Where I am From Reflection

I really enjoyed working on the assignment “Where I Am From”, because it allowed me to go through photos of my past that I have not taken the time to look at for a while. When I first began the poem, I had trouble coming up with information about myself. I had never really done an assignment that was based on me and my personal experiences and important people in life that were not based on education. It took a lot of thought about my childhood and the things I feel are important in my life. But once I started to write, it became easier to continue the poem. I no longer looked at it as an assignment but a self-discovery project. This assignment supports the “Funds of Knowledge” by using Moll’s strategy of learning more about someone else’s background in order to become more culturally informed. Not only did I discover a lot about myself, but I also discovered a lot about my classmates. It was a great add to the assignment to have us watch our classmates’ videos and give them feedback. Not only did it allow me to learn more about them, but it also helped me to think like a teacher as I was watching them.
This assignment is can help eliminate cultural deficit issues which occur in some classrooms. Cultural deficit is when there is an assumption that “students of color and low-income students often fail to do well in school because of perceived “cultural deprivation” or lack of exposure to cultural models more obviously congruent with school success”. It is placing a stereotype on students based on little known information on their life outside of school, like the situation with Donny in the article “As Soon As She Opened Her Mouth”. The teacher just assumed there was no hope for him because of the illiteracy of his mother.
This assignment was a great way to use culturally responsive teaching in the classroom. It falls under most of the principles of culturally responsive teaching. I plan on using this assignment with my own class. It will be a great way for me to get to know my students more personally. It also promotes culturally capital in the classroom by allowing students to take pride in who they are and where they came from.