It was the first meeting of Lellendo Juntos, an afterschool book club at an urban Title-1 elementary school in South Texas. Rudy, an early childhood student, entered the school’s library and walked towards the tables where the books were spread out for the book club members to select. As he looked over the choices, he grabbed Baseball in April by Gary Soto. Rudy flipped through the book and then stopped to read a page from one of the short stories. By this time, José, a member of the book club, had walked into the library and was standing beside Rudy. Rudy stopped reading, turned to José, showed him the cover of the book, and said, “Finally, a book about Mexicans!” José yanked the book out of Rudy’s hands and intently read a few lines from a random page. He then lifted his head, stared Rudy directly in the eyes and said, “You are right.. . this is about us.” The two boys just stood there for a moment in awe.
Abstract
Early childhood educators continue to see an increase in their culturally diverse student population. As our country continues to grow as a multicultural nation, it is imperative that our early childhood classrooms embrace this rich diversity and provide experiences that affirm all students, families and communities. We (teacher educators) synthesized the current research into the following five frameworks that we believe embody the foundation of culturally responsive teaching (CRT) in an early childhood setting: (a) developing a culturally responsive classroom community, (b) family engagement, (c) critical literacy within a social justice framework, (d) multicultural literature, and (e) culturally responsive print rich environments. In this article we situate each framework within the larger context of research. Next we move beyond discussing CRT practices by offering ideas on how culturally responsive classrooms look and how to implement this pedagogy and in an early childhood setting with real classroom practices.
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Bennett, S.V., Gunn, A.A., Gayle-Evans, G. et al. Culturally Responsive Literacy Practices in an Early Childhood Community. Early Childhood Educ J 46, 241–248 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-017-0839-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-017-0839-9