Teachers as Social and Cultural Brokers Reconstruct Their Views and Classrooms

• In Event: Sense of Belonging: School, Campus, and Classroom Climate

Abstract

Given the growing number of emergent bilinguals in P12 classrooms and the likelihood of teachers’ cultural and linguistic backgrounds differing from their students, this portion of a larger qualitative phenomenology used an interweaving of perspectives to investigate the lived experience of teaching ELs in mainstream elementary classrooms. Two shared preliminary experiences have emerged. Findings indicate that teaching in diverse classrooms guided participants towards changes in perspectives to improve instruction and classroom environments. This study revealed that educators became learners themselves, made cultural shifts, and became mediators for diverse populations as catalysts for dismantling racial injustices.

Author

• Jennifer Stegall, Louisiana State University of Alexandria