Emily Vaught Teaching Identity Being culturally responsive in a classroom setting is sometimes easier said than done.

Very often, it is easy to realize that, even though you do not mean to, you can often have stereotypes about a certain culture, or you may accidentally neglect a certain culture just by not fully understanding them. Adventures throughout my life have shaped and formed the person I am today, I would be nowhere and definitely not doing the job I have if it was not for these adventures and circumstances. I would like to start off talking about my childhood experience and what it was like to grow up in my area. I am from a small, rural, farm town in southern Indiana. My hometown consisted of white, German-catholic families with lots of children, farming, and basketball. Not much strayed from those four things. As I grew older, I noticed our hispanic population start to rise. No one really thought much of it, most of the hispanic population were older adults that were hard workers for our farms. We never really saw them as anything different. My high school received the occasional study abroad student for a semester or year, but even then, the students were usually from Germany or another predominantly white background country. As open minded and as liberal as my parents were, it was still hard for them to culture me and my siblings in other backgrounds besides our towns population and shelter us from the general stereotypes and racism we would hear about from our peers. After graduating from college, I attended Purdue University. Though still in Indiana, with the same stereotypes, it was a bit more culturally diverse. As most big division one colleges, Purdue took pride in its culturally ethnic background with a Black

Cultural Center, and Hispanic Cultural Center. Since being in education, we were highly encouraged to visit these centers and make the most out of what they had to offer. Little did I know the friends I would make at these places. The Hispanic Cultural Center formed a Latino Fraternity that ended up pairing with my sorority for house functions. They became regular fixtures at our house, they would help us with our Spanish courses, and we would help them with perfecting their English papers. One aspect we really enjoyed was their cultures food that they would bring, churros and horchata were a big hit with the girls. As much as I loved the Hispanic Cultural Center, I will never forget my first experience with the Black Cultural Center (BCC). At the time, I was a teachers assistant for a class in art history. I led my class to the BCC for a tour when lecturing on the history of African Art. The tour guide had a very strong presence everywhere she went. I admired how comfortable she was with herself and you could tell how much she loved talking to groups about her heritage. The first thing she said to all of us when we walked in was; Hi. I am black. I am not from Africa, I have never been to Africa and therefore do not tell me that I am an African-American because I am not. This was a huge turning point in my life. It made me realize that the color of your skin should not be generalized as to where we may think you come from. Why do we generalize and assume that someone who looks a certain way must be from a specific place? I have very dark hair, fair skin and light eyes, I am one hundred percent German even though I may not look like it. My boyfriend has the same dark hair, light complexion, and light eyes but his heritage is from Ireland. Why are we both caucasian even though we have completely different cultural backgrounds?

Her opening statement made me think about why we have to fill out our ethnicity when applying for college, credit cards, or anything else? What difference does it make where our great-great grandparents came from or how they even got here? I can guarantee that I am absolutely nothing like my great-grandparents and I would assume the same from just about everyone considering the technology and differences in the world today. Not even including the difference in opportunities such as women voters and segregated schools that have not always been around. Listening to the tour guide made me much more aware of my surroundings and how to use culture to my advantage. During my last semester in college, I observed an elementary school art teacher. She taught at a very nice public elementary school that most of the professors from Purdue University sent their own children. Now, in my opinion, she was a horrible art teacher. She was very rude and unfair to the students but she did have great lesson plans. Since her students were all from extremely different backgrounds (because of their parents coming to the United States to teach or further their education at Purdue University) she decided to have an artist of the week. Each week, she would feature an artist from a different cultural background. The students would learn about the history of the artist, the type of media the artist used, and how the artists culture influenced him or her. The students absolutely loved this and really got into it. They would always immediately relate to the artist from their heritage and even give some input of their own about their heritage and what they may know about the artist from their countries point of view. I decided at that point that I would make sure my lesson plans had some point of culture or heritage theme to all of them.

It is easy to get students excited about an assignment if they can relate to it in their own way. Something as simple as choosing artists with similar cultural backgrounds as my students can help tremendously. Not only are the students learning about art, but they are now able to relate history, geography, reading and writing while working in the art classroom. Making sure that my lesson plans are cross curriculum is also a big part of my goal as a teacher. You can see the students eyes light up when they understand and make the connection between what they have learned in another class and what they are learning in my classroom. Being able to teach cross culturally is not something that was really brought up until I started my masters classes. At Purdue University, we were told the basics of what we should teach in the art room. We were told to follow the standards of DBAE (Discipline Based Art Education). These standards include Art History, Art Criticism, Art Production, and Aesthetics. We were often told the importance of not focusing on the general famous artists from 19th century Europe but we were also not required to focus on certain cultures either. Of course, while teaching the art history portion of DBAE we would skim surfaces of cultures and how things have changed but never a specific cultural background and history or how it has shaped our world today. I feel it is important for students to continue to research and get to know their ancestors, be proud of where they have come from and what they have brought to society. Moving to Chicago has influenced why I feel this is so important and why I really want to make sure I teach the importance of ethnicity. My first job when moving to the area was for the UNO Charter School Network. Teaching for this school was a big eye opener because I have never taught a

predominantly hispanic population before. Understanding their background and the things they feel are important was key to understanding how to teach the students. Family and relationships were a big deal to the group of students that I helped to teach. Realizing that I could easily talk to a sibling of my student made me understand a specific problem or help to get through to the student in a more efficient way. Realizing that being social and always helping each other out was something that my students could take pride in. It made me think of the movie Stand and Deliver when the calculus teacher explains to his students that they have to be good at math, it is in their blood just like the Mayans and creating the Calendar. Having my students work together in groups and helping each other through an assignment was easy and educational for them. They would not move on until everyone was at their pace. Sometimes we put such an emphasis on changing a student to learn or appreciate things the same way as the majority of students, but in reality it is us as teachers that should change the way we teach to conform to the students behavior. Having my students work in small groups was a way that I changed my own teaching style to better help my students. Another example is of a time I taught an extremely mixed cultural classroom. This classroom was at a school that seemed extremely divided in Indiana. Each student would sit at a table with only students of the same color of skin as them. But it did not end with just race, it went as far as gender and sexual preferences. As with anyone, all of the students had one thing in common, my goal as a teacher was to find that commonality and use it to my advantage. The only thing every student in that class had in common regardless of who they were was their love for music. Everyday as the students worked on their projects, music was played in

the background. Before I knew it, everyone was mingling. Students would use their five minute breaks to teach each other new dance moves and everyone got excited (including me at this point) when a male student was proud to put Lady GaGas new song on the speakers for everyone to hear. I was not with this specific class everyday but I could see how the class bonded together in a different way than anyone else would have thought. As a teacher, we are capable of really stretching a students mind if we put a little effort in. It is easy to hand out assignments and sit behind a desk everyday, but where will that lead us? I want to make a difference in all of my students lives. I want them to remember me as a teacher, remember their classmates and peers, and remember what they are capable of. I do not want any student to walk out of their school thinking they have failed or are incapable of anything. They need to be taught self assurance, pride, and be made aware of their qualities. I hope to not only be the change in a childs life but I also hope that my students change my life. I plan on learning just as much from them as they do from me.