As future teachers, it is important that we are able to use different techniques and strategies that are appropriate for diverse learners to succeed in the classroom. The culturally competent teacher should also be able to accommodate sociocultural differences that affect learning abilities.
I took the FNED course in order to learn about different cultures and backgrounds, and also to learn how to approach different situations that involve sociocultural differences among the students. We, as teachers, must be able to fully comprehend how to apply what we have learned in order to respond to the different linguistic, ethnic and cultural characteristics that are present among our future students.
In the classroom I am currently tutoring in, I am able to observe how the teacher accommodates her lessons, making sure each and every one of her students understands the content being taught to them. She does not move on until every student understands the lesson. I go to my school every Friday, and every Friday morning the children meet on the rug in front of the teacher. During "rug time", the students go over what the date is, what the day of the week is, and how many days left of school there are in the year. This activity requires math skills. Each week, the teacher chooses a different student to come up and complete each of these activities. After a couple of visits to the classroom, I noticed that the teacher started to chose the children who have difficulties with math skills to complete the math portion of "rug time". I believe the teacher does this in order to further emphasize extra math help. Although the students to many math activities throughout the day, this particular math activity is taken more slowly and the student receives more attention during it. This is only one example of how the teacher in my classroom makes sure each one of her children is getting the help they need. I am proud to say that the teacher I am with is excellent in the work she does, and I can tell that she absolutely loves what she does. She works hard in making sure none of her students is left in the dark.
Another thing the teacher does every Friday is give the students spelling tests. At the end of every spelling test, the teacher reads a sentence and the student has to write down what the teacher is saying. I noticed one child who had great difficulty doing this. He was one of the boys who missed A LOT of school. In my few visits to the classroom, I have only seen him once. At the end of the test, when everyone was done, the teacher had me take the boy aside and read to him the sentence very slowly until he was able to fully comprehend what the sentence was. Usually, the teacher does this herself, but she wanted to me to experience what it would be like in my own classroom.
Claude Goldenburg is the author of an article entitled "Teaching English Language Learners". In this article, Goldenburg discusses issues raised by the National Literacy Panel in studies they have completed about ELL's. In the article, Goldneburg talks a lot about how teachers must be able to adapt to the students and their ways of learning. In order to be a good teacher, he/she must be able to understand the differences in languages and cultures among each and every individual in her class, and I believe she does this by making sure she is able to modify her quizzes and tests.
I also wanted to mention that the students work in groups of 4 to 5. Goldenburg points out that students' learning can be enhanced by cooperative learning. When the children work in groups, I notice that there is always one child trying to help another child while they are completing an assignment.
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