Critical Multicultural Education
A teacher has a “Native American Day” where students make crafts like totem poles and learn a few traditional words, but never learn about distinctive contemporary Native nations or sovereignty. What is missing?
A deeper understanding of distinctive First Nations as contemporary communities and sovereign nations, rather than treating them primarily as cultural artifacts from the past.
Joe Suina describes entering school as a young Cochiti child. What were two things about school that felt unfamiliar or overwhelming to him?
The English language, new ideas about time and expectations, the classroom environment, sitting in rows on hard chairs, unfamiliar routines, and the teacher's expectations are all examples.
What three things does Wisconsin's original Act 31 require schools to teach about Wisconsin's federally recognized American Indian tribes and bands?
History, culture, and tribal sovereignty.
Share one thing your group learned while exploring the Wisconsin First Nations website and why this is important for current students to learn.
Open answers.
Milner argues that educators should look beyond achievement gaps. What does he want us to examine instead and what does he mean by it?
Opportunity gaps, or differences in the opportunities and conditions students experience that contribute to differences in outcomes.
A teacher adds one lesson about Hmong Americans, but otherwise leaves the curriculum unchanged. Why might this be a limited approach to multicultural education?
Simply adding information about another group does not necessarily change whose knowledge is centered, challenge existing assumptions, or examine why that history was absent in the first place. CME asks students to examine the structures and power relationships shaping the curriculum.
Suina describes being told, “Leave your Indian at home.” What does this reveal about what his school considered acceptable knowledge or identity?
The school treated his Indigenous language, culture, and identity as things that did not belong in school. Instead of seeing his existing knowledge as an asset, the school expected him to leave important parts of himself outside the classroom because they did not fit with their expectations of success and belonging.
About how many federally recognized American Indian nations and tribes are located in Wisconsin and are included in the state's Act 31 requirements?
Eleven.
From student work: "The first plant to be domesticated in [Black River Falls] was" what?
Squash.
Ladson-Billings identifies four dimensions of education debt. Name them.
Historical, economic, sociopolitical, and moral.
A teacher says, “We already teach American history. Why do we need separate requirements for Native, Hmong American, or Asian American history?”
What is this teacher's assumption about American history?
The question assumes that the existing version of American history is already complete and neutral. The issue is not simply adding more groups to the same story. CME is looking at whose experiences, knowledge, contributions, struggles, and perspectives have shaped American history but have been left out or minimized.
How did Suina describe his changing feelings towards the things he had at home and what would make his life better?
He began to resent his home life and felt that "it could be a heck of a lot better if only [he] had a whiteman’s house with a bed, a nice couch, and a clock"
The land we inhabit, recognized as La Crosse, originally belonged to which First Nation?
The Ho-Chunk.
From student work: The Hochungra people are now typically referred to as the __________ Nation, and the name means what?
Ho-Chunk.
People of the Big Voice or People of the Sacred Voice.
Tatum asks us to think about identities in terms of both personal experience and society. What is the problem with assuming that everyone experiences the same identity in the same way?
People's identities intersect, and their experiences are shaped by context (cultures and communities shaped by structural circumstances all within a place and time in history), social status, privilege, and oppression, so there is no single experience of an identity.
A school is deciding whether to celebrate Columbus Day, Indigenous Peoples’ Day, both, or neither. From a multicultural education perspective, what is one question the school should consider before making that decision?
Whose perspectives are being centered? Whose history is being represented or left out? How might different students and communities experience the holiday? What does the curriculum teach students about colonization and Indigenous peoples? Are we presenting Columbus from only one perspective? Are we presenting all the facts or just some facts?
What can we learn from Suina's story of attending American English school at a young age?
Schools are institutions that have historically maintained set expectations and norms that do not integrate or consider those who are not necessarily culturally, historically, or linguistically tied to them. Suina's life, values, culture, history, relationships, and sense of self were shred from him, as has been done to many students who have not fit the school norms and expectations.
CME challenges us to understand these historical missteps and injustices and take the whole student for who they are while educating ourselves and all of our students on how we got here.
What major addition did Wisconsin make to its human-relations curriculum requirements through the 2023 legislation that became Act 266?
Hmong Americans and Asian Americans were explicitly added alongside American Indians, Black Americans, and Hispanic or Latiné communities.
Still limited!
The Potawatomi and Ojibwe have a word meaning "fox" that is also the name of the seventh most populous city in Wisconsin. What is it?
Waukesha.
In a city, Black families were historically prevented from getting mortgages or buying homes in certain neighborhoods because those areas were considered “too risky.” Decades later, schools in many of those same neighborhoods have fewer resources and fewer opportunities for students. What historical practice helps explain how housing discrimination became connected to educational inequality? And which aspect of GLB's debt can be described here?
Redlining.
All the debt! Historical, economic, sociopolitical, and moral.
A new student is enrolled in a third-grade classroom in Springfield, USA. As the teacher reads the student's file, they notice that the student's family is from Oaxaca, Mexico. The teacher is excited because they have been learning Spanish and have visited a few cities in Mexico on vacation.
When the teacher greets the new student, they use some of the Spanish they know, but the student looks puzzled and stays silent. Later, after lunch, the teacher asks the student if they enjoyed “Taco Tuesday” and asks, “What kind of Mexican food is your favorite?” in Spanish.
The student explains that their family speaks a language other than Spanish at home (though they understand it due to it being a dominant language in Mexico) and that some of the foods and traditions the teacher associates with Mexico are not part of their family's culture. The teacher is surprised and says, “Oh, I didn't realize there were different languages and cultures in Mexico. I thought everyone there spoke Spanish.”
What is one assumption the teacher is making about the student, and what could the teacher do instead?
Suina's story is not simply an argument that school was “bad.” What makes his experience more complicated than that?
School gave him access to English and knowledge he needed to navigate the larger society, but it also communicated that his own language, culture, community, and traditions were inferior. He had to gain access to the dominant system while also trying to maintain a connection to his own community. "Double-consciousness."
Why is it significant that Wisconsin law requires students to learn about tribal sovereignty, rather than only learning about Native American culture or history?
Sovereignty recognizes Native nations as political entities with their own governments and rights. It moves the curriculum beyond treating Native peoples only as a historical or cultural group and asks students to understand their continuing political presence and relationship with the state and federal governments. This allows us to, among other things, recognize treaties as legally-binding (not historically the case) between government entities.
This Wisconsin First Nation's name means "wild rice" or "Wild Rice People".
The Menominee Nation.
Name all seven of Tatum's categories of "otherness" experienced in U.S. society.
"People are commonly defined as other on the basis of race or ethnicity, gender, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, age, and physical or mental ability."