Background and Introduction
Introduction
In the modern world, globalization and immigration have led to a lot of interaction among people. While many countries continue to experience cultural diversity, the united states one of the leading countries that have people from all over the world. As such, nearly every socio-economic and political aspects experience the impact. One of the areas that require a lot of attention towards accommodating the effects of cultural diversity in education. In his article placed in the World Journal of Education, Yuan (2017) argues that it is essential to develop culturally responsive teachers. In the past few decades, educational settings have considerably changed and have become more diverse and somewhat complicated. The rapid pluralistic populations’ influx from various societies significantly contributes to the differences in student populations.
Research shows that differences among the students introduce various problems, particularly the new teachers who lack enough skills and experience in culturally responsive teaching (CRT). In this regard, new teachers experience an array of problems, including the management of students from different backgrounds. Turner & Drake (2016) assert that a significant proportion of the people living in most of the city neighborhoods come from poor backgrounds. Besides, these populations comprise of people from different cultures. It is apparent that people from various parts of the world migrate into the United States and become acculturated in different ways. While some people migrate to the United States for business and employment matters, so many people are in the United States for education. For whatever reason that makes many people get into the United States, most of the immigrants and other citizens decide to advance their knowledge at some point in life.
Therefore, culturally responsive learning is increasingly becoming crucial in the United States and other nations across the globe. In light of this, teachers need to have culturally sensitive teaching skills. Mogari (2017) argues that socio-cultural activities provide the learners with the context that demand increased levels of multicultural integration. The researcher notes that culture-based stereotypes are prevalent in different communities. However, these stereotypes are some of the challenges that hamper education in most of the schools. For example, gender discrimination enhances lousy conduct among the affected parties. As such, students may start focusing on cultures and beliefs concerning another gender while minimizing concentration in class. In this regard, Sciuchetti (2017) suggests that teachers should improve their culturally responsive teaching skills by learning or having some insights into other cultures.
Understanding some aspects of different cultures helps in creating a harmonious learning setting for culturally diverse learners. Also, teachers in a culturally diverse background should understand issues concerning different students and provide some reasonable solutions to promote impartiality in classes. This research establishes that new teachers in culturally diverse environments encounter various challenges in classes. As such, this research confirms that teachers must eliminate different conducts that promote social prejudice, stereotyping, and other discriminative behaviors occurring in schools while hampering educational progress in culturally diverse environments.
The research by Sherfinski, Jalalifard, Zhang & Hayes (2019) establishes that teachers receive various skills to address challenges in a setting with different cultures. However, no sooner they graduate from colleges, than they start dropping these skills. The researchers learned that most teachers complain that huge roles they play in classes, as well as increased activities that they must complete, are some of the factors that make then fail to implement these skills. However, other new teachers lack culturally responsive teaching skills. While this research helps to understand the need for teachers to implement culturally responsive teaching programs in classes, it also aims to advance culturally sensitive teaching while enhancing academic performance among students in culturally responsive learning environments.
This research investigates some of the most challenging aspects of the new teachers in a culturally responsive teaching setting. For instance, this qualitative research will try to examine how adequately-prepared are new teachers towards effective classroom management. Also, the study seeks to understand the kind of classroom management practices that new teachers implement for effective, culturally responsive teaching. In this regard, it is essential to understand the type of knowledge that the new teachers have concerning culturally sensitive teaching and learning behaviors among the students. Further, the research will determine the level of teacher-preparedness towards adopting culturally responsive pedagogy.
Background
Traditionally, teachers play a crucial duty in the children’s development process. As such, culturally responsive instructions make learners from different backgrounds embrace one another regardless of their cultures, beliefs, or lifestyles. Therefore, CRT is essential, especially in the contemporary world, where globalization has dramatically influenced cultural integration, acculturation, and assimilation.
Therefore, it is significant to address the problems that new teachers face in their endeavor to practice culturally responsive teaching to improve teacher’s educational experience while improving learners’ academic performance and competency. Otherwise, society may start experiencing undesirable results when the educators relax on accepting other peoples’ cultures by implementing unhealthy practices concerning classroom management. According to some research, teachers are gradually relaxing and lacking a passion for embracing culturally responsive teaching (Keehne, Sarsona, Kawakami & Au, 2018). According to Yuan (2017), a considerable population among Black American students are increasingly developing psychological problems, mainly because of stereotypes associated with their beliefs.
Yuan (2017) learns that most of the learners believe that culturally responsive learning is crucial for societal development and equality. Some of the changes experienced by new teachers include student assessment and classroom management problems. The latter is a societal and pedagogical problem. Although some educators may fail to emphasize on family backgrounds and cultural differences among the students, studies establish that focusing on these elements among the students enhances the association between the learners and students while improving the students’ performance. Besides, this research underscores that eliminating some historical perceptions concerning a particular group or community is a process that requires extensive exercise by the educators towards embracing the CRT model.
In light of this, disrupting the historical thinking on the education system among the educators demands repetitive practice. Nonetheless, teachers deed to understand and embrace cultural diversity among the students to permit impartiality when managing classroom affairs. While educators should establish various teaching strategies, to ensure that students grasp different concepts in classes, they must have adequate classroom preparation. Although the existing educational and societal setting is culturally diverse, new teachers are experiencing an array of challenges in these environments, as determined above. These challenges are no longer teachers’ problems but a primary societal concern.
References
Mogari, D. (2017). Using culturally relevant teaching in a co-educational mathematics class of a patriarchal community. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 94(3), 293-307.
Sherfinski, M., Jalalifard, M., Zhang, J., & Hayes, S. (2019). Narrative portfolios as culturally responsive resistance to neoliberal early childhood teacher education: A case study. Journal of Research in Childhood Education, 33(3), 490-519.
Turner, E. E., & Drake, C. (2016). A review of research on prospective teachers’ learning about children’s mathematical thinking and cultural funds of knowledge. Journal of Teacher Education, 67(1), 32-46.
Keehne, C. N., Sarsona, M. W., Kawakami, A. J., & Au, K. H. (2018). Culturally responsive instruction and literacy learning. Journal of Literacy Research, 50(2), 141-166.
Yuan, H. (2017). Developing culturally responsive teachers: Current issues and a proposal for change in teacher education programs. World Journal of Education, 7(5), 66-78.
Sciuchetti, M. B. (2017). Addressing inequity in special education: An integrated framework for culturally responsive social, emotional practice. Psychology in the Schools, 54(10), 1245-1251.