Bernice Garcia

Philosophy Statement on Teaching Diverse Students

All students are diverse learners they come from different cultures, learning
styles, interests, and languages. Therefore, as an educator, teachers must connect to all
the diversity in the classroom in order to become a successful educator. This involves a
lot of time and dedication. An educator must learn about every individual student and
their family. Differentiation is one of the most important components in a teachers lesson
plan. This is where an educator takes time to think about each student in the classroom
and how the lesson will be tailored to their individual needs. Once a teacher is able to
demonstrate to the students that he/she cares about them and how they learn, students
can then be given high expectations and goals to motivate them to learn at their best.
In order to promote individualized learning, assignments and instructions must be
differentiated. Saville-Troike (1978) states, to understand and facilitate learning in any
area of the curriculum, teachers should know not only what it is that is being acquired,
but how it relates to what has already been learned. pg 8. When a teacher knows the
students culture they will know and understand what a student already knows and
therefore be able to relate to what needs to be taught. Understanding students traditions
and cultural conflicts are very important. For example, Saville-Troike (1978) explains
how practices in Puerto Rico have significant differences between girls and boys and
their educational attitudes and performances. Girls have shown higher anxiety patterns
than boys when taking tests or threatened to fail. With this in mind educators need to
value and consider all the essential backgrounds for all students in order to promote
learning.
One specific challenge that culturally and linguistically diverse students face is
standardized assessments. In order to evaluate a student accurately, the assessment

method must examine his or her collective abilities (OMalley & Pierce). Assessments,
whether they contain items that are essays, multiple choice or fill-in-the-blank, contain
heavy language. This heavy language impacts students because it fills up students with
frustration and confusions and they give up in completing the assessment. Therefore,
they are incapable in providing data on what the student really knows.
Standardized tests are not English Language Learner (ELL) friendly because they do not
use language that these students may be familiarized with and can relate to. The
language used in these tests may be very confusing or hard to read for ELLs, since
ELLs are very diverse and range in languages and academic competencies. ELLs may
struggle with literacy in primary language, which makes it more difficult for them to obtain
and understand the English language. Laing & Kamhi (2003), discuss how linguistic bias
is associated with standardized tests. Its explain how if the language used is Standard
American English (SAE) and the student taking the test uses African American English
(AAVE), the student may perform differently, not because of language disability but
because of the mismatch of dialect. This proves that the performance this student
delivers is a reflection of linguistic difference and not impairment.
Another challenge is, according to Abedi, & Linquanti (2012), language that is
unrelated, unnecessary, or irrelevant to the construct can cause ELLs difficulty in
understanding and responding to assessment questions. Most standardized tests
include unfamiliar vocabulary, complex grammatical structures, and tense uses that may
derail the students understanding. Studies like Abedi (2006) found that reducing
unnecessary linguistic complexity improved the validity of content-based assessments
for ELL students. For example, original prompt: A cookie factory can bake 62 trays of
cookies in the morning and 53 trays of cookies in the afternoon. If each tray holds 12
cookies, how many cookies can be backed in 1 day? Revised prompt: A bakery bakes
62 trays of bread in the morning and 53 trays in the afternoon. Each tray holds 12 loaves

of bread. How many loaves did they bake in one day? This example provided by Abedi,
& Linquanti (2012) demonstrates that by reducing linguistic complexity it makes
language prompts in assessments more accessible to ELL students. Changing the
words cookie factory to factory, cookies to bread, and considering present tenses, simple
declaratives and passive voice etc., can make a change in helping ELL students
understand what is being asked of them in assessment. This will help these students
and teachers have accurate levels of assessments.
Therefore, if ELLs had the opportunity to be tested with assessments that provide
questions that they are able to break down, highlight important parts and key terms ELLs
would be more successful in assessments.
Ways that I can address these challenges in the classroom and in my school
environment are creating a welcoming classroom that is friendly to all my students
background. This means, I can have my students create All About Me projects with their
families, create bulletin boards with cognates and I can also have a words all with words
that are diverse that are said in many different ways but all have the same meaning and
promote respect and ongoing learning about each cultural inside the classroom.

In my experience, teaching in a multicultural setting has been

very challenging but rewarding. I have worked with students who have
come from different backgrounds and have been placed into one
classroom to learn together. They learn from their teachers and from
each other. As a teacher, I also learn from the students. I have seen
how culture relates to present time, experience, emotion and how it
helps students connect to the curriculum. When constructing lesson
plans, I take into account the diverse backgrounds of the students. For
example, I can read a book to the class about hats, then ask a question

like, how are hats used in your family? Students may have different
answers, depending on what background they are from and how each
family view the difference between all types of hats. This is why for me
it is important to consider vocabulary, gestures, and how the lesson
plans is introduced and presented. I also consider how to differentiate
lesson plans for those who need it. In addition, I like to observe
students and be understanding of certain situations that might be
happening at home. In this case, a teacher must know how to interact
with both students and parents about the situation. Involving parents
in creating projects, coming to celebrate published writing pieces or
even to come and play a math game of Family Feud are all fun ways to
invite parents inside the class and bring together all cultures in your
classroom. As an educator, if I dont take culture into account, I
wouldnt be able to relate or understand my students. Consequently, I
would not be able to teach my students because I will not know
anything about them. They would not learn because I would not be
teaching in a method that is sensitive to their interests.

References
Abedi, J. (2010). Performance assessments for English language
learners. Stanford, CA: Stanford University, Stanford Center for
Opportunity Policy in Education.
Laing, S. P., & Kamhi, A. (2003). Alternative assessment of language
and literacy in culturally and linguistically diverse populations.
Language, Speech, and Hearing services in schools, 34(1), 44-55.
Creating culturally responsive classrooms. Psychology in the
classroom: A series on applied educational psychology.
Shade, Barbara J.; Kelly, Cynthia A.; Oberg, Mary
Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association Creating
culturally responsive classrooms.(1997). viii 168 pp.