Culturally Responsive Teaching Strategies

Student’s name

Institutional Affiliation

Burnham, K. (2021). Culturally Responsive Teaching: 5 Strategies for Educators. Retrieved 6 October 2021, from https://www.northeastern.edu/graduate/blog/culturally-responsive-teaching-strategies/The article 5 Culturally Responsive Teaching Strategies was written by Kristin Burnham and published as part of the blogs by the Northern University Graduate Programs. Kristin Burnham is a renowned editor, journalist, and contributor of the Northeastern University Enrollment Management team. Furthermore, Ms. Burnham is an award-winning writer with over 12 years of experience in developing content for technology brands, magazines, and websites. She spent the majority of her career writing on matters ranging from consumer and enterprise technology, online privacy, cybersecurity, and IT leadership. Burnham has also developed various publications for clients including Computerworld, Harvard Business Review Analytic Services, The Parallax, Dun & Bradstreet, Northeastern University, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and Red Hat’s Enterprise Project just to name a few. Burnham’s background evokes trust in her article. The fact that she has is an award-winning writer makes me respect her and the work that she does. Burnham has had vast experience as a writer and reporter which makes her the best person to talk about culturally responsive teaching strategies.

The article 5 Culturally Responsive Teaching Strategies by Kristin Burnham is a recent article that was published on July 31st, 2020. This makes the article up-to-date and viable for understanding this topic. Knowing that this article was published as recently as last year, makes it easy for me to relate to its findings. It makes me understand the urgency of the matter and why as a society we should move away from traditional methods of teaching to more responsive strategies. The article’s publishing organization was formed with the sole purpose of taking enhancing deeper level learning. The mission is to ensure that in all programs from doctorate degree to certification- students learn to convert their ideas into meaningful actions. Northeastern University Graduate Programs also publishes any outstanding work that students write as relates to program courses of business, social sciences, and health professions. The article’s intended audience is academicians, teachers, researchers, students, program developers, and people that are generally interested in culturally responsive pedagogy. This article is a scholarly article as it was written with a specialized audience in mind. The author points out the need to consider the b diverse background, upbringing, and experiences of students and incorporating them in teaching strategies at all levels of education. The author appeals to the benefits of culturally responsive teaching as including an increased sense of identity, inclusivity, engagements, and critical thinking (Burnham, 2021). This text bears no notable bias; the author does a good job in explaining that diversity issues cut across both students and teachers.

Without a doubt, all the claims and arguments made by Kristin Burnham in the article seem sensible to me. She writes that “typical mainstream education is not addressing the realities of today’s students.” I could not agree with her less. I feel that traditional educating is not all-rounded and it does not have a personalized approach to learning. I support her appeal that culturally responsive teaching is better because it entails diverse authors and makes reference to diverse cultures that speaks to the personal experiences of students. In my viewpoint, this approach is more effective in teaching when compared to the traditional methods.

While the article is comprehensive, reading the article leaves me with questions about the practicality of culturally responsive teaching strategies. While we seek to move from traditional teaching methods to more diverse and inclusive methods of teaching, it is important to recognize the challenge that might be encountered in implementing. I feel that some teachers, particularly, the more traditional ones would prefer to stick to the traditional methods that entail the following curriculum to the letter. Moving from traditional methods to culturally responsive methods requires the teacher to prepare in advance such as using diverse sources written by culturally representative authors and this might seem like a lot of work for old-school teachers. In essence, there is the possibility of resistance in moving from traditional to culturally responsive teaching.

The evidence that seemed most convincing has to do with making learning contextual. I could not agree less with Kristin on this issue. I feel that education makes more sense if they time curriculum to real-world experiences. This ensures that the knowledge gained in class can be put to use in the contemporary world. The traditional method of mastering concepts with the pure purpose of passing exams and graduating is not viable because it does not produce thinkers and problem solvers which are important in today’s world.

The evidence that least appeals to me has to do with reconsidering classroom setup. Burnham says that there is a need to take an inventory of the books and sources in the school library and reevaluate them so that they include authors from diverse races. She also mentions the need for inventory books to represent LGBTQ individuals. However, I do not think this is strategy is realistic. At times, there might not be authors that identify as LBGTQ who have undertaken research in some areas. This might make it difficult to execute this strategy.

This article turned my entire thinking about culturally responsive teaching around. I have been a student for the better part of my life and I have never thought about the influence of teaching methods on the experiences of students. My thinking was that the most important goal that teachers have is to cover what is in the curriculum. I thought that passing exams and getting a certificate or diploma was enough proof that one is educated. It turns out I was wrong; education is what you do with the knowledge gained.

After reading this article, it is now clear that we must move from traditional to culturally responsive methods of teaching. I now understand that the latter is more beneficial as it ensures inclusivity and adopts a more personalized approach to teaching. I am informed that culturally responsive teaching strategies are all about ensuring that the studies reflect the background, upbringing, cultures, races, economic status, and experiences of all students.

Just like all other texts that I have read on culturally responsive teaching, this text holds that culturally responsive teaching strategies are more beneficial compared to traditional methods of teaching. The article shares similar insights with other texts. It holds that will an increasingly diverse society, comes the need to adjust teaching methods so that they suit all students. The text also holds that culturally responsive teaching is more beneficial as it fosters a sense of identity in students and promotes critical thinking.

After reading this text, I realize that teaching methods have an impact on the learners. Future research should concentrate on the implementation of culturally responsive teaching methods. The main concern here is how to ensure that moving forward all teachers adopt culturally teaching methods as they teach. Curriculum implementers should devise a tool on ensuring teachers a culturally responsive approach to teaching.

References

Burnham, K. (2021). Culturally Responsive Teaching: 5 Strategies for Educators. Retrieved 6 October 2021, from https://www.northeastern.edu/graduate/blog/culturally-responsive-teaching-strategies/