Ways to Create a Culturally Responsive Classroom

The rise in diversity across the United States means today’s students will be working and living with people from a wide array of backgrounds. It also means instructors increasingly have diverse populations of students in their classrooms. Below are resources to assist educators in creating a culturally responsive classroom that is respectful of diversity and inclusive of all perspectives and backgrounds. 
 

* NEW: Global Social Justice Education Framework

Global social justice education challenges educators to utilize global competencies to recognize systems of injustice, and to work to create equitable learning environments for all participants. This new Global Social Justice Education Framework serves as a model to help ensure that CTE programs are designed to value all students and to prepare them for success in our interconnected world. 

Professional Development Module

Want to dig deeper into the importance of global competence as a way to promote respect and empathy for diversity? Take Module 7: Deep Dive Into Global Competence and Respecting Diversity, a short 15-minute online professional development module that is part of the Career Readiness in a Global Economy program. This module is available for free (log-in required) in partnership with ACTE. Instructors will examine how to leverage the diversity in their classrooms and also how to encourage all students to pursue careers in STEM and CTE.

Classroom Resources 

• ACTE has gathered reports, articles, guides and toolkits to help you develop and support access and equity in high-quality CTE programs of study.
   
• Anti-Defamation League's free K-12 curricula teaches current events topics through the lens of diversity, bias, and social justice. 
   
• Diversity Discussion Starters are conversation starters to get your classroom discussing diversity.
   
• Facing History provides free resources on teaching history as well as current events. 
   
• The Human Library, based out of Denmark, was created to promote a greater understanding among people of different backgrounds. 
   
• OECD Toolkit on Teaching for Diversity contains free tools and resources to equip educators to teach in increasingly diverse classrooms.
   
• Race Bridge Studios provides tools and resources to explore diversity and race relations through respectful discussion, reflection, and action.
   
• StoryCorps was developed to, "preserve and share humanity's stories in order to build connections between people and create a more just and compassionate world." See the stories of others or have students create new stories.

• Tanenbaum’s Seven Principles for Inclusive Education contains free resources and curricula for inclusive and respectful classrooms. 

• Learning for Justice provides free resources anchored in their Social Justice Standards.

• Who Are My Students? activity from Asia Society, utilizes Mapping the Nation to help you take stock of who your students are and where they come from, allowing you to use the diversity in your classroom to engage your students. 

Readings

Articles, books, and blog posts on educating diverse students. 

• "Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain," book by Zaretta Hammond.

• "Diversity Education: An Investment You Can't Afford to Delay," blog post on Education Week by Tanenbaum Center. 

• "Encouraging Respectful Conversations on Religious Diversity," blog post on Education Week by Tanenbaum Center. 

• "Teaching Global Competence: Lessons and Strategies From Hong Kong," (using the Human Library), blog post on Education Week by Vanessa Shadoian-Gersing.

• "Unpacking Cultural Complexity to Create More Equitable Learning," blog post on Education Week by Sarah Luchs.