Interrogating Culture in a Teacher Inquiry Community: Collaborating Toward Culturally Engaged and Equity-Oriented Literacy Learning With Latinx Students

• In Event: Collaboration, Inquiry, and Civic Engagement in Language and Literacy Education

Abstract

Educators and researchers have long advocated for curricula that honor, learn from, and leverage the funds of knowledge of students from historically minoritized communities. Yet, the realities in many schools have not caught up to this ideal. This paper draws on data from a larger 4-year study to investigate how Latinx bilingual elementary teachers in an inquiry community thought together about these issues in the process of designing and implementing a culturally-engaged and equity-oriented literacy curriculum. We illuminate the nuances and tensions of the inquiry process, as teachers grappled with contesting notions of culture in light of their assumptions of students, their own positionings, and the constraints and possibilities for instruction at a time of high-stakes testing.

Authors

• Maria Paula Ghiso, Teachers College, Columbia University

• Patricia Martínez-Álvarez, Teachers College, Columbia University

• Oluwaseun Animashaun, Teachers College, Columbia University

• Minhye Son, California State University - Dominguez Hills