BONGOS, BOOMBOXES AND SELF-PUBLISHED BOOKS: ACCESSING CURRICULUM THROUGH CULTURAL CONNECTIONS

In many schools through the United States today, educators are striving to improve their students’ access to the richness of culture and language in their communities and throughout the world. Attempts to implement multicultural education continue to be met with roadblocks including funding shortages, inadequate staffing, poor teacher training and minimal political support. These obstacles often hinder and prevent implementation and support of multicultural education. Because many primary and secondary schools have these barriers, colleges are experiencing these barriers for under-prepared diverse students as well.

Due to these common educational woes, institutions of higher education have to address systemic and institutional barriers in order to meet the needs of their under-prepared diverse student populations. Developmental education programs within these institutions of higher education are seeking creative and strategic responses to these barriers. Conscious efforts are being made to enhance culturally responsive classroom climate and practice by establishing collaborative networks that enhance pedagogical approaches and student performance.

This session will provide theory-based hands-on strategies of methods to help students get in touch with their own cultural heritage and to use that relevance to learn more about reading and writing, making learning more personal and interactive to improve learning for all students.

Strategies that participants will experience during this session include Power of Metaphor, comprehension exercises, 6 Facets of Understanding Question Techniques, and a student produced self-published book. Fall 2008 students in a developmental reading & writing class responded to Paul Fleischman’s novella “Seedfolks” by writing chapters themselves and self-publishing a book using blurb.com.