Reflection: The Power of Caring Geneva Gay’s chapter on the Power of Caring captures the importance of attitudes and expectations within culturally responsive teaching. As Gay writes, caring is “manifested in the form of attitude, expectations, and behaviors about students’ human value, intellectual capability, and performance responsibilities” (p. 45). The success of multicultural students is heavily dependent on the teacher’s ability to develop a caring environment and educational experience. In the chapter, Gay breaks down the idea of caring into four topics: (1) Concept of caring, predominate attitudes and expectations of teachers, instructional behavior and achievement, and modifying negative attitudes and expectations Concept of Caring The relationships you build with your students are most effective with the use of “patience, persistence, facilitation, validation, empowerment for the participants” (Gay, p. 42, 2000). When effectively implemented through [...]

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Reflection: Culturally Responsive Teaching Culturally Responsive teaching is simply effective teaching. Attributes of culturally responsive teaching such as high expectations, caring, and student centered learning are the foundations of effective teaching. CRT demonstrates that all children are teachable if placed in the correct environment and given the appropriate tools to learn. As a teacher in a new school with many unique cultural challenges, implementing CRT practices has been vital to the teaching/learning success within my classroom. Looking back, there have been three CRT topics that have largely shaped my approach to teaching: Teacher Development, School Culture, and the Power of Caring. Culturally Responsive Teaching in Music Education by Vicki R. Lind and Constance L. McKoy begins by defining CTR and evaluating cultural influences on teacher development. We learn that cultural competence is vital to effective CTR. Lind and McKoy (2016) write “Teachers who demonstrate [...]

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Past. Present. Future? A Look Into Bronzeville and The 'Fight for Dyett' As Walter Dyett High School sets to reopen for the 2016 - 2017 year, a new chapter opens in Bronzeville history. The ‘Fight for Dyett’ campaign was successful in reopening the once closed high school but many community members believe the fight is not over. During an interview on Democracy Now!, Jitu Brown, member of the Coalition to Revitalize Dyett and co-leader in the hunger strike, proclaimed “This is not a victory for the children in Bronzeville…These are our children. These are our communities…So we will determine the type of education that our children receive in Bronzeville.” (Democracy Now, 2015). CPS had failed to recognize the community’s proposals for a new Dyett; the voices of Bronzeville were ignored. Jitu Brown: “This is a human right issue. You know, the great poet and author Alice Walker said, “No one is your friend who demands your silence or denies your right to grow” [...]

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