Cultural Competency Resources
Antiracism in ABE
103 Things White People Can Do for Racial Justice
This article from Medium.com provides a list of concrete actionable items that white allies can do each day to support the BIPOC community and build a more equitable society.
3 Ways to Speak English
From the TED Talk site: "Jamila Lyiscott is a 'tri-tongued orator;' in her powerful spoken-word essay 'Broken English,' she celebrates — and challenges — the three distinct flavors of English she speaks with her friends, in the classroom and with her parents. As she explores the complicated history and present-day identity that each language represents, she unpacks what it means to be 'articulate.' "
Anti-Racism Resources
The document is a resource list for white people to deepen their understanding of racism. Included in this list are resources that provide historical as well as the current context of racism in America.
Anti-Racist Educator Self-Examination and Questionnaire
This working document is intended be used as a tool for educators to reflect on their own pedagogical assumptions, biases, backgrounds, and preconceived notions, with a view to enabling teachers to intentionally create anti-racist classes.
Antiracist Praxis Study Circle Facilitator Guide
Many of us have heard the terms antiracist and DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion), but how do we actually implement these large frameworks into our adult English classrooms? This study circle goes beyond defining antiracism and explores how the research around Translanguaging by Ofelia García and Culturally Responsive Teaching by Zaretta Hammond provides us with tools to change the way we approach teaching. The Facilitator Guide provides step-by-step suggestions for conducting a study circle no matter where your program is based.
Benefits of Language and Accent Diversity Among ABE Teachers and Volunteers
Minnesota Adult Education community members Justyna Sparrow and Andrea Echelberger bring us a session on the numerous benefits of having teachers and volunteers who did not grow up with English as a home language. They also discuss how we can support, advocate and retain teachers with diverse languages and accents which is so important in progressing equity within our schools.
Characteristics of White Supremacy Culture
This site lists characteristics of white supremacy culture that regularly appear in organizations - such as either/or thinking and fear of open conflict - as well as "antidotes" to combat them. These characteristics are shown as damaging to both people of color and white people because they are "used as norms and standards without being pro-actively named or chosen by the group" and they promote white supremacy thinking.
Coaching for Equity Tools
This website by equity coach extraordinaire Elena Aguilar and her team at Bright Morning is full of wonderful tools and resources that can help both teachers and education coaches. However, you don't have to have an official job as a coach to use her helpful materials!
Code Switch
This podcast produced by NPR features episodes that explore the ways that race intersects with ethnicity, gender, religion and culture and its implications on our lives. The hosts and producers Shereen Marisol Maraji and Gene Demby both identify as BIPOC. They provide unique insights and reporting to topics relating to race.
Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Teaching in Adult ESOL
A helpful resource from our colleagues at SABES in Massachusetts, this video defines Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Teaching (CRST), in conjunction with Massachusetts' ESOL Professional Standard 3. SABES provides a brief overview of the 5 key elements they use to break down CRST in order to assist educators trying to find more specific ways of implementing these practices in their classrooms. There is also a Flipgrid article that gives more classroom examples of these 5 key elements.
Culturally Responsive Practices and Participatory Instruction in ABE
Minnesota Adult Education community members Yixiu Chen and Erin Cary present this two-part series. Part 1 delves into what culturally responsive teaching is, while Part 2 describes Erin's Participatory Curriculum Unit Design Tool. You will learn about many tangible tools to try in your classrooms.
Culturally Responsive Teaching 101
In this video, Zaretta Hammond gives an introduction to her book Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. She discusses the importance of centering our classrooms around learners' cultural and linguistic identities and experiences. Though she is talking about k-12 schools, there are many valuable parallels to adult education.
Culturally Responsive Teaching Examples
In response to a question in the ATLAS Antiracist Praxis Study Circle, this document was made as a companion to Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain by Zaretta Hammond. Even if you haven’t read the book, hopefully you can still follow along the list to see some examples of Culturally Responsive Teaching in action.
Education Liberates
Hear directly from scholar giants in the field of education bell hooks and Bettina Love as they discuss racism in education, Abolitionist Teaching, and what educators can do to strive for justice in their classrooms. Like many other sources, they discuss k-12 schools, but there's still so much to prompt us to reflect on our own adult education teaching.
Embracing Multilingualism and Eradicating Linguistic Bias
As adult English educators, it is important for us to understand the language and accent discrimination learners face, and also to advocate in our communities to end this discrimination. In this TEDx Talk, Karen Leung discusses this very fact and gives anecdotes of the discrimination she and her family have faced while learning English after moving to the US.
ESOL Teaching Resources to Promote Anti-Racism, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Our friends and colleagues at SABES in Massachusetts put together this rich collection of resources for adult English educators who want to be intentional in incorporating antiracist teaching in their classrooms. SABES highlights that many resources are created by historically marginalized community members.
Heritage Language Resources Hub
This is a massive collection of resources in many languages around the world, put together by LESLLA (Literacy Education and Second Language Learning for Adults). A huge part of translanguaging (which is included in culturally sustaining teaching practices) is providing literacy resources in learners' home languages. This affirms for students that their languages are an asset on their journey of English learning.
Implicit Bias Test
The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is an initiative of Project Implicit, an international nonprofit collaborative that researches "thoughts and feelings outside of conscious awareness and control." The IAT consists of a series of tests that can be taken to measure personal attitudes on race, religion, gender and sexual identity, ability, age, etc., as a first step towards addressing implicit bias.
Justice in June
For those who want to become active anti-racist allies, this list is full of dynamic readings (longer and shorter), podcasts, and various conversations particularly geared toward this goal at this moment. This resource was created for the purpose of providing a starting place for individuals trying to become better allies.
Learning for Justice
Formerly called Teaching Tolerance, Learning for Justice provides free educational resources founded on their Social Justice Standards, which are divided into four domains: Identity, Diversity, Justice and Action. Their website includes free lessons, learning plans, student texts and tasks, teaching strategies, film kits, printable posters, and a learning plan builder.
On the “Flip” Side: A Teacher Educator of Color Unveiling the Dangerous Minds of White Teacher Candidates
Dr. Cheryl Matias teaches urban education courses at the University of Kentucky to prospective teachers, many of whom are White women. She identifies how the "white savior" narrative serves as a motivator for many of her students, and she examines its implications in the classroom. Dr. Matias also discusses the impact that her students’ whiteness ideology has on her as an educator of color, and how she counteracts the psychological harm done to her through the “pedagogy of trauma.”
Participatory Curriculum Unit Design Tool
Minnesota Adult Education community member Erin Cary created an amazing tool as part of her capstone project at Hamline University. The key to Culturally Responsive Teaching is making the class more relevant to learners' lives, experiences, and goals, and you can't do that without asking them to participate in the creation of the class. This template is an excellent guide to do just that.
Pedagogy of the Oppressed
Brazilian educational activist Paulo Freire originally published the seminal book The Pedagogy of the Oppressed in 1968. This book is essential reading for any educator interested in adult literacy and equity. Freire explains how traditional schooling perpetuates colonization and domination over oppressed classes of people and the way to liberation is through literacy and evoking critical consciousness in education.
Problematizing Linguistic Integration of Migrants: The Role of Translanguaging and Language Teachers
In this article, Ofelia García defines translanguaging, gives a fascinating example of an adult language classroom, and redefines traditional teacher roles into 4 new roles: the detective, the co-learner, the builder, and the transformer. She gives us real examples to reflect on and to try in our classrooms.
Race, Identity, and English Language Teaching
A Joint TESOL Quarterly and TESOL Journal Publication This is an online database of articles on race and teaching curated by editors from TESOL Journal and TESOL Quarterly, to support TESOL’s statement against racial injustice and inequality.
Racial Equity in ABE
This is a Facebook group of people committed to applying a racial justice lens to Minnesota ABE (Adult Basic Education) programming.
Refugees in America
This is the official United Nations High Commission for Refugees website, which can serve as a primer for ABE educators who work with refugees to understand who refugees are, where they come from, and relevant statistics and facts about refugees.
Teaching To Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom
This book offers educators tools to increase democratic participation in the classroom and to think about education as a practice of freedom. From the back cover: "Teaching students to "transgress" against racial, sexual, and class boundaries in order to achieve the gift of freedom is, for the author, the teacher's most important goal."
The Change Agent Resource Packets
These high-quality, relevant materials provide a basis for teachers who want to start conversations about facing racism, racial equity, and other social justice topics pertaining to race in the U.S. The lesson packets are free to download, edit, and use.
The U.S.-Mexico Migrant Crisis
This news special gives insight to the scope and complexity of migration at the Mexico/U.S. border. This resource can be used by ABE practitioners to better understand the political, social and economic background of a population of learners who we serve in ABE.
To the girl in English class
Similar to the Karen Leung video in this section of the library, this TikTok video by Hafsat Abdullahi is another unfortunate but great example of an English language learner speaking about their own experience learning English and facing discrimination. This resource provides several ideas for activities you can use with the English learners you work with.
Translanguaging as an Antiracist Practice
In this recorded webinar, Minnesota adult English teacher Cydnee Sanders and Hamline University Professor Betsy Parrish define translanguaging and give tangible examples teachers can try in their classrooms. There are examples of vocabulary, reading and writing activities, plus some other things to consider in your classroom such as what to do if there is only one speaker of a language.
Translanguaging Guides
One of the leading institutions on translanguaging research and resources is CUNY-NYS. Their whole website is filled with resources, but this webpage brings readers specifically to some of the guides and videos they have made specifically for educators. For those who have more time to dig through longer resources, start with this webpage, which includes writing activities that center translanguaging.
Translangugaing in 15 Minutes
In these two helpful videos, Mike Mena breaks down the theory of translanguaging, which is often confused for code switching, to help us rethink the way we view the hierarchies of languages in the US. These videos are a great place to start if you’re new to translanguaging; or even for those more familiar with the idea, it’s a great refresher to make sure we are understanding this revolutionary theory.
Understanding Implicit Bias
The Kirwan Research Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity works to raise awareness to the complexity and impact of implicit bias and the ways it acts as a barrier to access. This website provides a concrete definition of implicit bias and the ways it operates to broaden social inequality. You can sign up to receive their newsletter to get updates on their interdisciplinary research.
We Want to Do More Than Survive
In this phenomenal panel discussion, Bettina Love, Genevieve DeBose Akinnagbe, and Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz discuss Dr. Love's book We Want to Do More Than Survive, which addresses the racism in education. Dr. Love suggests Abolitionist Teaching as a way of life that all educators need to commit to. Check out this fascinating talk to reflect more on how racism shows up in our own classes and what we can do about it.
What Does It Mean to Be a Refugee?
This video describes the prevalence of global conflict that results in the internal displacement of millions of people due to war, violence and persecution, as well as the difference between an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) and a refugee. This resource is a visually engaging resource to inform ABE practitioners more about refugee populations. There are also lesson materials provided.
What is Critical Race Theory?
For those looking for more information on Critical Race Theory, especially since it is mentioned in the news daily, take a look at this article. What truly is CRT? The author provides the definition and history of CRT while connecting it to our education system today. They also address myths surrounding CRT which cause many people to misunderstand its purpose in our classrooms.
White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack
Author Peggy McIntosh explains, "I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance on my group." Proceeding from her studies on male privilege, her list outlining the "daily effects of white privilege" is a starting point to help people understand how this dynamic shows up in our lives regardless of intent and without our conscious participation - so that we can begin creating a more equitable society.
Why English Class is Silencing Students of Color
From YouTube description: "Viral TED speaker, spoken word poet, and social justice education scholar Dr. Jamila Lyiscott makes a powerful argument that, to honor and legitimize all students, we must, likewise, legitimize and honor all of their varied forms of written and spoken discourse, practicing 'Liberation Literacies' in the classroom."
Worth the Risk: Towards Decentering Whiteness in English Language Teaching
In this article the author reveals how English Language Teaching (ELT) centers whiteness and its negative impact on teachers and students of color. The author also provides suggestions for how ELT educators can de-center whiteness in the ELT field.