Teachers' and Students' Identities, Languages, and Lived Worlds in Historically Minoritized Middle School Classrooms

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 9
  In Roundtable Session: Teacher Agency for Instruction and Curriculum

Abstract

This study is based on the premise that students have valuable funds of knowledge, FoK, that may assist their learning of novel academic concepts (Moll et al., 1992). However, historically marginalized populations have rich and diverse FoK that are not typically exemplified within the standardized United States, U.S. education system. The goal of this study is to 1) explore teachers’ depictions of minoritized students’ FoK 2) compared with teachers’ own FoK and 3) examine how teachers’ integrate FoK into their pedagogical approaches. Our analysis finds that teachers’ individual FoKs uniquely influence how they identify and leverage their students’ FoK in the classroom, providing insight into the various ways teachers approach culturally relevant instruction, with a focus on asset-based pedagogies.

Authors

• Martinique A. Sealy, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Christine Lee Bae, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Erin K Hogan, University of Texas at Austin