Teaching for Social Justice Joanna Greer Koch, Ph.D. Micha Jeffries, Ph.D. Beginning Teacher Institute July 14, 2016

To join the padlet, go to: Social justice is “a philosophy, an approach, and actions that embody treating all people with fairness, respect, dignity, and generosity.” (Sonia Nieto) Defining via Padlet: What is social justice?

What does it mean to teach for social justice? ■ Recognizing Inequality ■ Challenge, confront, and disrupt misconceptions/untruths/stereotypes leading to inequality and discrimination ■ Teachers As Change Agents ■ Providing students with material and emotional resources to learn at their full potential ■ Drawing on students’ talents/strengths and rejecting deficit perspectives ■ Promoting critical thinking and supporting agency for change

●Multicultural education invites students and teachers to put their learning into action for social justice. ●Multicultural education with a social justice perspective also means learning to ask questions about society’s power structures and the status quo. ○ Ethics and the distribution of power, status, and rewards are basic societal concerns; education must address them. ●A multicultural perspective presumes that classrooms should not simply allow discussions that focus on social justice but also welcome them and even plan actively for discussions. Multicultural Education is education for social justice.

Multicultural Education is a process. It is ongoing and dynamic because no one ever stops becoming a multicultural person and knowledge is never complete. This means that there is no established canon that is set in stone. Multicultural education is a process because it primarily involves relationships among people.

Teaching Strategy: Seminar ●The Socratic method of teaching is based on Socrates' theory that it is more important to enable students to think for themselves than to merely fill their heads with "right" answers. Therefore, a teacher regularly engages the pupils in dialogues by responding to their questions with questions instead of answers. This process encourages divergent thinking rather than convergent. (

Definition ● Socratic Discussion is a method used to facilitate deep understanding of information by participating in a collaborative dialogue about a specific text. ● Participants seek to deepen their understanding of complex ideas in the text through rigorously thoughtful dialogue.

Components of Seminars ● A common text ○ Dense and field with big ideas ● Open-ended questions ○ An insightful question about the text that will require proof and group discussion and "construction of logic" to discover or explore the answer to the question ● Exploratory dialogue ○ Student Centered (

Seminar Plan ● Pre-Seminar Writing ● Seminar Ground Rules ● Seminar discussion ● Post-Seminar Writing

The Text ● Is rich in ideas, issues, values ● Stimulates dialogue ● Raises important questions ● At the end of successful Socratic Seminars, participants often leave with more questions than they brought with them.

Potential Texts

Small Group: Activity 1 ● Review the text ● Identify the Big Ideas of the Text ● How would this text allow you to explore social justice with children?

Questions ●Opening: Focused on the big themes of the text ●Core: Focused on the details of the text ●Closing: Focused on personal connections with the text

Small Group: Activity 2 ● Using the “ Preamble to the Constitution ” write: 1. (2) Opening Questions 2. (3) Core Questions 3. (1) Closing Questions

The Preamble to the Constitution ● We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. domestic Tranquility defenseWelfarePosterityordain

Summarizing Our Learning Session ● What does it mean to teach for social justice? ● Explain how multicultural education is education for social justice. ● How does a socratic seminar modeling a multicultural, social justice approach? ● What are the components of a socratic seminar? ● Describe the type of questions asked in a socratic seminar.