Un-Standardizing Curriculum by Christine E. Sleeter & Judith Flores Carmona

Author:Christine E. Sleeter & Judith Flores Carmona
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Published: 2017-03-19T16:00:00+00:00

Learning About and from Students’ Communities

Teachers can use many tools to learn about and from their students’ communities. Elsewhere, Christine published mini-investigations for teachers to use (Sleeter, 2001). For example, teachers can walk through students’ neighborhoods, noting what students see every day that can be connected with curriculum concepts, or they can hold parent meetings in community spaces (Yosso, 2006). For math lessons, what kind of quantitative reasoning might students do as they shop with their parents in local stores? For science lessons, what kinds of plants, minerals, birds, or animals are likely to be familiar to students? Even better, take a neighborhood walk with some students and encourage them to act as tour guides; they will give a students’-eye view of the community and talk about not only what is there, but what interests them, what they notice, what kinds of connections they make, or what they wonder about.

Adults in the community are often receptive to talking with teachers about the community’s culture, assets, and upcoming events. A teacher can invite two or three adults who live in the neighborhood to describe the community; often the school secretary or custodian turn out to be excellent resources. Teachers and preservice students have found questions like the following to be useful:

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