When we share stories with one another we become bound together in powerful ways. Stories provide hope: they have the potential to shine a light into the darkness and challenge us to change our thinking. Stories matter. Stories are powerful. Each month, the Department of Curriculum and Instruction partners with the RPS equity specialists and American Indian Liaison to share the stories of those in our own backyard who are often silenced.

​All of us have those days where we wished we could press rewind and start over. But there is no rewind button. We just have to keep on keeping on and hope that whatever has crept into our day to sour it dissipates as soon as possible. I would like to share a recent experience I had with my dog, Walda. (Did you really think I would write a blog post without mentioning her?)
 
While this girl is no longer considered a puppy (she turned 3 on April 2nd), she does possess an endearing puppy-like quality. Man, this girl has done so much for me. She’s licked my face, rested her head in my lap, brought me her tug toy to play with, you know, all the typical doggie-companion stuff. But just a few days ago, I realized what she has done for me in the vein of personal/spiritual growth.

I’m an introvert so I don’t speak openly much about what is bothering me. If at any point you and I have had a discussion where I’ve shared a piece of myself with you, I love you and I’ve watched how you react to myself and others. Well, this girl here is super friendly to everyone she meets (I’m pretty sure she’s an extrovert), so I’ve shared many things with her. She’s always super happy when I come home and it doesn’t matter how long I’ve been gone--5 minutes or 5 days--when I walk through that door, it’s always a reunion for the ages.
 
Now, back to what she taught me a few days ago. I came home and, just like clockwork, she got all sorts of excited: zoomies, pet my belly, here’s my tennis ball, tippy-tappy with her big-girl paws, circle-circle-circle.

And I walked right past her without acknowledging her because I was in my own head commiserating with my own thoughts. ​She came in the room, jumped up on the bed, laid down, and let out a big sigh. A mirror. I saw my reflection in that moment. I didn’t like what I saw. I had to own it because even though she had nothing to do with what I was dealing with, I still made her pay for it. I felt awful.

I asked Dr. Cecil White Hat (Rosebud Sioux Tribal Member, deceased) one time why it seems we suffer so much from historical trauma.

He looked at me and said, “We have forgotten how to use our natural medicines.”

Great. Now, here comes a discussion on roots and herbs. And, because I hold much respect and admiration for this Elder, I need to listen to what he is going to say.

He must have sensed what I was thinking, because he then said, “Our laughter and tears, we have forgotten how to use our laughter and tears.”
 
I know I always feel good after a laugh or a cry. But why? Our tears release cortisol. If that doesn’t come out during a good cry, it stays in the body and can cause all sorts of negative effects. Cecil was a very wise man. He never carried himself as if he were a walking library. He was a relatable guy. I am forever grateful to have spent time with him and I appreciate his words and lessons.
 
His brother, Albert White Hat (Rosebud Sioux Tribal Member, deceased), was also well known for his Lakota language and culture revitalization work on the Rosebud Indian Reservation. In this video, he talks about the importance of forgiveness and what can happen if you hold onto anger.

This post brought to you by Dawn Bjoraker, American Indian Liaison for the Rochester Public Schools 
Feel free to contact Bjoraker at 507.328.4236 or to connect with her via email

Growing up in the South Bronx, one of the five boroughs which make up New York City, poverty and I were very intimate.  My mom was a single parent raising three kids and did an excellent job meeting our needs.  However, that certainly did not come easily for her, nor did it come without the need of support.  

I was able to experience all the joy one experiences when walking into a neighborhood bodega with several food stamp bills stuffed inside my torn blue jeans.  And although everyone in my neighborhood, an area roughly few miles long but supporting over 80,000 people, were in similar situations as my family, I still found it embarrassing using food stamps.  I remember the feeling of shame and humiliation course through my body as I readied myself for the monetary transaction.  Truth be told, I hated that our family needed help.  Yet, like anyone living in poverty can tell you, the worst part is asking for it.  

Several years ago I had the pleasure of speaking to a parent volunteer, Donna Greason.  She had told me that if there were ever any student needs, she would be happy to help. I informed her that our school actually had a resource room for students who had clothing or food needs.  The only issue was that it was only accessible by walking through a teacher’s personal office and, to top it off, a key was needed. Not many students knew about the room and those who did were required to ask a staff member to open it.

Basically, if I thought using food stamps was embarrassing, I could only imagine how it must feel to be a high school adolescent having to find an adult to open a room so I may pick out food for my family while inadvertently being gawked at by the same person who opened the room up for me.  But like many of us are very well aware, space is limited in just about all of our school buildings. And, as is often spoken in my household, “You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit.” 

Yet, when I brought Mrs. Greason to the 7’ x 7’ Support Our Spartans Resource Room, S.O.S. Room, she had other thoughts.  She too had financial difficulties growing up and started questioning whether our school could provide a more appealing space.  Being the only school social worker for over 1,700 students, honestly, the S.O.S. Room was not particularly on my radar…at all. It had been established well before I ever stepped foot into the building and was a group effort, mostly stocked by the generosity of other Mayo High School staff members.  

Her idea was to move out of the space we were currently in and be more centrally located.  The other portion of her idea was to be more selective in terms of the items we were taking in, and lastly, “make it look like Target.”  ​

I heard Mrs. Greason’s idea and had two main competing thoughts. Thought number one went a little something like: Sure lady, if you’re willing to do all the work, I’m all for it.  Thought number two was: Could we actually destigmatize poverty by changing our delivery? 

Growing up surrounded by poverty, many of my classmates would still manage to come to school with new Jordan sneakers, Guess Jeans, and Hilfiger sweatshirts, although they too were living in the same poverty stricken neighborhood as I was.  So, it was difficult for me to imagine students embracing walking into a resource room to grab a pair of pants and walk out with little shame. And yet, it was so much the opposite of everything most of us were brought up to believe that it might actually work!
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With support from our administration, we were provided a larger room right across from the lunchroom. The room is left open, unlocked, and largely unstaffed throughout the entire school day. Meaning, students can simply walk in and out of the room at their leisure.  No more hiding in a small space, no more needing to ask for an adult to unlock the room, and no permission needed. Although we have no prior data to compare how many items are coming and going, I can gladly say we estimate it to be about a thousand items every month.  We count empty clothing hangers to provide us with a base number of how many clothing items are taken from the room. The difficult part of keeping track of everything is that we offer more than just clothing: we also have school supplies, hygiene products, college readiness information, shoes, water bottles, books, and--to top it off--we also have a food pantry room for our weekly backpack program.  

I have come to the realization this generation of young people have come a long way since I was a kid. Students seem far more open speaking about their sexual orientation, engaging in open dialogue about different faiths, and acknowledging the importance of mental health.  So, I’m not sure why it still strikes me to see just how well Mayo High School has embraced this room.

Within a year of implanting the new strategy, our room was so successful that we expanded into the hallway.  Many of our school supplies are now located outside of our room and regularly stocked. Three clothing racks are also located in the hallway where students can grab a winter coat when needed. This model has opened the room up not only to those who are impoverished, but to any and all of our 1,700 students here at Mayo High School.  It has really helped me reframe my initial position of what a student in need looks like. Because regardless of how much money your parents have, if you rip your jeans in gym class during 2nd hour, straight down the crack, you’re now in need – true story.

The initial planning took more than simply receiving a centralized location.  In order to make the room look the part, it was going to take money. We enlisted the help of several Mayo students who were able to write grants for our room and generated about $2,000.  The money was used to purchase shelving, clothing rods, hangers, etc.. Recruiting Mayo students to write grants took the burden off of my shoulders and provided students with an opportunity to give back to their community as well as provided them with a life learning experience and an additional item to add to their resume.  

The next step was finding students who could be in charge of the daily maintenance and upkeep of the room. This was accomplished by soliciting the help of two student aides per semester. Simply put, there is no way any one person is going to be able to perform their job and effectively maintain a room of this nature.  The last piece of the puzzle was to create a club that would be responsible for all of the behind the scenes operations involving the room.

Most people don’t know the S.O.S. Room is actually run by a student club.  They meet every Tuesday morning for 40 minutes to discuss current and future needs, donations, monthly newsletters, and social media pertaining to the S.O.S. Room.  The last several meetings, however, have not been about our room but were spent discussing ways of establishing a resource room in every school across our district. They are willing to write grants, organize food drives, and donate clothing resources in order to help any school get up and running, or anything else that a school might find beneficial to establishing their own resource room.  

There are many myths surrounding a resource room that I would like debunked.  The most important one in my opinion is that we need to secure the room behind a locked door.  If I were to provide one bit of advice, it would be to make it easily accessible to any and all students.  Throughout the past several years I can easily recount only three instances where students disrespected the work put into the room.  When weighed against the thousands of times students have appropriately utilized the room...there is no contest. 

Some of my tips would include:

• Get students involved.  Why? Because if you believe doing everything alone will have an impact, you’re probably right.  But if you embrace the student aspect it will not only have an impact, it will become a part of the school’s culture.  
• Remember, neither Rome nor the S.O.S. Room was built in a day. It takes time and patience to get everything in order.  
• You’re not in it alone. I have found our community and student body to be very responsive when asking for donations.  

​Outside of those three suggestions, any of the S.O.S. club members will be happy to do whatever it takes to help out another school because they all share the same common belief that all students can be more successful academically when their basic needs are met.

This post brought to you by Juan Vasquez, a School Social Worker at Mayo High School 
Feel free to connect with Vasquez via email or phone

Working for educational equity is not a job for the faint of heart. It demands a sense of urgency, perseverance, empathy, humor, and,most importantly, an endless supply of humility. We can never know ALL there is to know about ALL the delicate cultural nuances that make the people around us who they are. But, we can strive to approach one another with a genuine sense of curiosity that is rooted in love and be willing to admit when we’ve made mistakes.
 
It is with this in mind that I write today. Recently, I was schooled on the term “codeswitching” and I want to share my new understanding as it relates to what Dr. Sharroky Hollie calls, VABBing.

First of all, for any of you readers who may not be familiar with the term VABBing, it is: “the validation and affirmation of indigenous (home) culture and language for the purpose of building and bridging the student to success in the culture of academia and in mainstream society” (Hollie 13).
 
When I first learned about VABBing, I could easily get my head around the validation and affirmation part, but I struggled with the notion of building and bridging. The idea that I should try to teach students to fit into the mainstream went against so much that I believed in. However, the more I read and the more I practiced VABBing, the more I realized building and bridging isn’t at all about forcing students to assimilate. It’s about giving our students the tools they need to be culturally dexterous. It’s about honoring and loving our students for who they are, first and foremost, while giving them the tools they need to navigate a complex, and often inequitable, human system. It’s about opening up the playing field so they can draw on their strengths while practicing the skills necessary for success beyond the classroom walls. I thought that this was what it meant to “codeswitch.”
 
It was with this understanding that I went forth into the world fielding questions about situational appropriateness and codeswitching, mistakenly assuming they meant the same thing. I had read Dr. Hollie’s book, studied the binder, wrestled with my own ideas about building and bridging, but never did I realize that I was misusing the term codeswitching. Today, I wanted to share a document that Dr. Hollie recently shared with me that clarifies the difference between VABBing and codeswitching: 

​​Before reading this, the negative connotations behind the term “codeswitching” had never really registered with me; I had simply been using it as a synonym for cultural dexterity. But, because I strive to examine the moments when my implicit bias or a deficit mindset creeps in, I have been working to change my language.

​Once again, I reiterate that this work is not easy. It takes time and openness to make change. It is my hope that all of us can feel supported as reflective practitioners as we walk along this road together. 

This post brought to you by Kim Eversman, E-12 Equity Implementation Associate

Lately, I have been thinking about my own education and how I, as a student, have changed over time.  In my K-12 education, I was a successful student who was “good at school.”  I did what the teachers and adults asked, I followed their examples of how to solve problems (I could follow any procedure in math when I knew the formula and worked through a few with the teacher), I followed their rules (no running, no swearing, etc.), and was always considered a “good kid.”  Once I went to college to get my undergrad and later my master’s degree, I realized I wasn’t as "good at school" as I had once thought. 
 
When I look back at why this shift occurred, I realize it was because as a K-12 student I wasn’t as interested in the learning and understanding of what I did, as I was with getting good grades (I was a passive learner), having teachers and classmates like me (the 'relator' in me) and being labeled as a "good student" and friend.  Now, don’t get me wrong: I did learn a lot during my K-12 years of education and I had a lot of great teachers, I just didn’t always strive to know or better understand the “why” behind what I was learning. I simply wasn’t motivated to do so.

A colleague introduced to the book Drive by Daniel Pink. The first two chapters really hit me: they highlighted what we are doing in education now,  noted what we can change, and identified why it is important that we do. Both chapters hit directly upon motivation.  The chapters “The Rise and Fall of Motivation 2.0” and “Seven Reasons Carrots and Sticks (Often) Don’t Work. . .” tie into what we see in our classrooms every day, even though his book is spun more for the business-world.  If you haven’t read this book, I highly recommend  you do! 

If you want a quick idea of what Pink is talks about in Drive, then watching his TED Talk: “The Puzzle of Motivation” is a great starting point:

My favorite part of this talk is when he mentions that what motivated 20th-century learners (me) doesn’t often motivate 21st-century learners (our students).

Looking at ways to motivate students in the classroom and comparing it to what has been done in education for years, John Hattie explores the effect size of these different actions, noting if they have a positive, negative, or neutral effect  on our students.  As secondary teachers who we all likely taught in a system that was incentive driven, we need to start taking a closer look at what we are doing to motivate our students and to help them be active, life-long learners.

One of the things teachers tend to struggle with is the homework we give and the reason we give it.  According to Hattie, homework has an effect size of .29 (very low).  We have had students who could do the homework and were motivated to get them all right (i.e. get a good grade) but then struggled when asked to explain why certain rules/procedures worked and why it didn’t. When asked to solve a problem another way, students usually groan and ask, "Why?". We have also had students who did the homework but didn’t really understand the material, as well as students who just didn’t do the homework at all. So clearly, just assigning homework was not a motivator for most students in class and tying it to grades make it even worse.  

Continuing to look at what we can do to help motivate students, implementing a different mindset, specifically growth mindset, into how our classrooms operate is huge. We need to model and encourage making mistakes and focusing on what can be learned from those mistakes.  Instead of modeling how to solve problems, we need to give out students the problems first and see what they can figure out on their own.  We should incorporate more projects that are real-life based (the why of what we are doing is relevant), give students timely feedback versus grades (a .75 effect size from Hattie), and have students self-report on what they learned and what grade they earned (a whopping 1.44 effect size from Hattie!) should become the norm.

Making our classes relevant, interesting, and challenging to our students will help with their motivation.  As Daniel Pink refers in his book Drive, if we make tasks in our classrooms fit into one or more of the three key categories--Autonomy, Mastery, or Purpose--our students will move from being compliant (grade driven) to engaged (seeing the value).

​I know from my own experience that when I switched from being all about grades and more about the why and how, what I was learning became important. I became a totally different student. I also remember far more about what I was doing rather than just knowing I had learned it once upon a time.  I know it isn’t always an easy transition: when we find things that work and that we are comfortable with, change can be hard.  But, in knowing our students face different opportunities than we may have faced, it's time to try things a little differently.

This post brought to you by Jen Coenen, Secondary Implementation Associate and STEM Village Director

I recently had the opportunity to travel to UCLA to hear Dr. Brene’ Brown speak. She spoke of vulnerability, shame, and hurt, but she also spoke about living fully, loving more, being courageous, and daring greatly (which, by the way, is also the name of one of her bestselling books).

As I was listening to her speak, one of the things that was on my mind was the immense pressure and joy that come from working in education. When I returned to Minnesota I spent some time looking into what she has to say about being an educator. I found a speech online that she delivered at the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in 2017. In this speech she talks about the power that we, as educators, have to affect the outcomes for our students as well as the power that we have to affect outcomes for ourselves.
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A few questions you may want to consider as you are watching:

• How does this challenge my thinking?
• What has been reaffirmed for me?
• What will I do moving forward?

 
I am cutting my writing of this blog short in order to allow time to watch the video. Think of it as a treat to yourself. It just may be exactly what you need.

This post brought to you by Ann Miller, K-8 Math Specialist

This past September, I had the opportunity to work with and hear Mark Perna speak about "Unleashing Passion, Purpose, and Performance in Younger Generations" as he addressed Career and Technical Education staff from all over southeastern Minnesota.  Since then I have had the opportunity to read his new book Answering Why, and I continue to be amazed at the connection between what he talks about in his book, the Rochester Public Schools Graduate Profile, and the opportunities that students at CTECH have each and every day.
 
As a staff at CTECH we are still working hard to establish, develop, and communicate who and what we are to students, colleagues, parents, and the community.  After working with Mr. Perna and reflecting upon our primary goals, it became clear that our curriculum and our instruction focus on three main areas:

1. Purpose  --  we strive every day to ensure that students leave our learning spaces with purpose.  If they complete a course at CTECH and leave knowing that they want to continue to pursue that career pathway we have succeeded.  If they complete the same course and leave with an understanding that the specific career pathway is not for them, we have also succeeded because both students now leave us with purpose.  Too many students move into a career or enter courses at the post-secondary level without purpose and they end up spending time, energy, and money to find out that they want to do something different.
2. Professional Skills  --  Each of our courses emphasizes the importance of learning, practicing, and perfecting the skills of timeliness, communication, collaboration, critical thinking and other commonly referred to "soft skills."  We prefer to call them Professional Skills as regardless of the career or college pathway a student takes, these skills will serve them well.
3. Competitive Advantage  --  The job market changes almost constantly and our students will at one point or another find themselves up against a pool of qualified applicants for a job, scholarship, etc.  We believe that by emphasizing both Professional Skills and industry-recognized certifications our students will leave CTECH with a competitive advantage.  Nursing students who complete their Certified Nursing Assistant assessment can seek employment as a CNA on their journey toward Nursing School, Med School, or any other Health Sciences career.  This certification and experience will give them a competitive advantage over those just entering the field.  Automotive students can now earn Entry-level ASA certifications and Culinary students can earn ServSafe Food Handler and/or Food Manager certifications.  Both of these provide a coveted competitive advantage.

 
I talk at length about these three areas of focus each time I lead a tour of our facility and programs and over the course of this year it has become very clear to me the connection between our focus and RPS Graduate Profile.  Specifically, I see direct correlation to the following domains:

We are very proud of the progress we have made in promoting not only Career and College Readiness, but Purpose, Professional Skills, and Competitive Advantage and we are grateful that these efforts are reflected in the qualities of a graduate that our community has identified as the most important.

This post brought to you by Brandon Macrafic, POSA focusing on Career & College Readiness and administrator at CTECH

To read more about the RPS Graduate Profile in Action, read part I of the series published in December of 2018 and written by Heather Willman. 

As the district wide Equity Implementation Associate, my role is to help support teachers as they both implement equitable (particularly Culturally and Linguistically Responsive, or CLR) instructional practices and reflect on the why behind these practices. This work isn’t black and white. It isn’t easy and teachers have questions. Lots of questions! And to be honest, it makes my heart so happy that there are so many questions. Questions mean that we are taking our work seriously; that we recognize we need to do better, even if we don’t know how to do better…yet!
 
In this post, I wanted to take some time to address one of the most common questions I am asked in regards to Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Teaching: “What’s the deal with these call and response protocols?”
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I have good news friends…you aren’t the only ones asking that question! There is so much wonderful literature out there that addresses the call and response conundrum.

One of my favorite resources on this topic is Zaretta Hammond’s book,Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. According to Dr. Hammond, the call and response cues the brain that something is going to happen. The novelty of the call triggers our brain’s reticular activating system, or RAS, which tells our brains to pay attention.
 
Culture plays its role, too. Many of our marginalized and underserved students come from indigenous cultures based in deeply rooted oral traditions. Storytelling, songs, rhymes, and poems were how information was passed on through generations. Furthermore, when we consider the historical context in which populations of marginalized people were denied access to the written word, we can recognize that oral expressiveness was imperative for survival.
 
For more on the neurological science behind call and response, here are some awesome resources.

• The Neuroscience of Call and Response
• Attention Protocols in the Culturally Competent Classroom: part I, part II, and part III

Yeah, call and response can most definitely feel strange if you haven’t been raised in a highly verbal setting and let’s face it, we Minnesotans are not a chatty bunch. But let’s move away for a bit to consider other layers of culture, such as youth culture. Walk through any school during passing time, and you will hear variations of call and response everywhere.
 
Another thing to consider is that call and response is just one type of attention signal. Culturally Responsive attention signals, such as call and response, use rhythm or have some sort of cultural relevance. Students have an opportunity to respond and have buy in. The most important thing that makes an attention signal culturally responsive, is when it is used with intentionality. If you are just doing a call and response for the heck of it, without a reason or a purpose, then it isn’t really culturally responsive. The other way an attention signal is culturally responsive is when the teacher uses all kinds of signals-traditional and responsive-to help students practice situational appropriateness. In other words-students need to know how to respond to traditional signals to be successful in school culture. But, when a teacher is only using traditional signals, he or she isn’t being responsive to the cultural behaviors a student brings to the classroom. Similarly, if the teacher is only ever using responsive signals, he or she isn’t being culturally responsive because they aren’t helping students learn to respond in traditional or situationally appropriate ways.
 
According to Dr. Hollie, there are three reasons why we use attention signals.

1. To clarify directions already given or to give further direct instruction.
2. To transition during the lesson.
3. To bring the activity or lesson to a close.

Using a call and response or any attention signal when students aren’t talking is not useful and will most certainly feel awkward. I’ve found that thinking of these three reasons has allowed me to feel less pressure when planning for call and response. If I don’t need to pull a group who is talking back to attention to clarify, transition, or close, I just don’t use it!
 
Finally, if you still feel goofy, have the students make them up! And let them lead them! Use this as an opportunity to give your students some more voice and choice during the lesson.

As I mentioned above, I’ve found it helpful to think of call and response as ONE TYPE of responsive attention signal. We use lots of different ways to get students’ attention. For example, in ENVoY, we use nonverbal signals such as raising a hand or ringing a chime. We don’t always use a call and response to get attention and there are still non-verbal cues that are culturally responsive. Again, it’s helpful to think about the rings of culture and how we respond to certain things because of how we identify within those rings. 

For example, I was raised Catholic, so when I hear a chime, my brain is wired to respond in a certain way. I was conditioned to pay close attention to people’s facial expressions because my parents are very quiet people, so it was easy for me, as a student, to recognize the classic, non-verbal, “teacher face”. Both examples are rooted in various rings of culture.

​We just need to remember that not all of our students’ experiences are the same as our own, so we can’t assume they will know what our different attention signals mean. We need to remember to take the time to intentionally teach our verbal and non-verbal attention signals. We also need to remember that we should be using a variety of attention signals-traditional and culturally responsive-so our students can be comfortable with situational appropriateness.

I know I may sound like a broken record when I say this, but remember, culturally and linguistically responsive teaching is a journey. There will be days where using call and response feels like the most natural thing in the world, and others when it feels painfully uncomfortable. You don’t always have to be using call and response to be culturally and linguistically responsive, but as you start to think about the cultural and neurological significance of the call and response, you may find yourself feeling less awkward. The most important thing to remember on this journey is to keep trying, keep building relationships, and keep reflecting on the layers of culture our students bring to our classrooms each day. 

This post brought to you by Kim Eversman, E-12 Equity Implementation Associate

When we share stories with one another we become bound together in powerful ways. Stories provide hope: they have the potential to shine a light into the darkness and challenge us to change our thinking. Stories matter. Stories are powerful. Each month, the Department of Curriculum and Instruction partners with the RPS equity specialists and American Indian Liaison to share the stories of those in our own backyard who are often silenced.
​ 

A song would get stuck in my head.  I would have to either sing or listen to it in its entirety to stop the broken loop going through my brain.  For a person who can never remember lyrics, I would google the words, play the YouTube video, and sing along to break the cycle.  Yet, the next day, I am back to where I started, every time.  This particular morning, going to work, I find myself singing and remembering most of the words to Michael Jackson’s Man in the Mirror.  I walked into my assigned high school, planning to discuss restorative practices with a team of teachers.  Our discussion ended.  I walked to the front office and one of my principals cued me in on a situation that happened on social media the previous night.  I heard myself say, “I’ve gotta go see the kids.  Where are they?”
 
In this post, I will explore three questions that address cultural relevancy, encourage sensitivity toward others, and end with tips to create relationship-building.

We spend years training as educators.  Combined with experiences doing the job, we often think we have a response for the implications and results of many educational theories if they are put into practice.  Personally, every time I feel that confidence, I am hit with the process gap called “reality.” 
 
That particular day was a humbling experience.  I had just spent time exploring strategies with teachers on what it means to have a restorative practice classroom so to understand how to provide a collaborative and collegial model for all students.  This particular situation stopped me in my tracks and made me rethink educational equity.  As I am listening to the pain in students’ voices, stories upon stories, I realized they mirror my pain.  I took notes and wondered what does real equity look like?  Many students are waging an uphill battle, be it about the color of their skin, their family history, their cultural heritage, their religious affiliations, their mental and emotional health, their sexual preferences, their gender, their grades, their sense of belonging, mistakes they cannot undo, combined with the fact that they are in their formative years.  One thought ran through my mind: I have not been able to sleep properly for a long time.  These things keep me up at night, dreading moments of reality such as this one.  I am afraid, just like my students are.
 
The school planned for an immediate response to address the issue before a long weekend.  I went home and poured over books because the students were exploring cultural issues that are pervasive in our current lives.  I looked at machine theorists who believe that the privileged few can truly understand the conditions of those who are less privileged.  I considered how combining being privileged and understanding the plight of the disenfranchised can be a humbling experience, leading to sense-making (Marion & Gonzales 2014). 
 
However, the students are right, it is true that some capitalize on the irrational nature of people in decision-making.  Listening to students, asking me how much sense-making is happening in our culture right now, is humbling.  Situations like this make it difficult to have meaningful answers for students.

I re-evaluated Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and what it means.  I keep landing on the fact that students who have experienced trauma, in the culture at large and in our schools, are struggling daily to have the first three levels of their needs met.  Maslow called them “deficiency needs” (Marion & Gonzales 2014). 
 
In my own experience, I learned that we often react to students’ behaviors based on “growth needs” but confused them with “deficiency needs.”  While I support working on the needs which speak to the satisfaction of developing students’ potential, I wish to see us unafraid to confront deficiency needs.
 
I can’t help but think that part of this issue is lack of access.  Helping students get past their deficiency needs toward their growth needs is a process.  However, education is the system that enables human flourishing—not just keeping students afloat and helping them survive but giving them the tools to thrive (Strike 2007).  Student readiness becomes a result of intellectual capital and human flourishing.  Just as we reflect on our practice to improve as educators, we need to create safe spaces for our students to reflect on who they are, what they do, and why they should care.  Because we work in loco parentis, it becomes a moral imperative to explore issues with students that touch on moral values and working at answers to change our culture positively.
 
Two things became clear that day in moving forward: collective impact and collective wisdom.  Maltbia & Power explain that “leveraging diversity is the collective impact of individual and organizational responses to differences in both the workplace and the external environment in pursuit of personal and organizational objectives” (2009). Collective wisdom creates the space for us to hold conversations that matter to build on these objectives.  Brown & Isaacs showed that “people already have within them the wisdom and creativity to confront the most difficult challenges” (2005).
 
This is a lot to digest.   

Because of what I explained in the point one (above), I landed on nonviolence.  I made this shift before any of these issues erupted in our culture and in our schools.  Personal experiences have pushed me over the edge toward nonviolence.  This shift came from a place of hurt, motivated by struggle, but I understood that it cannot be overcome with anger, or hate, or silent frustration.  Embracing nonviolence was the only path through a difficult one. 
 
As Rosenberg explained it, challenges us to give from the heart, from a place of abundance and not scarcity, to replace alienation with compassion (2015).  On that day, nonviolence as a response helped us to align the unexpected under a single cause to make the situation work for the good.
In our attitudes as educators, it is important to remind our students that boldness is not defined by disrespect or a lack of acknowledgment for others’ situations.  Challenging others with divergent views should be based on charitable truth.  Such an approach gives everyone involved a chance to look at their own response and actions, a chance at arriving at the truth, a chance at reaching for and finding compassion.  The same chances we want for and give ourselves.  In this way, we become the ones who work to develop cultural skills and sensitivity with both individuals and groups to advance a collective goal (i.e., here we are, we are all in this together).

In your classroom, don’t be afraid to conduct dialogues from the heart that foster relationship-building.  This practice fits well under the restorative practices movement in schools.  A restorative classroom will help you to be both reactive and preventive when situations occur.  Based on Smith, Fisher, and Frey (2015): 

There are seven steps: “(a) set the context, (b) create a hospitable space, (c) explore questions that matter, (d) encourage everyone’s contribution, (e) cross-pollinate and connect diverse perspectives, (f) listen together, (g) harvest and share collected discoveries” (Rosenberg 2015).  

This post brought to you by Martine Haglund, an Equity Specialist for the Rochester Public Schools
Feel free to connect with Mrs. Haglund via email

​Growing up, I did not want to be a teacher. School, especially in middle school, was the last place I ever wanted to be. I grew up in north Minneapolis and as a 7th grader I was the only white female student in my grade. Fights broke out constantly, teachers often cried in class, and   it was common for teachers to quit midway through the year. Education was not the focus: school was not a place I associated with learning. 

When I got to high school, it was still a very diverse setting but there were other white students. There were advanced classes where education and learning was actually the focus and the classroom was full of students who were there to learn. I thrived in this environment, learning from my teachers and peers who all had a variety of cultural backgrounds that brought in many different perspectives.
 
For those without my experience, maybe it is best to think about a school lunchroom. The lunchroom in a diverse school is a fascinating place. While in the classroom you will walk in and students of different cultural backgrounds are learning and working together, in most lunchrooms students tend to be pretty segregated. The black students sit with other black students, Hmong students with other Hmong students and white students with white students. There are always a few exceptions, but for the most part this is what a lunchroom looks like in my experience.
 
Once I became a teacher, and was no longer a student who was part of this segregated-by-choice system, I began asking “why?”. Why do we choose this? Why can’t we create the atmosphere--the one so many college pamphlets show when trying to demonstrate their diversity--where all students are friends who are able to cross the barrier of race  to all eat lunch together. Personally, I have always thrived in diverse setting and can see the importance of the different perspectives but have also struggled with the idea that when given the choice we tend to gravitate towards people with similar skin tones and backgrounds when in social setting.
 
The Why
Before coming to John Marshall this year I taught at Fridley High School in Fridley, MN where I was first introduced to Dr. Hollie and his CLRT strategies. It was the first year I was teaching at Fridley, which was very similar to the cultural makeup of John Marshall. I had been teaching for three years when I was introduced to CLRT, and I can honestly say there had not been a college course, a teacher training, or a professional development day that had affected my teacher and classroom culture the way this training did.
 
Dr. Hollie was about to outline the “why” behind the lunchroom conundrum. He explained why my peers in middle school where not interested in the content nor how my teachers were presenting it. He went through our differences, the different rings of culture, how we communicate with one another, and how much we lose when we do not understand the cultures that those around us have grown up in. As a student in north Minneapolis, I was very aware of other cultures. I was invited to and attended many events, family gatherings, and birthday parties that were very different from my own home culture. Even when writing this, I feel it ridiculous that it took this long to truly understand my educational experience as a student and now as a teacher.
 
Using CLRT strategies is so important, especially when working with students with other cultural backgrounds than our own. Creating a space where all students feel you understand, at least a small part of their home culture and that you want them to be able to express themselves in this way, builds a bridge that impacts the relationships you have with your classes as well as individual students in your classes. As a student who identifies with white culture yet grew up in a diverse school setting, it would have been really beneficial to have had teachers use CLRT strategies in my classes because other students would not have always had to code switch into the mainstream traditional teaching strategies that have been typically used in the United States over the last 200 years. The students as a whole would have been more engaged and I would have been able to focus on my education--even in middle school.
 
The How
I have only been teaching in the Rochester Public Schools the last four months and in that time I have talked with teachers in my building who are aware I do quite a bit with CLRT and have said, “I understand why this is important but I just do not feel comfortable, or just do not understand how to even start using some of the strategies.” First, I want to say, I get it. I too was once uncomfortable with the idea of using ‘call and response’ because it felt like it did not fit my personality. However, I would say now that I do not go a class period without using it. Now, I love ‘call and response’. Starting is the hardest part, but once you do you will not go back.
 
Below, I have outlined a few of the strategies I use on a weekly, if not daily, basis.

Call & Response
This is the easiest strategy to use; yet, I think it can be a really intimidating. I did not feel comfortable with this one right away, so I found a way to engage the class in the process that made it feel more natural. I asked students to help create the ‘call and response’. he first one that one of my classes decided to use was “When I say Holla, you say Back!” It was fun because they came up with it and it was specific for that class.
 
As I have become more comfortable with ‘call and response’, I started to come up with them on the spot and students come up with them as well. Together, we might have different ones that relate to the unit we are studying,  others that students know are more serious, and some others that are more fun. It is a full-class engagement tool to use!

​Silent Appointment
I use ‘silent appointments’ a lot when I am trying to get students to have conversations with people whom they do not tend to gravitate to in the classroom. Students must use eye contact to choose a partner. I tell them they have to make an appointment with someone on the other side of the room. They all look down at the floor and when I say, “One, two, three: look up!” They then have some time to make eye contact with someone. Once they have a partner, they put their hand over their heart. If they are still looking after 20 seconds I tell them to put their hand in the air so they last ones can find each other. It works really well!

1-3-6
This is a strategy I use when I want students to get a lot of different perspectives from their peers. They must answer a prompt or begin a compare contrast assignment task independently (that’s the “1”). Then, they move into a group of three to share and elaborate on ideas (that’s the “3”). After a set amount of time, I finally have them move into a group of six to discuss (that’s the “6”) For added learning, I also usually have a full-class Venn Diagram or an example on the board that groups can take turns filling out as they are working in or finishing up their six-person conversations. At the end, we discuss the topic as a whole group. 

**These are all strategies that can be found in Sharroky Hollie binder “Strategies for Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Teaching and Learning”.

A Work in Progress  
I am still a CLRT work in progress. The reading strategies still feel foreign and forced when I use them which is why I do not have many listed above. I am still working through them in my classroom. Honestly, I have failed many times when using these in my own class, but part of it is owning the failures. Students are more willing to be real and understanding with you if you do the same with them--that has been proven time and again in my own classroom.
 
It really is fun to shake things up, try a new strategy, and sometimes even fail. I enjoy this work and feel it is really important, especially in districts with a growing diverse population like here in the Rochester Public Schools. 

This post brought to you by Michaela Sperl, social studies teacher at John Marshall High School
Feel free to connect with Sperl via email

Many of us have asked ourselves the following questions at some point in our teaching career:

• How do I engage all my students in class?  
• How do I find what works best for them to learn and to participate in class?  
• How do I get students to stop saying things like: I am not a math person, I have never been good at math, or I don’t know why you think this year would be different?

How many of us, while sitting in meetings or presentations learning about CLR protocols, are left wondering, how do I use these in my math classroom?
 
While there is no quick fix or one simple solution, here are a few things to consider and try in your classroom that will engage your math students and create more culturally responsive learning spaces.
 
Recently, I came upon an article by Mark Ellis (access it here). In his piece, “Knowing and Valuing Every Learner: Culturally Responsive Mathematics Teaching,” he defines the idea of culturally responsive mathematics teaching (CRMT) as, “creating a learning environment focused on mathematical sense making in which each student feels valued for who they are, for their ways of engaging mathematical reasoning, and for their contributions to the collective success of those within the classroom community.” He goes on to talk about how CRMT requires teachers to (re)consider the mathematics learning environment they’ve created and how well it reflects these four elements:

Ellis explains that while “Supporting Deep Learning” is the most straightforward, it isn’t enough to just focus on that quadrant alone. A couple of questions that go with this element are:

• How am I ensuring my students learn mathematics with coherence?
• What connections and relationships will help them to build conceptual understanding?

 
The second element, “Engaging and Valuing Identities,” has these questions to think about:

• How do I learn about the experiences and interests of my students?  
• How do I communicate that these experiences and interests are valued in relation to their learning of mathematics?  

 
When addressing “Sharing Authority,” think about:

• What instructional routines do I use to scaffold students’ engagement in productive mathematical discourse and collaboration?
• Who is given mathematical authority in my classroom? Who is not?

 
Finally when thinking about the last element, “Applying Mathematics”, ask:

• How do I integrate concepts into instruction that are more relevant to my students?
• How am I helping my students to see ways to use mathematics to analyze and address issues within their community?  

In this same article, Ellis goes on to share some examples of what CRMT is not versus what it is, since there are often misconceptions. There are shown below:

You can see Ellis directly discuss the ideas above in this previously recorded webinar.

As I dug more deeply, I found this article by Omiunota Ukpokodu, published in Multicultural Education, which summarizes the types of questions teachers should be asking themselves to be self-reflective.  She states that “culturally responsive mathematics instructional practice must first begin with teachers setting high expectations for all students, holding themselves personally responsible if their students are not achieving, creating motivation by demystifying mathematics as culturally neutral, and scaffolding students’ learning to ensure their success” (53). I liked this idea because it focuses on what I can do as a teacher to help all my students, rather than make excuses for why students are not achieving. Frequently asking ourselves as teachers these self-reflective questions pushes us out of our comfort zones, puts the focus on our students, and helps us become more culturally responsive teachers.
 
These questions include:

• Who is learning math in my classroom and who is not? Why/why not?
• What is my expectation for each of my students in mathematics learning?
• How am I scaffolding instruction for student mathematics learning?
• Do I use word problems that are familiar to my students?
• What social and community issues am I integrating into mathematic curriculum and instruction?
• Do I allow student so contextualize their thinking when practices and solving mathematics problems?
• Am I open to divergent thinking and problem processing style?
• Do I look only for the right answer that I know?
• Do I look to understand students’ strategies and logic when they engage in mathematical problem solving?
• How caring and supportive is the learning context I foster?
• How did each of my students do today?
• How was I responsive to each of my students today?

From: Ukpokodu, Omiunota. How Do I teach Mathematics in a Culturally Responsive Way? 
Identifying Empowering Teaching Practices. Multicultural Education. Spring 2011. 53.

Once teachers have taken the time to ask themselves these self-reflective questions and honestly answer them, then they can start fostering a CRMT classroom.  Ukpokodu summarizes four ways to foster a CRMT classroom with the focus on cooperative learning structures:

So, the next time you find yourself struggling to find ways to get your students participating or learning in your class, look inward before looking outward.
 
To continue to grow and learn more about CRMT, consider follow the following people on Twitter:

• Mark Ellis: @EllisMathED
• Zaretta Hammond: @Ready4Rigor
• Rochelle Gutierrez: @RG1gal  

Also, you’ll likely want to read the book Reimagining the Mathematics Classroom by Mark Ellis. You and your students will be very grateful that you did.

This post brought to you by Jen Coenen, Secondary Implementation Associate and STEM Village Director