AASL 2017 presentation

1. TRANSFORMING
YOUR LESSONS FOR
EQUITY
Casey Rawson, Ph.D.
@CaseyHRawson
Kimberly Hirsh
@kimberlyhirsh

2. About
Project
READY
• Funded by IMLS
• 3-year project:
– Year 1: Design PD focused on racial equity
– Year 2: Implement PD with school librarians and
their collaborative partners inWake County, NC
– Year 3:Transition PD curriculum online

3. Educating for
Equity
• Working toward racial equity requires
attention to:
– Our collections (#OwnVoices)
– Our spaces
– Our policies and procedures
– Our interactions with students and families
– Our instruction

4. Rethinkingthe
Standard
Curriculum
• North Carolina 4th Grade Social Studies Standard:
4.H.2.1 Explain why important buildings, statues,
monuments, and place names are associated with the
state's history.
• Basic Unit:
– Students choose a building, statue, or
monument in the state and create a written
report about its history.
– Classroom teacher creates a list of
monuments from which students can choose
and oversees the written reports.
– Librarian collects print and digital resources
students can use to research their chosen
monument.
Confederate Soldier Memorial,
Fayetteville, N.C.
Image: Public Domain.
http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/nc_post/id/1753/rec/2

5. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• James A. Banks, professor of Diversity Studies at the
University ofWashington
• Developed a model outlining four approaches to
integrating diverse perspectives into the classroom
• Goal: to enable students from diverse racial and ethnic
groups to fully engage with and access the curriculum
– Challenges the Euro-centric traditional curriculum
• Takes advantage of the cultural assets students bring
to the classroom
• Works toward prejudice reduction
• One tool for dismantling structural racism in schools
Image: Photographed by Dell Upton.
http://docsouth.unc.edu/commland/features/essays/upton/

6. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• Students complete the same assignment.
• Teacher ensures that the list of monuments
students can choose from includes those
that memorialize prominent African
Americans, such as the Martin Luther
King, Jr. monument in Edgecombe County
or the John Coltrane statue in Guilford
County.
• Librarian provides resources.
MLK, Jr. Memorial,
Rocky Mount, N.C.
Level 1 Contributions
Approach
Focuses on
heroes, holidays,
and discrete
cultural elements.
Image: Photographed by Dell Upton.
http://docsouth.unc.edu/commland/features/essays/upton/

7. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• Teacher expands the list further to include options such as
the Greensboro Four monument in Guilford County and
the Cherokee Botanical Gardens in Jackson County.
• Student reports must now include a one-page “letter to
the editor” written from the perspective
of a person living in the time period
before the monument or building was
dedicated, arguing for its development.
• Librarian provides resources, co-teaches
letter to the editor guidelines.
Cherokee Botanical Gardens,
Cherokee, NC
Level 2 Additive
Approach
Content, concepts,
themes, perspectives
added; structure of
curriculum
unchanged.
Image: Photographed by Chris Kruessling
http://www.ncpedia.org/cherokee-botanical-garden

8. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• Teacher & Librarian revise the unit to focus on the main
idea that a community’s values and biases are
evidenced by what it chooses to memorialize.The unit
incorporates media about recent protests over
Confederate monuments in Durham and Chapel Hill,
North Carolina.
Level 3 Transformation
Approach
Structure of
curriculum changed
to enable students to
view concepts from
diverse perspectives
Image: SilentSam protest, 8/23/2017, photographed by Sara Davis.
http://time.com/4912005/unc-protest-silent-sam-confederate-monument/

9. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• Students discuss the history of these monuments and
what they communicate about our state’s values and
biases. Other monuments, such as the Greensboro
Four monument, are similarly discussed.
• Groups of students then work together to decide on
one positive value they feel North Carolinians
exemplify.
• With the librarian’s help, they conduct research to find
a North Carolina citizen or event that embodies that
value & design a monument or statue memorializing
that person or event.
Level 3 Transformation
Approach
Structure of
curriculum changed
to enable students to
view concepts from
diverse perspectives

10. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• Similar to Level 3 plans, except…
• Student groups will prepare a package of materials to
send to local officials in the city or county where they
would like to place their proposed monument or
statue.This package might include letters, images,
audio or video recordings, student artwork, etc.
• This packet would actually be sent to city councilors or
other officials as appropriate.Alternatively, the teacher
and librarian could arrange for some local officials to
visit the school to hear student proposals in person.
Level 4 SocialAction
Approach
Students make
decisions on
important social
issues and take
actions to solve them.

11. Information
Literacy Skills
Addressed
Original Plan:
• Selecting appropriate
sources
• Completing a product to
express their learning
Level 4 Plan:
• Selecting & evaluating
sources
• Identifying bias, conflicting
information, point of view
• Connecting understanding
to the real world
• Considering diverse
perspectives in drawing
conclusions
• Showing social
responsibility
• Using information in the
service of democratic
values
• + more!

12. Shared
FoundationsAdd
ressed
Original Plan:
• Curate
Level 4 Plan:
• Inquire
• Explore
• Include
• Collaborate
• Curate
• Engage

13. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
Level 4 SocialAction
Approach
Students make
decisions on
important social
issues and take
actions to solve them.
Level 3 Transformation
Approach
Structure of
curriculum changed
to enable students to
view concepts from
diverse perspectives
Level 2 Additive
Approach
Content, concepts,
themes, perspectives
added; structure of
curriculum
unchanged.
Level 1 Contributions
Approach
Focuses on
heroes, holidays,
and discrete
cultural elements.

14. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.5.6
Analyze multiple accounts of the same
event or topic, noting important
similarities and differences in the point
of view they represent.
• Let’s try to brainstorm units at each
level of Banks’s model

15. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.5.6
Analyze multiple accounts of the same
event or topic, noting important
similarities and differences in the point
of view they represent.
• Topic: Recent hurricanes (Harvey,
Irma, & Maria)
• Base (“Level 0”): Students read and
compare two different news stories
about the hurricanes from major news
outlets

16. James A. Banks:
Levels of Integration
of Multicultural
Content
Level 4 SocialAction
Approach
Students make
decisions on
important social
issues and take
actions to solve them.
Level 3 Transformation
Approach
Structure of
curriculum changed
to enable students to
view concepts from
diverse perspectives
Level 2 Additive
Approach
Content, concepts,
themes, perspectives
added; structure of
curriculum
unchanged.
Level 1 Contributions
Approach
Focuses on
heroes, holidays,
and discrete
cultural elements.

17. Workshop • Work with a group to brainstorm
lesson or unit plans at each level of
integration.
• Your lesson or unit plans should
address a content area standard on
your handout or another standard you
teach.You should also discuss what
the librarian’s role could be at each
level and what information literacy
skills and/or content could be taught.

18. Resources • Banks, J. (2013). An Introduction to Multicultural
Education (5th Ed.). Boston: Pearson.
• Multiculturalisms’s five dimensions: Dr. James A.
Banks on multicultural education
• Overview of Banks’s four levels of content integration:
http://resources.css.edu/diversityservices/docs/levels
ofintegrationofmulticulturalcontent.pdf
• Hughes-Hassell, S., Bracy, P. B., & Rawson,C. H.
(2016). Libraries, literacy, and African American youth:
Research and practice. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries
Unlimited.
• Paris, D., & Alim, H. S. (2017). Culturally sustaining
pedagogies:Teaching and learning for justice in a
changing world. NewYork:Teachers College Press.