Black students have been
found to learn best with activities involve a high level of movement and
verbal sharing in a communal setting (Parsons, 2008), which is commonly
misinterpreted by white teachers as misbehavior and signs of defiance
(Downey and Pribesh, 2004). Accordingly, urban college faculty should:
The poor performance of urban public school students is attributed to
issues of race and income within urban centers. Griggs et al. (2006)
document that Hispanic and Black students continue to score lower than
white and Asian students on standardized science test scores in their
senior year of high-school. In addition, statistics from New York State
indicate that pre-college urban classrooms are less likely to be led by
highly qualified teachers than those in rural settings (Brackett et al.,
2008). Although the situation has been improving since 2001's No Child
Left Behind Act, schools with the greatest percentage of poor and
non-white students still employ the least qualified teachers (Boyd et
al., 2007). Thus bright students with high potential may be arriving in
college classrooms with deficits from their pre-college education.
Teaching to Diversity
In their survey of teacher beliefs regarding minority students and
students from low-income families, Bryan and Atwater (2002) noted common
misconceptions and related classroom responses that could adversely
affect learning outcomes in diverse classrooms. Two of the most common
and problematic beliefs held by teachers of diverse students, as
compiled by Bryan and Atwater (2002), are discussed below.
Misconception 1: "Students from culturally diverse backgrounds are less capable than other students"
Instructors who hold this belief, whether overtly or tacitly, tend to
define less ambitious learning goals, provide students with less
autonomy, allow less interaction between students, and tend to rely more
heavily on passive teaching methods. In direct contrast, researchers
have found that minority students respond most favorably to inquiry in
which they have some degree of control, and resist lessons that they
perceive as being imposed upon them (Moll et al., 1992).
- Real-world problems with no clear answer, and with implications
for the well-being of the community, are ideal for engaging a diverse
class of urban students (Bouillion and Gomez, 2001; Basu and Calabrese
Barton, 2007; Buxton et al., 2008).
Misconception 2: "Teachers should treat all students the same, regardless of their class, gender, or race"
This attitude, which is referred to as "dysonscious racism," is most
commonly held by white teachers (Bryan and Atwater, 2002) who hold 85%
of college faculty positions in the U.S. (NCES, 2006), as well as
faculty who teach in predominantly white colleges (Marbach-Ad et al.,
2008). This belief leads to teaching methods that do not take into
account the lack of commonality in educational and cultural background
in an urban classroom. For example, students whose secondary schooling
was done outside of the United States may not understand references to
specific events in U.S. history, or analogies that refer to American
popular culture (e.g., television, food products)
