Creating Classrooms that Address Race and Ethnicity

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Creating Classrooms that Address Race and
Ethnicity
Chapter Six
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Roots of Racial and Ethnic Conflict in American
Society

• Causes may be political, economic, religious,
  linguistic, cultural, or racial.
• Conflict is usually due to a sense of injustice
  in the distribution of material, social, or
  cultural resources.
• A knowledge of the sources and dimensions of
  conflict is necessary for understanding.

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We Have Been Different from the Beginning

• Columbus introduced European culture in the
  1490s.
• The Spanish, the French, the Portuguese, and the
  English colonized the Americas.
• The English emerged as dominant, in part due to
  English immigrants desires for religious freedom.

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Religious Tolerance Short-Lived

• White, English-born Protestants were dominant by
  the turn of the 19th century.
• Fear and persecution of different kinds of
  immigrants became prevalent, particularly with
  respect to
• Roman Catholics
• The Irish

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The Civil War Era

• Race in education became an issue after the Civil
  War.
• Freedmens Schools were developed to educate the
  children of freed slaves.
• Public education for black children was most
  often segregated, more often in the south than
  the north, but in the north as well.
• Violence often characterized the development of
  black schools.

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Legislative and Judicial Landmarks

• Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) Separate but equal
  facilities for the races in schools and elsewhere
  is constitutional.
• Brown v. Board of Education (1954) Separate
  but equal doctrine is inherently unequal and
  unconstitutional.

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The Civil Rights Movement and the Schools

• The Equal Pay Act (1963)
• The Voting Rights Act (1963)
• The Civil Rights Act (1964)
• The Bilingual Education Act (1968)
• Title IX, Educational Amendments (1972)
• Education of All Handicapped Children Act (1975)

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Characteristics of Classrooms that Address Race
and Ethnicity

• Pedagogies Old and New
• Teachers do not shy away from the deep-seated
  influence that race plays in peoples lives.
• Teachers understand the historical significance
  of race.
• Teachers are aware that majority children may not
  understand the role race plays in their lives.

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• Roles Old and New
• Teachers understand their roles as active agents
  of change.
• Teachers reach out to individuals and community
  groups that represent various ethnic and racial
  groups.
• Students interact with community groups working
  to change the status quo.

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• Place of Content Knowledge Old and New
• The history of diversity in the U.S. is a
  critical element.
• The concept of race is often used incorrectly.
• Genotypeshared genetic material
• Phenotypevisible traits, e.g. skin color

• Textbooks are often inaccurate and dated.
• Content materials are often biased (intentionally
  or unintentionally).

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• Assessment Old and New
• Assessment instruments may be developed and
  normed with only one race or ethnic group in
  mind.
• Assessments should consider the sociocultural
  context of the learner.
• Biases and stereotypes
• Prior experience of the learner

• Assessments should be varied.

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Curriculum Transformation the Case of Prejudice

• It is human nature to surround oneself with
  others who provide social acceptance and help in
  times of need.
• Individuals begin to think that the familiar
  behaviors of their group are good and natural.
• It follows, then, that others may be perceived as
  less good and less natural.
• These judgments may become harsh, discriminatory,
  and involve rejection.

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The Functions of Prejudice (Katz)

• Adjustment prejudicial attitudes that aid in
  adjusting to a complex world will be maintained
• Ego-defensive prejudicial attitudes that protect
  self-concepts
• Value-expressive prejudicial attitudes that
  demonstrate ones own virtues
• Knowledge prejudicial attitudes that offer
  decision-making criteria about members of
  outgroups

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Prejudice Formation

• Three components of prejudice
• Cognitive component the process of
  categorization
• Affective component the feelings that accompany
  ones thoughts about members of outgroups
• Behavioral component discriminatory practices
  towards members of outgroups

Continued
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• How Children Learn Prejudice
• Observation of respected elders socialization
• Group membership desire to mimic ingroup
  attitudes in order to belong
• The media reinforcement of stereotypes
• Religious fundamentalism belief that one holds
  the truth, that others are at best wrong, and
  at worst, dangerous

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Extreme Cases of Prejudice

• ?Hate groups any organized body that denigrates
  select groups of people based on their ethnicity,
  race, religion, or sexual orientation and/or
  advocates the use of violence against such groups

Continued
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• White privilege what occurs when members of the
  dominant group (in the U.S., whites) are taught
  that racism is something that puts others at a
  disadvantage, but are not taught to see the
  corresponding advantage their color brings to
  them
• Racial Profiling law enforcement practice of
  targeting someone for investigation in public
  spaces on the basis of a statistical profile of
  his or her race, ethnicity, or national origin

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Prejudice Reduction

• Critical to reducing prejudice and establishing
  an interculturally sensitive classroom is the
  teachers understanding of, and ability to
  integrate, intercultural awareness and prejudice
  reduction activities into the curriculum.
• Intercultural sensitivity is not
  naturalcross-cultural contact has historically
  been accompanied by bloodshed, oppression, or
  genocide.

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Educational Strategies to Reduce Prejudice

• Improving social contact and intergroup relations
• Equal status contact when those who are brought
  together perceive they are of equal status
• Superordinate goals when the purpose of bringing
  people together cannot be accomplished without
  the participation of all

Continued
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• Encouragement of intergroup interaction should
  become a positive school norm
• Personal familiarity people must have the
  opportunity to get to know the other person in
  ways that render the stereotypic image clearly
  inaccurate or inappropriate

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Some Cautions in Applying the Contact Hypothesis

• Many schools are monocultural, providing little
  opportunity for intergroup contact to occur in
  such cases it is best to stress the diversity
  that is present, e.g., socioeconomic or gender
  diversity.
• Equal status contact within the school may
  conflict with that which occurs outside the
  school.

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• The Importance of Critical Thought
• Increasing Cognitive Sophistication
• Improving students critical thinking skills
• Questioning
• Analyzing
• Suspending judgment until all available
  information is collected and studied

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Ten Criteria in the Development of Critical
Thought

• Intellectual Curiosity
• Objectivity reliance on evidence
• Open-mindedness
• Flexibility in thinking
• Intellectual skepticism

• Intellectual honesty
• Ability to be systematic
• Persistence
• Ability to be decisive
• Attentiveness to other points of view

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Elements of Classrooms that Encourage Critical
Thought

• ?Students feel respected and safe.
• ?The classroom is a community of inquiry.
• ?There is a balance between teacher-talk and
  student-talk.
• ?Students are taught to think about their own
  thinking.

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Improving Self-Confidence and Self-Acceptance

• ?A sense of self-worth and self-confidence
  supports the reduction of prejudice.
• ?Students feel secure and accepted.
• ?Student participation is valued.
• ?Students know the boundaries and limits of
  behavior.

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Increasing Empathy for and Understanding of Others

• ?Long-term gains in prejudice reduction require
  educational activity that actively engages the
  emotions.
• ?Writing stories or acting out dramatizations of
  cross-cultural situations
• ?Any activity that enables students to step into
  the shoes of another
• ?Classroom simulations that generate culture
  shock

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Something to Think About

• lets think about the consequences of silence.
  I think about Hitler. He got into power by
  people around him being silent and not
  challenging him. When you are silent, you are
  giving tacit approval of the messages you hear
  around youyour simple comments can go quite far
  in making change.
• --John Gray