Today we started our early morning with a lecture called How Biases, Archetypes, and the Diversity Competencies Affect Teachers’ Actions and Students’ Achievement. We spent a lot of time talking about the biases we may have about our students and their families. We discussed the biases our minority students and their parents may have about us, and the biases we have about them. The lecturer suggested that many of the biases we assume they have about us really stem from our biases about them. Confusing, but interesting.
We were given four “diversity competencies”:
Suspending Judgement (don't jump to a negative conclusion)
Asset-Based Thinking (relationships with students and their families are valuable to students' success)
Locus of Control/Growth Mindset (focus on ways to improve)
Interpersonal Awareness (be aware how others are perceiving me)
I think the main purpose of this lecture was to have us begin thinking about how we identify ourselves and how we think of others. It reminds me of my first week in Botswana. I think I can use a lot of what I learned there. Most importantly, I learned how I feel about my own racial, cultural, and socioeconomic identity, and I learned to what degree another culture can differ from my own and to what degree it can be similar to my own. And different cultures/groups are more different and more similar to my own in more ways I can imagine. That's all I can get from this. The rest I need to see for myself, when I begin teaching on Tuesday.
What I really need practice with is receiving criticism from my advisers and mentors. That is not my strong point and I'd really like to start improving at it before we get in the thick of things.
And now it is Friday. I shall make it through the end of the day and proceed to relax for a while. Yesssssssssss.
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