Summer Seminar in Multicultural Education and Anti-Bullying Strategies, University of Puerto Rico - Río Piedras.

1. Summer Seminar 2014
University of Puerto Rico –Rio Pierdas
Metropolitan State University of Denver

2.  Dr. Myron Anderson
 Dr. Vanessa Anderson
 Dr. Jan Perry-Evenstad
 Dr. Percy A. Morehouse
 Dr. Carmen Sanjurjo
 Dr. Peter Vigil
 Metropolitan State University of Denver

3.  What is culture?
 What is multicultural education?
 Criticisms of multicultural education
 Relevance of multicultural education in U.S. ?
 Relevance of multicultural education in Puerto Rico?
 Connections to Bullying

4.  Socially transmitted ways of thinking, believing,
feeling, and acting within a group.
 These patterns are transmitted and transformed from
one generation to the next.
 The various facets of culture are shared and
interrelated
 “…man is an animal suspended in webs of
significance he himself has spun. I take culture to be
those webs and the analysis of it to be therefore not
an experimental science in search of law but an
interpretive one in search of meaning (Geertz, 1973)

5. Multiculturalism
Multicultural Education

6. Heterosexual
Academic
Chicano
Upper-
Middle
Class
Husband
Professor
Middle-aged
Family Member
Brother/Son

7. Multiculturalism
Multicultural
Education

8.  cultural competency, the idea that teachers acquire the knowledge and
skills to function productively in cross-cultural classrooms and to interact
efficiently with students from cultures that differ from their own (Marquez-
Chisholm, 1994);
 culturally responsive teaching, an instructional strategy based on the theory
that when curriculum and skills are situated within the lived experiences and
frames of references of students, they are more personally meaningful and
are learned more easily and thoroughly (Gay, 2000);
 reflective practice, the concept that teachers develop the skills of critical
analysis and self-reflection, allowing them to examine their own cultural
perspectives and personal assumptions underlying their expectations,
beliefs and behaviors when interacting with CLD students (Ladson-
Billings,1995).

9.  Content Integration
 The Knowledge Construction Process
 Prejudice Reduction
 An Equity Pedagogy
 An Empowering School Culture

13.  Examples:
 Utilize active inquiry-based learning
 Cooperative learning techniques
 Native –language instruction
 Performance-based assessment
 Incorporating students’ funds of knowledge into
curriculum (Moll, 1993)

14.  Critical Pedagogy: Paulo Freire, Henry Giroux, Donaldo Macedo,
Peter McClaren, Ira Shore, Sonia Nieto, John Dewey
 Problem posing, reflective thinking, knowledge gathering and
collaborative decision making
 Intentional instructional opportunities to discuss critically and act
on issues that directly affect the society they will form:
 Racism, Environmental Pollution, Human Rights, Sexism, Gun Laws
(school shootings), Global Warming, Gay Rights, Ubiquitous
Technology, Immigration, Income disparities, etc.
 “Helping students recognize that they are protagonists in the story
of their own lives and adequately preparing them to act upon this
knowledge”

15.  Multicultural education is antiracist. It does not gloss over the
presence of racism in society but addresses it
 Multicultural education is vital for both majority and minority
students.
 Multicultural education is critical pedagogy. Teachers and
students do not view knowledge or educations as being
neutral or apolitical
 Multicultural education is ongoing and dynamic and involves
relationships between people as much as content
 Multicultural education is education for social justice. It
connects knowledge and understanding with social action

16.  What does it have to do with increasing achievement (e.g., test
scores) ?
 Contrary to Public school mission of preparing students to
participate in shared national culture
 Schools should teach allegiance to shared national values
 American education system is undermined by dogmas that have
little to do with quality education
 Puts minority sentiments on a pedestal while putting majority values
on trial.
 If “the system is so bad”, why are substantial numbers of certain
minority groups able to succeed? Other groups need to get on
board

17.  “Achievement Gap”
 Heterogeneous – student population
◦ Nearly 50 % students of color
 Homogeneous – teacher population
◦ 84 % of teachers are Anglo
 Disproportionate numbers of crucial statistics:
◦ Educational achievement
◦ Incarceration rates
◦ Socio-economic status
◦ Life expectancy

18.  Dr. Carmen Sanjurjo……