Connecting with Different Cultures

The book Different Cultures Common Ground is written by Tara Brown, and it includes 85 different (proven) strategies to connect with all the different cultures in your classroom. I will be sharing around 5-8 strategies each week in this blog!

1. BE THE BOSS OF YOU AND YOUR CLASS: Be very clear and communicate that you are in control from Day One. This is the cornerstone of you beginning to connect and to build relationships immediately. If this piece is not in place, you will not be able to build the relationships with your students in a way that will be effective. You need to try to do this in a manner that lets your students know you are worthy of their respect and that you follow through on what you say you will do. Lamar teachers have done this well at the beginning of the year through Respect Agreements, Classroom Expectations/Rules, and another great tool to use would be 10 x 2.

2. CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?: If you are working at your desk and the student comes up to speak with you, stop, look up, listen, and really connect with that student. Nothin is so important that you can't spare a few seconds of 100% attention. This is very important with certain cultures that might be represented in your classroom.

3. START SMART: Speak with the kids in the halls, say "hello", "good morning", crack a joke even. For some students that will be the only positive adult interaction they might get during the ENTIRE day.

4. DO YOU SEE WHAT I SEE? Challenge yourself to try and make eye contact with each of your students every single day. This won't be easy to do but you'll certainly connect with many more kids by creating that setting and being very intentional with your eyes. Simply stated, many kids feel invisible at times, and they crave to be acknowledged.

5. A STORY ABOUT ME: Make an effort to get to know things about your students, both school and non-school related. Create individual profiles for each student even: request information about their hobbies, talents, friends, pets, things people would be surprised to know about them, short and long term goals, and family structure. Build a classroom in which your students feel safe in revealing these things. Familiarize yourself with each profile and use it as a reference should you need a different way to reach a particular student. 10 x 2 will serve a tremendous purpose here, and also help you to understand their functions of behavior.

That is all for this week, hopefully educators will take a piece of this...and run with it!