The Strelow Goal Model in Diversity/Classroom Management

The Strelow Goal Model in Diversity/Classroom Management

     My goals for diversity are simple and concrete.  You keep an open mind, have high expectations for all students, and implement teaching strategies that will accommodate all students.  For classroom management my goals are for a creative learning environment through classroom procedures, 10 key “Golden Rules”, a syllabus, and a test over these components.

     Dr. Mason provided a great list for research and I chose teaching tolerance.  This particular article was Test Yourself for Hidden Bias and was a group product by a Harvard psychologist, the University of Virginia, and the University of Washington on understanding the roots of stereotypes and prejudice in our society.  The site had posters, publications, teaching kits, lesson activities, mix-it-up, and professional development.  One article, How Culture Shapes Learning, was productive and refreshed strategies given to me through WSU’s education courses.  In this article, there was some new information.  This article stated that behaviorism is pertinent to different cultures.  For example, Hispanic students are social learners and excellent for group work.  Korean students are less likely to ask question and express personal opinions.  These are some examples of what is displayed in the everyday classroom.  Much of this behavior is learned and tied to their cultural identity.   Today classrooms have a multitude of diversity from gender, religion, language, geographic, race, and ethnicity.  So when I read this article, I found myself asking the question, “Do I have a hidden bias”?  “Do students have a hidden bias?”  The answer for me was I hope not, but one can show subtle bias from facial expressions, eye contact, and other forms, which can be positive or negative.  Therefore, my next thought was “what would be the best day to show diversity”.  With the start of a new school year, it impressed me that this would be a good time to show diversity.  Students tend to sit in culture clicks in the lunchroom, classroom, and hallways.  I decided it would be productive to assign students a seating chart to split the culture clicks up.  Next, I would have students write down (5) five things about themselves that was true and (1) which was false on a piece of paper which related to their culture.  From there students would take (5) five minutes to discuss these statements and find which was false as a means to introduce themselves, their culture, and be a great icebreaker.  Last, students would reveal their statements to the entire class and hopefully learn more about each other, their culture, and be more familiar and comfortable with each other.  Through this exercise, I hoped to do the following: break the ice, split the groups up, create a means to look at different cultures from their own perspectives, lesson discrimination/untruths, and provide a background that students would relate their similarities.

            My goal in classroom management was to improve upon a situation that had occurred last semester.  As an instructor, I wanted to have good classroom management and be more specific regarding plagiarism.  The previous semester, I started with a syllabus, classroom procedures, 10 key “Golden Rules”, and a test over these components.  It worked great until a student plagiarized an entire essay.  My question to myself was “What did I do wrong”.  Plagiarism was in the syllabus, discussed in class, on the school web site, and on a test.  I asked again, “so why did it happen”?  After much thought, I decided to ask my student why the paper was plagiarized.  My answer was, “I told him he could?”  This frazzled me.  I had never made a comment stating that.  This was a student who only showed up for (5) five classes, never called, or turned in any work.  My next step was to remedy this so it would not occur again.  To reduce any future confusion, I prepared a “Plagiarism” PowerPoint, which detailed how plagiarism is defined, what is classified as plagiarism, and gave examples.  I would post this on the school web site, discuss in a lesson plan, and make sure it was highlighted in the syllabus.  I hope that this would not occur again.

            These are the goals which I want to improve upon, discuss with my CT, and do more research on for future reference and insight. 

Citation:

www.education.com/reference/article/how-culture-shapes-learnining/?

www.toleranceorg/hiddenbias