Teacher Education Students Using White Bread to Examine Themselves and Others

• In Event: 69.037 - Critical Family History and the Novel as Tools of Whiteness Pedagogies: A Theory-to-Practice Symposium

Abstract

Frameworks
Educators, scholars, and advocates have emphasized the changing demographics of schools in the United States, especially regarding race and ethnicity, language, culture, and immigration status, when calling for changes in the way teachers are prepared (Sleeter and Grant, 2009). As a response to changing demographics, we adapted the Multicultural Curriculum Process (REACH Center, 1980) framework. This framework promotes (a) students’ understanding of themselves personally and culturally, (b) understanding of people of different backgrounds, and (c) consideration of implications for teaching practice.

Context of teaching and goals
In 2006, the faculty at a land-grant university in the northeastern United States developed a new course, Education in a Multicultural Society based on the REACH Center’s framework. This course is a sophomore-level course required of all students majoring or minoring in Education and serves as the primary course for conscientizing teachers about diversity, teaching, and learning. Over 95% of the students are White and monolingual English-speaking, and about 75% are female. National origins included many countries, almost all European. As part of this course’s on-going revisions, the novel White Bread was adopted as a textbook in Spring 2016. This study evaluates this most recent innovation in the course.

Data sources and analyses
Students were asked permission for five of their assignments to be de-identified and used for research purposes after final grades were submitted. Depending on the assignment, 36-39 students, or 45-50%, consented. In all, 188 samples of student work were available for analysis. The assignments included two online reflection journal entries, an essay on a topic from White Bread, a cultural map depicting a community that has impacted who the student is culturally, and a multicultural advocacy letter. The instructors adhered to grounded theory’s (Straus & Corbin, 1990) analytical procedures and techniques and approached data through the REACH Center’s (1980) conceptual framework.

Substantiated observations and scholarly significance
Most students in this study indicated that they had given minimal attention to diversity prior to taking this course. As a consequence of reading White Bread and of other course experiences, many students indicated interest in exploring their own backgrounds more deeply and/or learning more about students different from themselves. Most cultural maps indicated that they grew up in predominantly white, rural or small town communities. Most multicultural advocacy letters advocated that their former schools take specific steps to address diversity in school climate or curriculum, such as including Native American history and culture in the curriculum. Overall, this study adds to teaching and learning on diversity literatures that seek to document curricular and pedagogical wisdom.

References

REACH Center (1980). Multicultural Curriculum Process. Seattle WA: Author.

Sleeter, C. (2015). White Bread: Weaving Cultural Past into the Present. Rotterdam, The Netherlands: Sense Publishers.

Sleeter, C.E. and Grant, C.A. (2009). Making Choices for Multicultural Education: Five Approaches to Race, Class, and Gender (6th edition). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Straus, A., & Corbin, J. (1990). Basics of Qualitative Research: Grounded Theory Procedures and Techniques. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Authors

• John Maddaus, University of Maine

• Bryan Silverman, University of Maine

• Tammy Mills, University of Maine