Multiculturalism in the Modern World: Jen Holladay at TEDxDenverTeachers
Summary
TLDRIn this TED Talk, a parent Guardian from Denver Public Schools emphasizes the importance of a deeper approach to multicultural education. They critique the superficial inclusion of food, festivals, and folklore, arguing for a more rigorous and critical engagement with diverse perspectives. The speaker advocates for a multiculturalism that is academically rigorous, promotes pro-social skills, and fosters social justice or critical thinking. They share examples from their child's education, highlighting the transformative power of teaching history from multiple viewpoints, such as Native American resistance narratives and the perspective of a buffalo in the context of westward expansion.
Takeaways
- 👨🏫 The speaker emphasizes the importance of multicultural education that goes beyond表面的文化元素如食物、节日、英雄和民间故事,提倡深入的内容和教学。
- 🎓 Multiculturalism in education should be rigorous, focusing on content and instruction that supports skill building and advanced learning.
- 🤝 It should foster pro-social capacities, enabling students to view issues from multiple perspectives and work collaboratively in diverse groups.
- 📚 The speaker criticizes the trivialization of significant cultural and historical events, such as serving tacos for Cinco de Mayo, which can reinforce stereotypes.
- 👀 The value of multicultural content is not just in its origin but also in the messages it conveys, which should be carefully considered.
- 🏫 The speaker shares their experience with Highline Academy Charter School, which practices purposeful integration and uses Core Knowledge Plus curriculum to ensure a balanced and rigorous education.
- 🌟 A key example is the teaching of westward expansion, where the speaker wanted their child to understand both the positive and negative impacts of progress.
- 📖 The use of diverse narratives, including resistance stories, is crucial for providing a comprehensive view of historical events.
- 🌱 The Denver Green School's approach to teaching westward expansion from the perspective of a buffalo is highlighted as an innovative method to engage students.
- 🌐 The ultimate goal of multicultural education is to empower children to participate effectively in a diverse democracy, preparing them to be critical thinkers.
Q & A
What is the main focus of the speaker's talk on multiculturalism?
-The speaker focuses on a rigorous and advanced form of multiculturalism that includes content and instruction, pro-social capacities, and advancing social justice or critical thinking.
Why does the speaker express concern about using food and festivals to represent multiculturalism in schools?
-The speaker is concerned because such practices can reinforce stereotypes and trivialize important cultural aspects, rather than promoting a deeper understanding of the cultures.
What is the risk associated with serving tacos for Cinco de Mayo in schools, according to the speaker?
-The risk is that students may not associate the food with the historical significance of Mexican resistance to French occupation, thus trivializing the event.
Why does the speaker criticize the use of folklore and fables in early childhood classrooms?
-The speaker criticizes this approach because it may not convey the messages and values of the stories as much as their geographical origin, which is not the primary goal of multicultural education.
What was the speaker's daughter's reaction to the story 'The Selkie Girl' in her multicultural anthology?
-The speaker's daughter, and the speaker themselves, were uncomfortable with the story's content, which was inappropriate for a second-grade literacy class.
What are the three characteristics of the multiculturalism the speaker advocates for?
-The three characteristics are: 1) Rigor in content and instruction, 2) Development of pro-social capacities, and 3) Advancement of social justice or critical thinking.
What was the controversy in Denver Public Schools regarding the new teacher evaluation protocol?
-The controversy arose because the new draft included elements related to social justice, which some community members feared would turn children into socialists, while others argued it was necessary to prevent reinforcing a white supremacist system.
How does the speaker describe Highline Academy Charter School's approach to multiculturalism?
-Highline Academy Charter School is described as a purposefully integrated school with a 50/50 split of students of color and white students, using a Core Knowledge Plus curriculum to ensure a rigorous and diverse learning experience.
What was the speaker's concern about her daughter's westward expansion unit in second grade?
-The speaker was concerned that her daughter was only getting half of the story, focusing on the positive aspects for some groups while not fully addressing the negative impacts on others, such as Native Americans.
How did Highline Academy Charter School supplement the core knowledge sequence for the westward expansion unit?
-They supplemented with various resources including fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and resistance narratives to provide a more balanced and comprehensive view of the historical event.
What was the unique approach taken by the Denver Green School for teaching the westward expansion unit?
-The Denver Green School taught the unit from the perspective of the Buffalo, offering a unique and multicultural viewpoint that allowed students to understand the impact of westward expansion on different species and environments.
Outlines
🌟 Multiculturalism Beyond Celebrations
The speaker, a parent and newly employed by the Adams 14 School District, emphasizes the importance of multiculturalism in education. They critique the common approach of focusing on food, festivals, and holidays, arguing that these can reinforce stereotypes and trivialize significant cultural aspects. Instead, they advocate for a more rigorous and meaningful engagement with multicultural content that supports academic skill-building, pro-social capacities, and social justice. The speaker shares concerns about how certain stories, like the 'selkie girl' tale, might be inappropriate or send the wrong messages to children, suggesting a need for careful selection of multicultural educational materials.
🏫 Implementing Social Justice in Education
This section discusses the controversy surrounding the term 'social justice' in educational settings, particularly within the Denver Public Schools. The speaker recounts how the introduction of social justice elements in a teacher evaluation protocol sparked debate, with some fearing it would indoctrinate children with socialist views, while others argued it was necessary to counter white supremacist ideologies. The speaker clarifies their stance on multiculturalism, aligning it with the development of critical thinking skills and pro-social proficiencies, which involve understanding multiple perspectives and working collaboratively in diverse groups. They highlight their involvement with Highline Academy Charter School, a purposefully integrated school that emphasizes core knowledge plus a diverse curriculum to ensure a comprehensive and equitable educational experience.
📚 Teaching History from Multiple Perspectives
The speaker shares their personal experience with their daughter's education, focusing on how history, specifically westward expansion, is taught. They express initial concerns about the potential one-sided narrative but are reassured by the school's approach to include a variety of perspectives, including resistance narratives from both Native Americans and white individuals who opposed the Indian Removal Act. This approach is praised for fostering a deeper understanding of historical events as complex and multifaceted. The speaker also describes their daughter's enthusiasm for learning, which led her to request a visit to the site of the Sand Creek Massacre, demonstrating the impact of this educational approach on student engagement and curiosity. Finally, they discuss the unique perspective taken by the Denver Green School, which taught the same historical unit from the viewpoint of the buffalo, symbolizing the importance of considering multiple perspectives in multicultural education.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Multiculturalism
💡Stereotypes
💡Pro-social capacities
💡Social justice
💡Core Knowledge
💡Westward Expansion
💡Resistance Narratives
💡Pioneer Perspective
💡Healthy Commons
💡Sustainability
💡Diverse Democracy
Highlights
The speaker emphasizes the importance of multiculturalism in education, which has been a topic of discussion since the 1970s.
Multicultural practices should not be limited to food, festivals, heroes, and holidays, as they risk reinforcing stereotypes and trivializing important issues.
The speaker critiques the common practice of serving culturally specific foods on holidays, suggesting it can oversimplify complex cultural histories.
The value of multicultural content extends beyond the origin of a story to the messages it conveys to the reader.
The speaker shares a personal experience of her daughter reading a story that objectified women, highlighting the importance of story selection in multicultural education.
Multiculturalism should be rigorous in content and instruction, supporting skill building and advanced student instruction.
Pro-social capacities are crucial for students to view issues from multiple perspectives and work collaboratively in diverse groups.
Social justice or critical thinking is a key component of the multiculturalism the speaker advocates for in schools.
The speaker discusses the controversy around the term 'social justice' and how it was met with both support and resistance in the Denver Public Schools community.
Highline Academy Charter School, where the speaker is involved, is a purposefully integrated school with a 50/50 ratio of students of color to white students.
Core Knowledge Plus is a teaching approach that provides a scaffolded set of content, ensuring a comprehensive and sequential learning experience.
The speaker's daughter's school experience with westward expansion was enriched by supplementing the curriculum with diverse perspectives and resistance narratives.
The Denver Green School, which the speaker's daughter later attended, taught westward expansion from the perspective of a Buffalo, offering a unique and multicultural approach.
The speaker urges educators to go beyond表面的multicultural practices to truly empower children to participate in a diverse democracy.
The talk concludes with a call to action for educators to embrace a deeper, more critical form of multicultural education.
Transcripts
so it's important for me to say that I
am here as a parent Guardian from the
Denver Public Schools and I just want to
thank the organizers for inviting a
parent voice into this venue I really
appreciate the opportunity I also just
accepted a job with the Adams 14 School
District's I got to do a little shout
out for Adams 14 you know most TED Talks
talk about a new idea or a big idea I'm
talking about a really old idea it's
been around for decades I'm talking
about multiculturalism we were talking
about it in 1978 and we're still talking
about it today because it's been around
for such a long time it can mean
different things to different people so
I want to talk about some multicultural
practices that I'm not talking about
today I am NOT talking about food and
festivals or heroes and holidays
okay these sorts of things can be really
fun they're very easy to do and if
they're authentic to the cultures that
are represented in our school they can
be really fun community builders but
they also come with some risks one of
the things that I've see a lot out here
as I see I see things on the school menu
we'll have tacos and celebration of
Cinco de Mayo
we'll have Fried Chicken for Martin
Luther King Day we'll have soul food on
the menu during Black History Month and
again these sorts of things can be fun
but they also run the risk of sort of
reinforcing stereotypes and they also
run the risk of trivializing things that
are really really quite important so how
many people here think most of your
students have heard of Cinco de Mayo
right and so if y'all had taught I use
y'all as a gender-neutral pronoun if
y'all had tacos on your menu as your
students are biting into that taco are
they thinking about Mexican resistance
to French occupation that what they're
thinking about No
so it runs the risk of sort of
trivializing something that is actually
quite important
oops can you go back one I'm also not
talking about something we do a lot in
early childhood classrooms which is when
we bring in stories from all over the
world right kind of that folklore and
sort of fables approach again this is
something that's really easy to do it's
also a way to kind of ensure that our
children our diverse children in a
classroom see somebody who looks like
them and what they're reading in the
classroom it's a really easy thing to do
but I want to remind everybody that the
value of multicultural content is not
just about where a story comes from it's
also about the messages that the story
relays to the reader
last year in her second grade literacy
class my daughter was reading a
multicultural anthology one of the
stories that was included in that
anthology was a story called the selkie
girl which is a traditional Celtic tale
and if I were to summarize this story
it's basically about a man who gets
obsessed with a magical seal woman so
I'm going to read one paragraph from
this story he went to look in wonder and
delight he saw three beautiful girls
sitting on the rocks
naked combing their hair one of the
girls had fair hair one red and one
black the fair haired girl was singing
she was the most beautiful of the three
and he could not take his eyes from her
he gazed and gazed at her gleaming white
body okay this was my daughter's
response to that story I would say it
was my response as well so when you are
using sort of the stories from around
the world approach remember that the
messages matter the messages of the
story matter as much as where the
stories come from to be fair to my child
this is what Zooey looks like happy okay
so if I'm not talking about food and
festivals or heroes or holidays or
folklore and fables what am I talking
about I am talking about the kind of
social the kind of multiculturalism
that's characterized by three base
big things it is rigorous in terms of
content and instruction very rigorous it
supports all that skill building we're
so concerned about it also is designed
particularly with instruction to
advanced students pro-social capacities
and that's a big phrase that just means
our students can look at issues from
multiple points of view and they can
work collaboratively in diverse groups
that's what pro-social proficiencies are
and the third thing that the kind of
multiculturalism that I'm talking about
does is that it advances social justice
let's talk about that for a second last
fall in the Denver Public Schools we had
a little kerfuffle DPS rolled out the
new a draft of the new teacher
evaluation protocol and it included some
elements that related to this term
social justice and so it brought out
some pretty significant responses in our
community to some people in our
community if we focus on social justice
that means we're going to turn all of
our children into socialists who hate
white people okay this of course this
kind of response then brought out people
from the other end of the spectrum who
said if we don't have an emphasis on
social justice in our schools that just
means our schools will serve to
reinforce the white supremacist
heterosexist oligarchy and by the way so
right so if you get hung up on the
social justice term if it's not a term
that works well for you I'm going to
take a cue from our school
superintendent Tom Bose Berg when we
were having this kerfuffle in DPS
who just came back and said we want our
kids to be critical thinkers
multiculturalists are interested in our
children being able to look at issues
from multiple points of view work
collaboratively with each other
and really kind of solve problems so the
kind of multiculturalism that I'm
talking about is the kind that is
rigorous academically content and
instruction it advances pro-social
proficiency particularly through
instruction and it advances social
justice or critical thinking would ever
term you're most comfortable with
so one of the schools that I have the
privilege of being involved in in Denver
and Denver Public Schools is Highline
Academy Charter School
I'm the board president there that's a
volunteer position where I work
full-time and yeah and Highline Academy
is a k-8 public charter school
authorized by Elissa authorized by the
Denver Public Schools we are a
purposefully integrated school and we
mean that like in the old school way we
are 50% of color and 50% white that's on
purpose and the demographics of South
East Denver allow us to do that we're
also what we call a court what we call
literally we made this up we are a core
knowledge plus school those of you who
know core knowledge if you don't know
core knowledge what it basically is it's
a it's a sequence and a scaffolded set
of content that spirals up through the
grade levels and it's a really useful
tool because it allows us to make sure
that you know our kids aren't reading
that I have a dream speech every year
when they when they do Martin Luther
King Day right it just allows us to
create shared knowledge and second grade
that is then built upon in the fifth
grade so when Zoe my daughter was in 2nd
grade last year this was when they had
their first introduction to westward
expansion and it was now High Line High
Line has where a core knowledge Plus
school
we supplement our content a lot to make
sure it meets the needs of our diverse
learners and when Zoey got into this
westward expansion unit it was a whole
bunch of a pioneer wagon trains River
boats trains and that and varied that
based sort of in this manifest destiny
mentality and that is a perfectly valid
way to teach westward expansion it
really is because westward expansion was
really really good for a lot of people
and we probably would not be here today
had it not unfolded the way that it did
but westward expansion was not good for
everybody
and I was really worried that Zoey was
only getting sort of half of the story
and so I sat down and I thought to
myself okay what is it I really want her
to know by the end of this unit what do
I wanted to be able to answer and I
wanted her to be able to think about how
can progress be both positive and
negative that's really what I wanted her
to be able to reflect on with this unit
and so we supplemented a lot we
supplemented a lot we brought in the
core knowledge sequence for example
includes a short story that's the that's
told from the perspective of a pioneer
girl who's going out on the road right
and so we then diagram early grades
teachers best friend we did a Venn
diagram activity using a story about a
bitterroots Eilish girl who was being
forcibly removed from her home that was
one way we brought in we brought in
fiction nonfiction we brought in poetry
from the Choctaw we brought in an
important thing that we brought in were
resistance narratives because when you
teach history particularly this episode
of history it's almost like it's a
foregone conclusion but there was
massive resistance to policies of Indian
Removal we certainly taught some of the
resistance narratives from Native
America but we also made a point to do
resistance resistance narratives from
white folks the the ladies of stupid
Ville oh hi Oh a group of Quaker women
who wrote to Congress asking them to be
more equitable a u.s. senator who gave a
six-hour long speech
on the floor of Congress asking folks to
reject the Indian Removal Act we brought
in lots and lots of different things and
by the end of the unit my child and many
others could answer or at least reflect
on right about that essential question
in what ways can progress be both
positive and negative they used all of
their skills their reading skills their
writing skills we had mapping activities
for geography we had graphing activities
for math it was a whole sort of skill
based it was very rigorous for my child
she was really transformed I would say
by this unit it really sparked a passion
for her I took at least three trips to
the bookies which is our little
independent teacher bookstore in
southeast Denver to get her nonfiction
books about Native America that kind of
thing and then she did the most
incredible thing she asked us to do
something over spring break she didn't
want to go to camp she didn't want to
lay around and play video games this is
what she wanted to do she wanted to go
see the side of the Sand Creek Massacre
because she had read about it in some of
her books
so she was really really motivated by
this content you know that you're
getting it right when the kids are doing
it on their own time you know you're
getting it right so between second and
third grade Zoey changed schools she is
now at the Denver Green School which is
a when it's fully enrolled it'll be a
k-8 vk8 and it's an innovation school
which means it's it's a traditional DPS
school but it's got its own kind of
thing going on it does have an
environmental if I could get some water
that would be helpful
and it does have an environmental focus
but it's really built around these
principles of sustainability and it's a
little different than environmentalism
so for example they are really
interested in teaching children about
the healthy commons how do we protect
the healthy commons thank you
hmm much better so the idea of the
healthy commons is there are things that
we share in common right we share the
earth we share the land we share the
water how do we work collectively to
protect those things so Zooey goes to
the Denver Green School and wouldn't you
know at there teach in westward
expansion in the third grade right I'm
like really because we just we just did
this and we just did it really well and
it was it was awesome and now she's
going to sit in class and do it all over
again
well cartel cartel Jacquet her teacher
definitely did lay down some background
knowledge about what happened for Native
America and the Pioneers and that sort
of thing and then mr. Jacquet did
something that rocked my daughter's
world and it rocked my world and it's
very Denver Green School he taught the
unit from the perspective of Buffalo
right and if you think about
multiculturalism being about inviting
multiple perspectives think about the
power of children looking at westward
expansion from these three frameworks it
was really quite a beautiful it was a
really beautiful and exciting thing for
my daughter and for me and hopefully for
all the kids so I just want to ask all
of the educators in the room that when
you think about doing multiculturalism
please don't stop with heroes and
holidays food and festivals folklore and
fables please don't stop there and maybe
don't even start there because there is
a wonderful way to do a kind of teaching
and learning that is going to build
those academic skills you care about
that's going to allow children to really
look at issues from multiple
perspectives and that is going to enable
them to sort of think very critically
and and doing multicultural education
really at the end of the day is about
empowering our children to be really
prepared to participate in our diverse
democracy thank you very much
you
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