Digital Blog Post #G- Chapter 10

     The first topic to catch my attention was multicultural education in 21^st century schools. Multicultural education is defined as the way teachers go about “affirming” the expansive diversity of student interests, needs, and talents present in every school classroom. Multicultural education is based on the idea that all students should have an equal opportunity to learn. The idea is that we must provide majority students with information about people who are different from them, and diverse students with opportunities to locate themselves, their histories, and their cultures in the curriculum. Students tend to be more engaged when they can connect to the subject matter. This begins with creating culturally relevant curriculum and instruction. As an educator, you must find a way to connect the subject matter to student’s experiences. For example, using mathematics to calculate the distance between subway stops. You must also expand teaching methods to include small group learning opportunities rather than just whole-class or large group instruction. Small group learning gives students the opportunity to get to know other students and improve their cross-cultural understanding. Promoting group work among diverse groups of students can expand appreciation and understanding among students. There are also ways we can use technology to make learning easier and more interesting for diverse students. Resources such as online translators and international news and interactive maps can be helpful for those students who are linguistically or racially diverse and also those who are the majority and are eager to learn.

     Another topic I felt was important to address was differentiated instruction and universal design for learning. Differentiated instruction is an instructional approach in which teachers create different educational experiences as ways to meet the learning needs of individual students. To achieve this, you should think of multiple ways to achieve the same end result, then let students choose the way that makes the most sense to them. For example, letting students choose between writing and acting out skits or playing a series of games. A lesser example of this is in mathematics, when there are multiple ways or formulas to solve an equation, you teach all of the methods instead of just one so that if one way doesn’t make sense to a particular student, perhaps another will. This method of instruction allows for multiple learning styles to be addressed in the space of one class period. Universal design for learning is the application of universal design principles to educational settings. This method applies recent advances in understanding how the brain processes information to the design of a curriculum that can accommodate broad student needs. The idea is to create teaching and learning situations that serve the needs of the widest range of students without diminishing or reducing opportunities for anyone. I think that both of these methods are extremely important. It’s a fact that not one student is identical to the next. Everyone has different learning styles and different things that make sense to them, and this cannot be ignored, especially in the classroom. This is the first that I’ve heard about this concept, but I know that I definitely want to include it in my teaching methods when the time comes.

     The last topic I chose to address is assistive technology to reach diverse learners. Assistive technologies apply the concept of technological convergence to the ways that information technologies enable teachers to differentiate instruction and pursue universal design. These tools allow individuals with disabilities to do things they might otherwise not be able to do. Assistive technologies can help students with hearing, sight, mobility, cognitive, or other disabilities/challenges. These assistive technologies are relatively new, and I can only imagine how discouraging it must be to have a disability when trying to learn, but individuals with disabilities are finally getting more attention now and more and more assistive technologies are being produced every day. Some important technologies that may be avidly used in the classroom include speech recognition software, text reading software (or text-to-speech software), and interactive electronic storybooks or storybook applications. Our society is making leaps and bounds in promoting the success of diverse students and I am excited to see what other advances we’ll make and I will be able to utilize in the years to come.

Resources:
Maloy, Robert, Verock-O’Loughlin,Ruth-Ellen, Edwards, Sharon A., and Woolf, Beverly Park (2013). Transforming Learning with New Technologies. 2nd Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.


Morrison, T. (2015, October 18). Student Diversity Word Cloud. Created with Tagxedo http://www.tagxedo.com/app.html