CREDE and Culture

I recently taught a science unit called “Eco-Scouts.” The big question addressed in the unit was “Do our schoolyard habitats provide the living, once living, and non-living factors necessary to support the survival of a variety of organisms?” After reflecting on the implementation of the lessons in this unit, I was able to identify several CREDE standards that I feel were met. Standard #4 suggests that students should be engaged with challenging lessons. My students were engaged in challenging lessons on a daily basis, for each activity they completed helped them to design a Schoolyard Habitat Action Plan. Due to the progressive design of the unit, I found that the students were very attentive and motivated to participate. Each student was challenged at their own level and extension questions were presented to foster higher level thinking. Each lesson also emphasized dialogue over lecture (CREDE Standard #3) in that the students worked in small groups to discuss their daily observations and then shared their group’s observations and ideas with the whole class. This type of partner work allowed my ELL students the opportunity to practice verbal interaction with their English-speaking peers, who were able to serve as strong models. Both of these CREDE standards were implemented effectively and assisted students in developing their action plans.

I believe that the instruction I delivered in the Eco-Scouts unit was culturally responsive to the diverse needs of my students. Regardless of their current stage of English language acquisition, I set high expectations for all of the students involved. I made sure to include every student in each discussion and every student was also responsible for recording their observations in their science log books. As stated by Dr. Garcia, “Children learn to see themselves as others see them.” Of the five R’s that he presents, I believe that showing respect to students should always come first. My students know that I see them as being very capable individuals and I am always respectful of the ideas they present. Throughout the unit, they learned to view themselves in the same way and were confident in proposing their action plans to their fellow classmates. The “T” in Dr. Garcia’s “5 R’s and 1 T” was also addressed in that I knew what prerequisites the students needed in order to be successful. Prior to the implementation of this unit, several days were spent on developing the necessary background knowledge and vocabulary related to the study of ecology.

Entered on 6/13/09

Once the foundation for this unit was established, the students were given the opportunity to talk about their findings each day. This unit was culturally responsive because the students were able to use the scientific language they acquired in genuine conversations. This allowed me to take the responsibility of assessing whether or not they were understanding the topics that were being discussed. Although I have mentioned several of Dr. Garcia's "R's," I feel that I could have been more resourceful in planning this unit. Families are an extremely valuable resource and I would like to include them in the planning process in the future. This particular unit has the potential to be very family-oriented. A parent trifold was sent home at the beginning of the unit, which includes several activities that parents can do with their children at home to support their learning. Many parents found this resource to be very helpful and it was reassuring to know that they made use of this.