Abstract
This article examines how four urban elementary teachers designed their literacy instruction in ways that sought to sustain students’ cultural competence—maintaining their language and cultural practices while also gaining access to more dominant ones—amid expectations to prepare students for high-stakes testing. A large part of their teaching involved taking their students’ backgrounds into account and selecting classroom texts to provide examples of the contributions made by successful culturally, ethnically, and linguistically diverse people with space for dialogue about inequity.
A major concern in the education field is how U.S. schools respond to culturally and linguistically diverse students, knowing that in many ways, schools contribute to their marginalization and deficit-oriented perspectives (Bennett, 2012; Orfield, Frankenberg, & Lee, 2003; Pacheco, 2010; Sleeter, 2012). Another major concern is over the neoliberal ideologies, discourses, and reforms that permeate and drive the educational context. The subsequent accountability policies privilege monolingual and monocultural standards (McCarty & Lee, 2014). As a result, student performance on high-stakes tests is scrutinized and prevails as the ultimate form of school success, with culturally and linguistically diverse students often performing below students from more mainstream backgrounds (Brandt, 2007; Sturges, 2015). Instruction that is responsive to students’ backgrounds and that honors their diversity as an asset holds promise for marginalized students, and as many would argue, is more important now than ever (Bergeron, 2008; Dara Hill, 2009; Ladson-Billings, 2014).
This article examines both of these concerns in the context of four urban elementary school teachers. Specifically, these teachers sought to sustain students’ cultural competence—maintaining their language and cultural practices while also gaining access to more dominant ones—amid expectations to prepare students for high-stakes testing. I highlight how the teachers found a way to comply with test preparation in ways that were not as yielding to a “testing” curriculum. A large part of their teaching involved taking their students’ backgrounds into account and selecting texts to provide examples of the important contributions made by culturally, ethnically, and linguistically diverse people with space for dialogue about inequity. The action these teachers took in an otherwise oppressive situation (for themselves and their students) created from high-stakes testing demonstrates their critical meta-awareness (Souto-Manning, 2013) to influence and adapt their teaching contexts.
Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy (CSP)
I use Django Paris’s (2012) theory of CSP to examine and interpret teachers’ practices. Paris challenges teachers and researchers to take up a new stance on what is often referred to as “culturally relevant pedagogy.” He proposed the term “culturally sustaining pedagogy” as a way of re-envisioning what it means to foster cultural pluralism and equality (Paris, 2012). He offered this new term as a way of embracing and then pushing further the work of scholars who have laid the foundation for thinking about what it means to teach students of non-dominant backgrounds from a stance of what has become known collectively as “asset pedagogies” (Ball, 1995; Heath, 1983; Ladson-Billings, 1995; Moll, 1992). According to Paris, CSP goes beyond what it means to be relevant or responsive because “it requires that they [the pedagogies] support young people in sustaining the cultural and linguistic competence of their communities while simultaneously offering access to dominant cultural competence” (p. 95). This stance also acknowledges the importance of linguistic, literate, and cultural pluralism without assuming that such practices are static or limited exclusively to some groups but not others. CSP emphasizes and demands pluralist outcomes. Paris and Alim (2014) clarify that CSP is intended as a “loving critique” of the asset-based pedagogies that have come before and that provide a foundation for CSP. In response to their assertions that CSP moves beyond earlier work, Ladson-Billings (2014) agrees with them and pushes for evolving understandings of what it means to be culturally relevant. She challenges the superficial understandings that have come from previous work by practitioners and researchers.
Paris and Alim (2014) also hold critical consciousness to be an important part of the CSP framework. In this way, CSP can help students develop a critical lens to consider and critique oppressive practices. They refer to CSP as being at the edge of critical and asset-based pedagogies.
How a CSP framework translates from theory to practice still needs much attention. As the construct Paris has proposed is fairly new, there is little empirical research on what CSP actually looks like in practice. Most research examines culturally responsive pedagogy, culturally relevant pedagogy, multicultural teaching, equity pedagogy, or social justice pedagogy (Sleeter, 2012). A recent study that has used a CSP framework examined teachers’ practices in relation to monolingual language policy (Michener, Sengupta-Irving, Proctor, & Silverman, 2015). The researchers conducted a comparative case study of two elementary classrooms to explore how teachers’ pedagogical approaches reflected educational language policies. They found that although the two teachers may have differed in their approaches, there was still little evidence of their use of culturally sustaining practices. Despite using the framework of CSP, this study does not offer an example of what CSP looks like in the classroom.
In another study, McCarty and Lee (2014) focused on what CSP looks like in Native American communities. They argued that CSP should not only seek to sustain, but can also be “revitalizing” for communities whose practices may have been suppressed or disrupted by colonization. Grounded in their concern for Native students’ achievement and the lack of instruction in Native languages or culture, McCarty and Lee found that some of the strategies for sustaining and revitalizing students’ cultures included building community, teaching Native languages, creating a sense of belonging, using non-traditional teaching methods, and integrating Native perspectives and culture in the curriculum.
As most research has examined culturally responsive and relevant pedagogies, it is important to understand what has come before CSP (Paris, 2012). Culturally responsive and relevant pedagogies emphasize the importance of educative environments that validate and that are “comprehensive, multidimensional, empowering, transformative, and emancipatory” (Gay, 2000). In these classrooms, community building is important, as are building empathy and understanding (Bennett, 2012). In addition, culturally responsive and relevant approaches embrace equality, access, social justice, and equity (Sleeter, 2012).
Empirical studies on culturally responsive and relevant teaching support underlying notions of what is important in connecting with students from non-dominant backgrounds. For example, in one study of a novice teacher’s enactment of a culturally responsive curriculum, the researcher found that what was important for the teacher was building community in the classroom along with promoting oral language development through social interaction and classroom dialogue. Other important factors relate to valuing diversity and celebrating the potential of each individual (Bergeron, 2008). In another study, Scott and White (2013) examined adolescent girls who participated in a multimedia program that fostered culturally responsive computing practices. After collecting data for 2 years, the researchers concluded that the main attributes of the program that helped empower the girls included building on the girls’ assets and the sense of connectedness that came from dialogue and problem solving. They also found that the girls sustained their motivation to stay in the program through the process of learning and mastering the technology and challenging negative stereotypes.
Other areas of research examine the role of hip-hop education as one way of enacting culturally relevant and critical approaches (Petchauer, 2015). For example, one study of young urban children’s hip-hop identities and communities of practice found that children used hip-hop in ways that exemplified their ability to language-shift as well as use creative and critical thinking skills (Love, 2015). For these children, their identities were interwoven with hip-hop, demonstrating their cultural plurality. The researcher argues that CSP provides an appropriate framework for understanding hip-hop-based education because of the cultural hybridity that occurs when students construct their identities from multiple cultures.
In these examples of what culturally responsive and relevant teaching practices look like, there is emphasis placed on community building and critical consciousness. What is missing from these studies, however, is an examination of how these practices manifest in the larger context of high-stakes testing. Ladson-Billings (2014) eloquently points out that in the current educational context, teachers “take on the dual responsibility of external performance assessments as well as community- and student-driven learning” (p. 83). This study examines exactly this, how a group of four teachers navigated testing while also teaching in ways that honored their students.
Literacy Teaching and High-Stakes Testing
Preparing students to pass standardized tests often dominates instruction and the culture of schools, especially in schools that primarily serve students from low socioeconomic backgrounds (Anagnostopoulos, 2003; Smagorinsky, Lakly, & Johnson, 2002). Such a narrowing of the curriculum often leaves teachers with little autonomy for teaching in ways they believe in, including ways that honor students’ backgrounds and cultural richness. Research on the effects of high-stakes testing shows that curriculum is often limited in three ways: by content (often only teaching what is directly tested), the format (such as dividing the curriculum up into smaller, fragmented parts), and how it is taught (mainly through teacher-centered practices; Au, 2007; Moe, 2003). An overemphasis on testing has also been shown to replace the curriculum with test preparation, where literacy is taught as decontextualized practice related to drill and practice answering multiple-choice questions, especially in urban schools with students of low socioeconomic status (McNeil & Valenzuela, 2001). The materials used to teach often resemble testing materials such as worksheets and replace the use of more authentic materials such as children’s literature (MacGillivray, Ardell, & Palma, 2004).
Most research that examines teachers’ response to high-stakes testing highlights the negative impact on practices (Hoffman, Assaf, & Paris, 2001) and the misalignment between teachers’ beliefs about teaching and testing (Dooley & Assaf, 2009). Fewer studies have documented how teachers have negotiated a culture of testing to include practices they believe in. Those that have, have shown that administrative support is important (Parsons, Metzger, Askew, & Carswell, 2011) as well as resistance (Pease-Alvarez & Samway, 2008) and agency (Zoch, 2013).
The negative effects created from an overemphasis on high-stakes testing can especially be seen in schools that are low performing, which are often schools that serve students from non-dominant backgrounds (Diamond & Spillane, 2004; Figlio & Getzler, 2002; Haney, 2000; Valenzuela, 2005). Inequalities in schooling are often a consequence of intense focus on test preparation because of the amount of time spent on testing, the materials used, and the way the curriculum is affected. In addition, teachers may feel limited in their teaching and may not take into account the diverse backgrounds and sociocultural needs of their students (Achinstein & Ogawa, 2006; McNeil & Valenzuela, 2001). Little has been done to show how teachers might take their students’ backgrounds into account while considering how to prepare students for high-stakes testing. This study attempts to begin to fill this gap by showing how a group of teachers approached test preparation with their students’ backgrounds in mind.
Research Design
This study began as a traditional ethnographic study (Heath, Street, & Mills, 2008) of an urban elementary school in Texas where the focus was on capturing and understanding teachers’ literacy teaching practices. I noticed how some teachers designed their instruction in ways that accounted for who their students were, and that these practices not only honored their students, but also seemed to contest some of the expectations placed upon them by their school district due to high-stakes testing. Understanding how and why these teachers taught in this way led me to shift my understanding of teaching in this context. I was also challenged to reframe my research agenda, moving away from a superimposed perspective of what I thought was problematic—an overt emphasis on high-stakes testing—to understanding the decisions teachers made and why. In this way, I allowed the voices of the participants to guide my analysis and reframe the study despite my previously held expectations about the school and literacy teaching.
The Context and Participants
The school was situated in the largest Latino/a community in a metropolitan city in Texas. Student enrollment was close to 1,000. Ninety-six percent of the students’ parents indicated that Spanish was spoken at home on registration information, although only 70% of the students were enrolled in a Bilingual Spanish/English or English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom. Most Latino/a students were second- or third-generation immigrants. The remaining 3% of the students were African American and less than 1% were White. Almost 100% of all students were eligible for free/reduced lunch.
At the time of this study, the standardized test was called the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS). It was administered to all students beginning in third grade. Reading and math were tested at each grade level, while writing, science, and social studies were tested at designated grade levels.
The four teachers who are central to this article were purposefully selected because of their literacy instruction. They taught third and fourth grades, and all were certified ESL teachers. Three of them were also certified bilingual Spanish/English teachers, which means they were fluent in Spanish and English, had bilingual education certification, and taught in Spanish at least part of the time.
Data Sources and Analysis
This study occurred across one school year. Data sources included 110 classroom observations and observations of 35 meetings, each ranging in length from 30 min to 5 hr. I wrote expanded field notes and collected video and audio recordings. I also conducted 66 individual interviews with staff members (they were interviewed between 1 and 4 times during the school year) that lasted approximately 1 hr. These interviews were all transcribed and other data sources include field notes of informal conversations with teachers, photographs of classrooms and materials, and documents such as photocopies of classroom handouts.
Data analysis was inductive and ongoing, using the constant-comparative method (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) to develop codes and themes. A focus of analysis was to describe the teachers’ literacy teaching practices, especially those that demonstrated teachers’ efforts to sustain students’ cultural competence within a test-driven context. During data analysis, I read data sources line-by-line multiple times to name and categorize the phenomena. I used ATLAS.ti, a computer software program designed for conducting qualitative research, to code the data. I did not impose a pre-established set of codes onto the data, but rather, I used the language that emerged from the data to describe it (Emerson, Fretz, & Shaw, 1995). Using the initial codes, I generated larger categories that I later refined and recoded to develop more meaningful units and themes. I also engaged in member checking with the participants to confirm my assertions.
Findings
The teachers in this study reflect the pressure many urban teachers are under in high-stakes testing environments. They disagreed with their school’s administration and district decisions to focus on test preparation from the beginning of the school year. Despite negative feelings toward testing, they mindfully navigated the context they worked in and gave consideration to the students with whom they worked, rather than use the more traditional test preparation that I observed in other classrooms. This kind of test preparation relied on workbooks where students practiced reading test-like passages and answering questions. The readings passages were of varied topics, but did not seem to be written with any particular community in mind other than a monocultural population. Also, in these classrooms, dialogue during test preparation was not encouraged and students were expected to work independently. In this way, skill-mastery and choosing correct answers were communicated as the end goals. In contrast, the following four teachers offer examples of the negotiations teachers can make while still acknowledging the immediate importance of preparing students for high-stakes tests, and thereby providing access to dominant cultural competence. What follows are examples of how these teachers sustained their students’ cultures, knowledges, and emerging identities in the context of literacy instruction.
Going Across Racial Lines
June, a fourth-grade bilingual teacher in her mid-20s, was in her third year of teaching. She obtained alternative teaching certification after receiving bachelor’s degrees in English and communication arts. June connected with her students because she grew up speaking Spanish, having a mother of Mexican descent. She described her teaching as including a lot of what she referred to as “code-switching” between English and Spanish because “it’s just the way my brain works as I’m teaching. And I see that in the kids too” (Interview, September 22, 2010). This was June’s way of explaining that she often switched back and forth between English and Spanish while talking. I observed two main ways that she did this. Sometimes she spoke in one language but inserted single words from the other language. I also observed that she would say something in one language and then immediately repeat what she said back in the other language. Although CSP does not specifically comment on “code-switching,” this would be an example of having linguistic flexibility and using hybrid language practices that support multilingualism.
At the beginning of the school year June explained that she uses small group time to get to know her students. “I know a lot about them but I know I’m going to learn a lot more about them. And I’m really excited to start guided reading groups so I can get to know them better as individuals and as learners” (Interview, September 22, 2010). Toward the end of the year, the ways in which she talked about how she defined success for her students illustrates how she got to know her students. For June, part of knowing her students included building trust as well as empathizing with what they might experience.
I define success as if my kids trust me and I can tell that they trust me. And that they realize that I’m their ally, I’m their advocate. I really want the best for them. I try to understand what they’re going through, what it’s like to be a kid. What it’s like to be a kid in this neighborhood. Just how cruddy the world is now, politically and economically. So I just hope that they can go home at night after school and just feel like I’m in their corner and they can trust me and I genuinely appreciate them. (Interview, April 19, 2011)
Being a bilingual class, all of June’s students were Latino/as, but it was important for her that her students not only learn about role models who looked and talked like them but also learn about other minority role models as well, especially African Americans. Because her students lived in a neighborhood that was primarily comprised of Latino/a and African American families, June encouraged the cultural hybridity that she knew her students might experience from living in the community. The following example begins just after June has distributed an article about Senator Barbara Jordan and has asked students to preview the pages and talk about what they noticed (Field Notes, October 6, 2010). She used words such as “prediction” and “schema” as well as guided students to think about the text features. In what follows, we will see how June prompted students to think about inequity, make connections to their lives, and consider possibilities for their future.
June goes on to ask, “Has anyone heard of Barbara Jordan before?” A student says that Barbara Jordan was president. June replies, “She wasn’t a president, but she was involved in government. Let’s read the subtitle, ‘Speaking out for American Ideals.’ Does anyone know what ideals are? Funny that ideals has the word idea in it. So I think of ideals as really good ideas. A perfect world where nobody was racist and nobody hurt anyone. A synonym for ideals is values.”
Here June clarified that Barbara Jordan was not president, while supporting students’ understanding of the word “ideals,” and in relation to racism. This is one example of how she promotes her students’ critical consciousness during this lesson. June continued by discussing text features and strategies they could use for reading informational texts. Once she made these points, she brought the conversation back to issues of fairness.
June asks the class to read the last caption together. Afterwards, she responds to the caption by asking students if it was fair that 60 years ago there was only one school where black people could attend law school and that Barbara Jordan had to leave Texas to do so.
The article itself did not use the words “fair” or point out that it was an injustice that people of color could only attend one law school. June added this layer of interpretation to the reading and challenged her students to question whether this was fair, thereby fostering their critical consciousness. She then prompted them to make connections to their own lives.
June continues by saying, “Think of the connection here. We are in Texas and we think our lives are so boring. She grew up in Houston. We are familiar with it or at least have heard of it. She worked here in our city and then went to Washington D.C. All these great big wonderful things are not that far away from you guys.”
As a follow-up to stating what was unfair, June brought the conversation back to the students’ lives. She pointed out that Barbara Jordan was from a nearby city and also lived in the city where they lived. She wanted students to think about how their lives could be similar to Barbara Jordan’s.
June talks about how Barbara Jordan is still remembered to this day. She points out that students might be able to feel her presence if they “walk the walls” of the University of Texas where she was a professor. June points out that Barbara Jordan helped a lot of people, not just African Americans.
Once June helped her students understand more about Barbara Jordan’s background, she emphasized her importance and contributions.
June went on to say, “When you go to Congress, you represent a lot of people. Maybe the community in Houston was a lot of African Americans, but we go across racial lines. There are people of all color in the Democratic Party. The president is a public office. When elected by the people, you are a public officer.”
Through explaining the role of Congressmen and what a public officer is, June also wanted her students to know that people of color can hold office. She used the phrase “we go across racial lines” to take the emphasis off of only one group and to be more inclusive of all races. She then returned to discussing text features.
June writes on a chart tablet: “Esta tabla— una manera para organizar la informacíon muy específica como las fechas.” [This table— a way to organize specific information such as dates.] She says, “It gives us specific information and it’s detailed.” June then says, “I wanted to introduce non-fiction today. We have been talking about Tomás Rivera award winning books. They are all fiction books, although some of them are historical and biographical fiction like José, Born to Dance (Reich, 2005). He was a real person but it is written as a story. I want us to connect to other minorities, African Americans and Asians. I want us to connect to all the minorities and not just the minorities either. Hopefully Barbara Jordan can bridge that for us. Tomás Rivera was important and not just because he was Mexican American and Barbara Jordan was important but not just because she was African American.
June situated the importance of what they were reading and discussing within other texts they had been reading. June brought up her point once again about connecting across racial lines when she said that she wanted them “to connect to all minorities and not just minorities either.” She also wanted to emphasize the importance of the two leaders they had been discussing, Tomás Rivera and Barbara Jordan, without students thinking they were only important and being discussed because of their race.
In this example, June supported her students’ understanding of a variety of different kinds of texts and reading strategies while also addressing issues of social justice. She began by supporting her students’ reading comprehension (e.g., using text features, making predictions), which are the kinds of skills and strategies commonly found in literacy instruction. She extended the lesson by incorporating talk about inequality and asking students to make connections to their own lives. In this way, June demonstrated using CSP by supporting students’ identities as minorities and envisioning of what is possible. She also used dialogue to encourage critical consciousness about unfair social issues. Through her text selection and encouraging words, June provided her students with access to the academic demands of school reading while also supporting their cultural hybridity. In addition, June demonstrated and modeled linguistic fluidity in her use of code-switching.
Discussing Everyday Heroes to Access Testing Language
Celestina, a third-grade bilingual teacher, was a native Spanish speaker who identified as a Chicana. She was in her sixth year of teaching and was in her mid-20s. She earned a bachelor’s degree in Ethnic Chicano studies before obtaining alternative teaching certification. At the time, she was pursuing her master’s degree in bilingual education. She was transparent about this process with her students, including studying for the GRE, because she wanted to set an example for them and for them to know that “you don’t stop with education” (Interview, October 5, 2010). Celestina described one of the ways that she learned about her students, which was by observing them interact with other adults. Celestina regularly invited the literacy coach to model lessons for her in the classroom, which also gave her an opportunity to learn more about her students.
I love when the literacy coach comes in and models a class for me because I get to step back, and I get to see my kids interact with another adult. I get to hear things that I never probably would have heard because I’m so busy sometimes trying to keep the class in order while somebody is talking. (Interview, October 5, 2010)
One of Celestina’s main goals for her students was for them to be critical thinkers, to question things, to not think that everything’s bad or good . . . To question what I say even if I don’t want them to. To not take everything as it comes, but to be like why, why does it happen? (Interview, April 5, 2011)
Working with other third-grade teachers and the literacy coach, Celestina helped create a literature unit on “Everyday Heroes” to support students’ awareness of role models from non-dominant groups and to increase their understanding that heroes are not just superheroes (Field Notes, February 9, 2011). The texts they selected for the literature unit were chosen because of their connection to the theme and to support two tested objectives—using context clues to figure out word meaning and inferring. This serves as an example of how children’s literature was used in place of worksheets that resembled the tests to ensure students had access to test preparation as well as quality literature and time for authentic response. The literature also gave teachers the opportunity to discuss issues of equality. Celestina described her text selection by how well she thought her students would connect to it. For this reason, she preferred to select her own texts rather than use the textbooks. “I don’t like the basal readers [textbooks]. Most of the time they aren’t relevant to my students. Everything is taught in this bubble and didn’t connect to my students” (Interview, October 5, 2010). By excluding texts that she did not think connected with her students, Celestina demonstrated her responsiveness to her students’ cultures, knowledges, and identities.
Celestina began her unit with a book about Martin Luther King Jr. (Rappaport, 2007). Other texts she selected featured Marian Anderson (Ryan, 2002), Amelia Earhart (Ryan, 1999), Eleanor Roosevelt (Ryan, 1999), Cesar Chavez (Krull, 2003), Wilma Rudolph (Krull, 2000), and Bessie Coleman (Lindbergh, 1998). Similar to June, Celestina identified African American role models to encourage cultural hybridity, and also placed emphasis on women role models. The following example is of one class period when Celestina was in the middle of teaching the unit. At this point, she had read aloud several of the books mentioned above, and although the focus of the discussion was on Bessie Coleman, she continued to reference other books.
Celestina begins the discussion by saying, “We’ve been talking a lot about heroes. Who have we been talking about?” A student mentions Wilma Rudolph and Celestina asks “What made her heroic?” This leads into a discussion about Wilma Rudolph, Amelia Earhart, Eleanor Roosevelt, and eventually Bessie Coleman. Celestina asks her students to think about a word they would use to describe Bessie Coleman. Another student says, “Determined.” Celestina responds, “My question to you is, how can you prove that she was determined? What in the text proves she was determined? What made you think as you read the book that she was determined? What was something we read that made you think that?” (Field Notes, February 9, 2011)
By asking students to defend their answers with evidence from the text, Celestina emphasized the use of contextual evidence to support their thinking. This was also a way of reinforcing how making inferences about characters was tested on the state test.
The discussion moves to Bessie’s migration to Paris to attend flight school. Celestina asks, “How would you feel if you had to go to a new country where you didn’t know anybody or the language, just because you wanted to achieve your dream? Does that mean you are determined? How do you know?” They continue to talk about how they could tell Bessie was determined. Celestina says, “Don’t tell me a character is nice or mad or sad, you need to tell me what made you think that.”
She goes on to remind students of how they used context clues to figure out word meaning the previous week and relates what they are doing this week to making inferences.
Celestina, “This is something that we are going to have to start getting used to. TAKS talk. She holds up a chart she has made in English and Spanish. It says, “The reader can tell that ____ is ____ because ____.” “El lector puede notar o saber que ___ es ____ porque____.” You don’t need to be scared of this because we already do this. It’s the same thing but written a different way. Can you repeat that? That’s pretty brilliant. You are supposed to put your own words. It’s written in a test way. So when you see it in TAKS, you know what it’s asking.
By pointing out the chart she has created along with the instructional goal—making inferences—Celestina guides the conversation to test preparation. She wants her students to understand that what they are doing is something they have already been doing, but now they are seeing how it looks on the test. This is an example of exposing students to the test language used on the test, and in two languages, by linking it to how students have already been talking and thinking about texts. In the next excerpt, Celestina continues to encourage students to provide textual evidence. We see how one student points out the injustice of women not being allowed to fly airplanes.
Think about what we read in the book yesterday. How was she courageous? She pulls a popsicle stick from a can to select who will answer. [Students’ names are on the sticks and this is her system for randomly selecting students.]
She flew planes.
What was courageous about that? People fly planes every day.
She flew when they didn’t allow girls to fly.
They didn’t allow women, African American women especially.
Celestina writes on a sticky note and they reread the sentence. “Did I give you proof? Can I stand by what I said? Can I show you from the book? This is probably what a TAKS question would look like.”
Celestina brought the discussion back to what students can expect to see on the test again. She also pointed out the injustice of women and African Americans not being allowed to fly. She followed up by saying, “What we are doing is inferring. We are doing it a little different because we’ve never talked like this, but we are talking about using what an author tells us about a character. It is phrased a little differently.” This was her way of showing her students that inferring is what they already do as readers and it can be understood in a different way that aligns with the test.
Celestina used the “Everyday Heroes” theme to advance the instructional goal of exposing students to testing language, working on inferring as a comprehension strategy, and providing contextual proof. By using a set of related texts, students not only worked on test preparation, but also thought about the contributions of historical figures and were able to consider perspectives that may align more with their own. Celestina’s careful guidance focused attention on building students’ vocabulary (e.g., determined, heroic, courageous) and linguistic flexibility. The use of the sentence stem from the test gave students access to the language used on the test and helped them see what the test would look like and gave them a strategy for answering similar items. Her teaching choices also allow her to employ CSP by finding ways to sustain, not just recognize and make relevant, the use of non-dominant cultural resources within and beyond schooling environments. Celestina built on students’ cultural pluralism and gave them a space to discuss issues of inequality. By bringing up instances of injustice, Celestina also encouraged her students’ critical consciousness.
Fostering Talk About Social Issues
Arturo was a third-grade bilingual teacher in his early 40s. This was his fifth year of teaching in the United States, although he taught high school in Mexico before. When he moved to the United States, his previous credentials were not recognized, so Arturo explained that he attended school for 6 years—two to learn English and four to earn his degree. His identity was closely connected to his reasons for teaching. He lived in the same neighborhood as his students and felt strongly that he should teach students with similar backgrounds. He described his desire to teach at the school, “I love this community and I want to do something for my community” (Interview, October 8, 2010). He began his teaching career as a Kindergarten teacher, but requested to teach third grade after seeing students struggle with the reading test. Arturo felt he could have a larger impact on student success by teaching students with whom he identified and who might identify with him. He also wanted his personal experiences to serve as an example for his students and be able to tell them, I came to the United States speaking no English and now I think I’m able to communicate with people and I went to college . . . So I use this experience in my classroom and I think it helps my students to see that their teacher went through the same process. (Interview, October 8, 2010)
Arturo took a community-engaged approach to teaching, which was also a way that he learned about his students. Something else he did was work on Saturdays of his own volition with students who needed extra help.
Like Celestina, Arturo was also teaching the same unit on “Everyday Heroes,” and he used many of the same books and heroes. In the following example, Arturo was reading aloud a book about Martin Luther King Jr. (King Farris, 2003). He used this time to raise critical consciousness through talk about race and segregation.
Arturo asks his students to think about Martin Luther King Jr. and Cesar Chavez. He points out that Cesar Chavez played outside but Martin Luther King Jr. played in the house. He says, “This is very important. ¿Habían leyes que separaron quién? [There were unfair laws that separated who?] Unfair laws. Tenían que mantener separados.” [They had to remain separated.] He continues by explaining that these segregation laws existed in Atlanta, Georgia where Martin Luther King Jr. lived. He reiterates that Martin Luther King Jr.’s parents could not go to places like parks because of the laws. One student adds that there was segregation on the buses as well and Arturo thanks him for his contribution. (Field Notes, February 8, 2011)
The book about Martin Luther King Jr. invited conversation about the unfairness of segregation and the enforcement of laws that supported it. As he continued with the read aloud, Arturo pointed out other inequities, such as in housing and living conditions.
He continues by saying, “Even though there were laws that wanted to keep them separate, the kids still played together.” He follows up by asking the students what their predictions are for the rest of the story. A student says that the kids will not be able to play together because of the laws that wanted to keep them separate.
The page Arturo referred to explained that all the children on the street played together, including the two White boys whose parents owned a store on the street. The author explained that it never occurred to the kids to not play with each other because they were different.
On the next page Arturo goes over how the white boys told the children they could not play together anymore because they were Negroes [this is the word used in the book]. Arturo explains that at this time it was not thought offensive to say Negroes. “It is different, for example, if we say ‘Mexicanos’ because it is not offensive like saying ‘mojados’ [wetbacks]. For them to be called Negroes back then, that was because of the color of their skin.”
Arturo called attention to the historical use of the word Negroes and compared it with words his students might hear to describe Mexicans. By bringing up the derogatory term “mojados,” Arturo wanted his students to understand the difference in what labels might signify.
Arturo continues reading the story and stops to talk about what is happening, such as how the kids are feeling in the story. During their conversation, he asks what students think Martin Luther King Jr. meant when he said, “I’m going to change the world upside down.” A student says that Martin Luther King Jr. is going to give a speech. Another student adds that he is going to stand up for what is right. Arturo adds, “He learned to never give up. He never forgot those memories or the promise he made his mother when his friends were taken away.”
During this part of the story, Arturo guided his students to think about inequity as he asked them to connect to how the characters were feeling. He also highlighted Martin Luther King Jr.’s promise to “turn the world upside down” by stopping and asking students to think about what that meant. The last page of the book shows a group of White and Black children holding hands as they run and smile juxtaposed with the words “ . . . that turned the world upside down.” After reading the last page, Arturo asked what Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream was. His students volunteer responses such as “to be president,” “to change the laws,” and “to change the world.” In response, Arturo explains that Martin Luther King Jr. was not a president: But his dream was that all men were treated equally. Tomorrow we will read part of the speech and you will see his dream was not to be president and not to be famous. It was for people to be treated equal. So that was his dream. That turned the world upside down.
After reinforcing what Martin Luther King Jr. strived to achieve, the conversation led to more talk about racial discrimination, including the need to clarify who is discriminated against and address a misconception a student had about race.
One student said that black people were discriminated against by white people, like himself and his classmates. But white people and people like him were treated fairly. Arturo sought to clarify the student’s misconception about race. He says, “Our skin is not white and not black, but it is in the middle. Don’t think we were on the side of the white people, no, we were on the other side. We couldn’t go to the same schools, drink from the same fountains. We are not white people. La discriminación de este tiempo también fue de los Mexicános. [The discrimination at this time was also for Mexicans.] Our skin isn’t really as dark, but we were treated the same way. Don’t say, ‘oh that’s good we weren’t treated like that.’ También eran injustas. [There were also injustices.] We are not white. We don’t look like white people or black people, but we were discriminated against too.”
In this interaction, Arturo helped his students to understand racial discrimination, particularly how Mexicans were treated unjustly. By voicing his misconception about race, the student who positioned himself as White gave Arturo an opportunity to identify with and connect with his students as a Mexican immigrant living in the United States. When saying, “we were discriminated against too,” he unites himself with his students. He recognized that sharing similar cultural and ethnic backgrounds with his students was a strength he had as a teacher that he could then build on. Although he was faced with the task of preparing his students for the state test, Arturo did not let this preclude him from creating space to address social issues.
At the close of the read aloud, Arturo directed his students’ attention to a chart he prepared on inferring. He projected a copy of the chart using a document camera, and students also had their own copy to write on. At the top of the chart, Arturo wrote “Inference” along with the corresponding objective from the state standards. Underneath he divided four questions up into separate columns and created a row for each of the books they were reading. The four questions were based on similar questions used on the state test (e.g., At the end of the story, what can the reader tell or conclude about the author’s message?)
Through guided practice, Arturo supported his students in filling-in the chart as they talked about each answer. This portion of the lesson was in direct response to the need to work on test preparation. Rather than use worksheets with multiple-choice questions, as was the norm in this school district, Arturo used literature that invited purposeful discussion about social issues. The chart was a tool to facilitate and record their discussion in ways that were linked directly to how inferring was tested. The conversation that preceded this guided practice not only allowed students to engage in meaningful dialogue but also prioritized their discussion over test-driven discourse.
In addition to addressing test preparation, Arturo adopted a CSP by promoting understandings of inequality in relation to race and what it means to be a minority. His use of Spanish and English modeled the linguistic flexibility that comes from being bilingual. In using race to talk about discrimination, Arturo also raised students’ critical consciousness in a way that helped to build the community of the class to understand difference but at the same time create a sense of belonging. By bringing a perspective that is similar to the cultures of his students to the classroom, Arturo could build on their experiences for understanding. At the same time, the discussion that ensued was important for his students whose community consisted primarily of Latino/as and African Americans.
Supporting Meaning Making Through Building on Students’ Identities
Evelyn, a third-grade ESL teacher of Chinese descent, was in her mid-20s and in her third year of teaching. In contrast to the three previous teachers’ classrooms, Evelyn’s was not a bilingual classroom although she was ESL certified. Her students were Latino/as or African American. Evelyn belonged to an educators’ group that helped produce and promote a documentary about how the current educational system is difficult on students and families. She was also involved with a local teacher inquiry group that focused on teaching for social justice. Her interest in social justice could be seen in the topics she chose to teach about, which included teaching about Africa, slavery, and women rights. She described her ultimate goals as making “learning more purposeful” and “shaping the kids into becoming better citizens” (Interview, April 6, 2011). When describing a unit on slavery, Evelyn said that it made them reevaluate what they want from life, like these people [slave traders] did it for power and money. That kind of triggered them to think, “If it were me, I would do what I could to help other people. I would help the slaves get their freedom. I would tell them that’s not okay.’”
She used these moments of discussion to learn about her students and was pleased when she could “sometimes over hear kids talking about things we talk about in class” in other contexts.
During the school year, Evelyn was one of a handful of teachers who collaborated to design a special unit using books that were honored with the Tomás Rivera Book Award, which recognizes authors and illustrators who create literature that depicts the Mexican American experience. With help from the school’s literacy coach, they were invited to participate with their students in the annual award ceremony held at the university that developed the award. Their participation included meeting the author and illustrator, and some students were chosen to introduce them to the audience. In addition, the children’s writing was displayed.
The unit the teachers created incorporated several of the award winning picture books through interactive read alouds, independent reading, and writing projects that supported students’ identity work through poetry and memoirs. Planning for and implementing this unit involved extra time, but for teachers such as Evelyn, it was important because they saw the value of using the books because they wanted their students to see characters who looked and talked like them.
Using Tomás Rivera Book award books, [was] a segue to talking about culture. They make little connections to feel like they are represented. It’s important for them to know who they are and feel special and unique. Maybe they can contribute to society like Tomás Rivera. (Interview, October 5, 2010)
Evelyn saw this unit as an opportunity to build on her students’ identities and culture while also teaching them about Tomás Rivera, an author and educator who had lived in their vicinity. She understood the value of using texts where students can see people who are similar to them represented in positive ways. At the same time, Evelyn recognized the expectation her school had to teach the state objectives. She was able to use the books to support her students’ movement toward test taking in place of worksheets that resembled the test. She did this by anchoring their discussions about the book to learning goals that reflected the state test. The following example comes from a lesson Evelyn did on cause and effect and figuring out word meaning using Chato’s Kitchen (Soto, 1997; Field Notes, September 14, 2010). She began by reviewing what they had read and talked about the day before.
Evelyn says, “For example, yesterday in Tomás and the Library Lady (Mora, 2000), we put this as the cause [she reads aloud what is written] and what was the effect?”
She is reading off a chart hanging at the front of the room. The chart contains a graphic organizer for cause/effect where two rectangular boxes are beside each other with an arrow connecting one box (cause) to another (effect). There are sticky notes with writing on them posted inside of the boxes. To teach cause and effect, she wrote some of the “causes” and some of the “effects” ahead of time and had students provide the missing information that she then recorded and posted with them. On the state test, this graphic is commonly used to assess students’ understanding of cause and effect.
Pointing to the graphic organizer, Evelyn says, “Chato’s Kitchen (Soto, 1997) also won the Tomás Rivera award. Do you remember some of the criteria?” She flips to a chart where she has written the award’s criteria. She reads aloud from the chart, which lists: Written for children and young adults (0-16) Text and illustrations are of highest quality Portrays and represents Mexican Americans accurately and avoids stereotypes Evelyn says, “Think about if this book has things you would do or eat in it. See if it has stereotypes. We do not want to think that all Mexican Americans do this. I am thinking of Skippyjon Jones (Schachner, 2005). Do you all know them? Maybe after we read some more books we’ll read Skippyjon Jones because it is a book with a lot of stereotypes.”
Evelyn reinforced her students’ understanding of how the books in the unit were related and she gave them an opportunity to think about stereotypes and their prevalence in some books. By saying, “We do not want to think that all Mexican Americans do this,” Evelyn expressed the importance of not making generalizations about people based on ethnicity, and thereby called on her students to resist an essentialized conception of Latino/a culture. She then went on to identify a popular children’s book that is often criticized for being stereotypical. Evelyn used the chart to talk about the criteria for selecting the award winning books each time she shared a new book, which helped reinforce the importance of the award and its role in supporting Mexican American authors and illustrators. After engaging in discussion about stereotypes, Evelyn then directed the class’ attention to the skill of using context clues to identify words.
Evelyn says, “Scattered. I want you to think about what words can help you figure that out. I am going to reread the sentence before it.” She rereads the previous sentence and the sentence that contains the word “scattered.”
Although this was a lesson focused on cause and effect, Evelyn also highlighted another skill they had been working on—using context clues to identify word meaning. The rest of the conversation consisted of discussing the meaning of “scattered” as well as a cause and effect example. Evelyn supported her students’ comprehension through dialogue in partners and the whole group.
The interactions Evelyn had with her students in this example show how she addressed the curricular objectives she was expected to teach, but without using worksheets that mirrored the state tests like many of her colleagues used. She was able to use the materials she saw most appropriate while continuing to prepare her students for the test. The format of how she was teaching cause and effect with the graphic organizer and the wording “what caused . . . ?” also shows how she maintained a close relationship with the testing language but without restricting her students’ reading material to reading passages created for test practice. Because these particular books in this unit were tied to her students’ participation in the Tomás Rivera book award ceremony, Evelyn further promoted her students’ image of themselves as they celebrated Tomás Rivera’s life and the lives of other Mexican American authors and writers.
Having a mixed class of Latino/as and African Americans, Evelyn felt it was appropriate to cover topics where she could highlight the strengths of both groups, and in diverse ways. The ways in which she enacted CSP could be seen in how she raised critical consciousness about issues such as slavery, women’s rights, and stereotypes. She also incorporated dialogue as a way of building community and examining multiple perspectives. By offering a variety of social issues to examine that highlighted the cultural ways of being for multiple communities, Evelyn sought to sustain students’ cultural competence by acknowledging that their experiences were varied and pluralistic.
Discussion
In this article, I give special consideration to the context in which these teachers worked—an urban school facing pressure from high-stakes testing—to better understand the decisions they made. It is important to take into account the context in which teaching occurs to remind us that teaching is not just about teaching; it also involves maneuvering and negotiating a highly politicized terrain. I was particularly interested in how high-stakes testing can be understood as part of what Paris refers to as “dominant cultural competence” because of the role it plays in creating the culture of schools and in defining school success (Brandt, 2007). A CSP framework allowed me to look at what these teachers did to interrupt the dominant curriculum that prevailed because of testing when they acknowledged the importance of their students. They found a way to comply with test preparation, such as covering text features in June’s case, and the testing language and skills in Celestina, Arturo, and Evelyn’s cases, and still incorporate authentic reading materials that supported students’ identities as well as cultural hybridity. They opposed deficit perspectives about their students and promoted literacy teaching through dialogue and heightening critical consciousness. The attention they gave to social justice issues and cultural connectedness exemplifies critical pedagogy and asset pedagogies, of which CSP relates to (Paris & Alim, 2014). What distinguishes CSP from these other frameworks, however, is the additional attention to linguistic dexterity and competence with the end goals of sustaining linguistic, literate, and cultural pluralism (Paris, 2012).
Just as there are various approaches to culturally responsive pedagogies (Gay, 2010), there may also be various approaches to CSP. These teachers are examples of the kinds of imperative decisions teachers make and act upon to support students in an age of high-stakes testing, especially when we know that teachers in lower performing schools are the most pressured to teach to the test rather than be responsive to diverse students (Sleeter, 2012). There is, however, still much more room for understanding what a CSP framework looks like from theory to practice. The examples presented here are a beginning look at this, but are not necessarily perfect examples of what Paris (2012) proposed, in fact it would be quite possible to identify many places of missed opportunity these teachers did not take. For example, a large part of what they did involved providing examples of role models from non-dominant backgrounds, which often included themselves, to discuss inequity but also give their students a vision for who they can be and the contributions they can make. CSP does not necessarily object to the use of role models, but cautions against the oversimplification that can occur when making assumptions about communities based on their backgrounds, appearances, and languages. They probably could have adopted a more inclusive stance that acknowledges that cultures and the practices of communities shift and change over time. In some ways, they did show their sensitivity to this, such as including literature on African Americans in their curriculum when the majority of their students were Latino/as. Nevertheless, they could have included in their dialogue with students more about the dangers of essentializing cultures as well as discussing the complexity of cultures, including their own, and pushing for a deeper understanding of culture.
The three bilingual teachers—June, Arturo, and Celestina—used and modeled hybrid language practices, however, they could have included their students more actively in the process of maintaining multilinguistic practices (Michener et al., 2015). To do so, their students must be cognizant of the importance of doing so, and teachers can support students’ active involvement by making this a part of the classroom culture and discourse. In addition, the teachers could have developed students’ critical meta-awareness (Souto-Manning, 2013) to engage in social action to address the issues that affected their identities and histories, rather than attempt to identify these issues for them.
Another missed opportunity relates to a limitation that Ladson-Billings (2014) identified in her call to “remix” culturally relevant pedagogy. She pointed out that teachers rarely push students “to consider critical perspectives on policies and practices that may have a direct impact on their lives and communities” (p. 78). As context is an important part of this study, and the teachers often found themselves at odds with how they felt about high-stakes testing and having to prepare their students for them, they could have engaged their students in dialogue about why such policies are created and how it affects them. In addition, some of the topics they covered (e.g., slavery and segregation) could have been opportunities to talk about how these older policies and practices still affect communities in the present day.
This study has implications for teacher education as we continue to develop our understanding of culturally sustaining practices and what this means for teacher preparation. Although teacher education programs might encourage culturally sustaining practices, the reality of teaching in high-stakes environments calls on teachers to re-theorize and re-appropriate practices to teach literacy that may be very different, depending on their context. As teacher educators, we need to bridge the gap between our university classes and this wider, political context so preservice teachers have the tools to construct informed responses that demonstrate their dedication to maintaining students’ cultural competence, including attention to cultural pluralism, multilingualism, and critical consciousness. In addition, teacher education programs should prepare teachers to deliberately engage in critical meta-awareness with students where social action is at the forefront of curricular and pedagogical decisions. In this way, preservice teachers can help their students speak to and challenge dominant discourses and policies that impact their lives.
Although I did not directly involve the teachers as co-researchers in this study in the same way that Souto-Manning (2013) argues for in an effort to create critical meta-awareness, I did reframe my analysis of the data to understand the teachers’ practices. I acknowledge that in retrospect, involving the teachers as co-researchers would have been a more powerful methodology to learn about how they sustained themselves and their students and to explain their decision making. As such, this study has implications for educational researchers and how they can engage in and contribute to social action in ways that make relevant the non-dominant cultural resources in school communities.
To help CSP and other asset pedagogies and critical pedagogies gain more traction in the education field, Sleeter (2012) argues that we need more empirical data, which shows the connection between these pedagogies and student learning. She particularly means large-scale studies that are generalizable. This study, like the majority of what exists in the literature on culturally responsive pedagogies and related theories, was qualitative and of a smaller scale. Also, I did not collect student data, because the focus was on teachers, so I am not able to present statistical data showing how achievement was impacted and I cannot show or elaborate on how students’ cultures and languages might have been sustained. What I do know from informal conversations with teachers is that their students did perform well on final assessments. Test scores should only be part of how we define success, however, as other factors are important such as students’ identities and perceptions. Sleeter does bring up an important point though, especially when we consider the role policy makers play in educational decisions and what will most likely get their attention.
CSP holds promise for improving the education field and school experiences for culturally and linguistically diverse students, especially in environments where high-stakes testing is emphasized. It is one way to imagine a better schooling experience for students that affirms identities and honors and sustains diversity. In the ongoing struggle for social justice in education, I borrow from the wisdom of the ageless African proverb, “it takes a village.” For CSP to be a reality in education, we need more stakeholders on board—students, parents, teachers, administrators, and policy makers.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.