Canoe Building
The video showing the visit of an actual expert of something discussed is beneficial to the students. For example, if the topic in a History class is about the canoe building of the Haida Tribe as the video showed, the visit of Peele helped the students understand and appreciate the ways of the Haida Tribe and their Canoe making culture thus their learning took a step forward. However, getting the students actually involved and get them to help in making the Canoe is another thing which is better than just the invitation of an expert. The students were able to actually experience and be part of the lesson they were learning and get a connection with the natives.
This activity has indeed promoted a culturally responsive environment as a teaching learning environment was created for the students that encouraged them to embrace the local culture, an environment recognizing the capability of the students specifically in finishing the canoe project where they are encourage to finish the task out of their own, and most importantly along the way, they were able to “gain cross-cultural skills necessary for successful exchange and collaboration” (alliance.brown.edu, 2013) in the future. Furthermore, through this, the teacher’s role as a facilitator in a culturally responsive learning environment is further emphasize and he lets the students learn on their own.
When learning a specific culture, it is not necessary that the culture in not represented in the classroom. While learning the culture, this can trigger reactions that promote involvement of students. For example, a student may have similar culture with to culture being discussed and may give way for him to share what his culture is and how it is related to the discussion. By this, the student has been given a chance to share who he is and may provide ways of better understand his behaviors or other characteristics.
References:
Alliance.brown.edu (2008). Principles of Culturally Responsive Teaching. Retrieved from http://www.alliance.brown.edu/tdl/tl-strategies/crt-principles.shtml
Bertani, Todd et. al. (2012). Culturally Responsive Classrooms. Retrieved from http://www.sbbh.pitt.edu/files/pdf/Culturally%20Responsive%20Classrooms010412.pdf
Metropolitan Center for Urban Education (2008). Culturally Responsive Differentiated Instructional Strategies. Retrieved from http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/scmsAdmin/uploads/005/120/Culturally%20Responsive%20Differientiated%20Instruction.pdf
