- Amherst, Massachusetts, United States
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Diversity always has been an important characteristic of the United States, and this is truer today than ever before. From the many indigenous groups already here before In this special section of the Record, five Kappa Delta Pi Laureates... more
Diversity always has been an important characteristic of the United States, and this is truer today than ever before. From the many indigenous groups already here before In this special section of the Record, five Kappa Delta Pi Laureates explore the interrelated topics of diversity, globalization, and education. Their essays set the stage for the Laureate Panel at KDP’s upcoming Convocation in Dallas.
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Alicia López and Sonia Nieto share their cowriting experiences and reflect on writing bravely over the years
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“We want our students to develop tolerance of others,” says a teacher when asked what multicultural education means to her. “The greatest gift we can give our students is a tolerance for differences,” is how a principal explains it. A... more
“We want our students to develop tolerance of others,” says a teacher when asked what multicultural education means to her. “The greatest gift we can give our students is a tolerance for differences,” is how a principal explains it. A school’s mission statement might be more explicit: “Students at the Jefferson School will develop critical habits of the mind, a capacity for creativity and risk-taking, and tolerance for those different from themselves.” In fact, if we were to listen to pronouncements at school board meetings, or conversations in teachers’ rooms, or if we perused school handbooks, we would probably discover that when mentioned at all, multicultural education is associated more often with the term tolerance than with any other. My purpose in this article is to challenge readers, and indeed the very way that multicultural education is practiced in schools in general, to move beyond tolerance in both conceptualization and implementation. It is my belief that a movement beyond tolerance is absolutely necessary if multicultural education is to become more than a superficial “bandaid” or a “feel-good” additive to our school curricula. I will argue that tolerance is actually a low level of multicultural support, reflecting as it does an acceptance of the status quo with but slight accommodations to difference. I will review and expand upon a model of multicultural education that I have developed elsewhere (See Sonia Nieto, By Sonia Nieto
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In this personal reflection, Sonia Nieto recounts the lessons she learned about language and literacy from learning to speak Spanish and then English; to reading and writing; and the impact of these lessons on her identity, teaching,... more
In this personal reflection, Sonia Nieto recounts the lessons she learned about language and literacy from learning to speak Spanish and then English; to reading and writing; and the impact of these lessons on her identity, teaching, research, and life; and, more broadly, on the fields of education and literacy.
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Dear Richard,The last time I saw you was at UMass, my university and a place where I had never seen you before, although I guess you had been here many years before when you were a doctoral student...
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As discussed throughout this paper, many institutional and instructional strategies can facilitate higher achievement among Latino/a students. Many of these are effective partly because of the relationships they foster. But we also want... more
As discussed throughout this paper, many institutional and instructional strategies can facilitate higher achievement among Latino/a students. Many of these are effective partly because of the relationships they foster. But we also want to point out a few concrete examples of supportive constructive relationships. The common thread in these examples is how the school affirms the students’ home cultures and ethnicity. When students witness the validation of their culture within the educational process, they connect their home or community identities with an academic identity. Most importantly, the cultural substance of their identities feeds and sustains an academic persona , which in turn promotes strong school-oriented relationships among peers, teachers, and parents. The outcome is engaged and interested students who feel their culture is not a deficit but a benefit to their academic achievement.
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Published by Teachers College Press, 1234 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10027 Copyright © 2005 by Teachers College, Columbia University All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by... more
Published by Teachers College Press, 1234 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10027 Copyright © 2005 by Teachers College, Columbia University All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, ...
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... In Danza! too, the names are unusual to say the least: Paulo, Res, Fidelina, Mira, and Rameriz. ... The Rainbow-Colored Horse. Illus. Martorell. New York: Frederick Warne, 1978. Bethancourt, T. Ernesto. New York City Too Far from... more
... In Danza! too, the names are unusual to say the least: Paulo, Res, Fidelina, Mira, and Rameriz. ... The Rainbow-Colored Horse. Illus. Martorell. New York: Frederick Warne, 1978. Bethancourt, T. Ernesto. New York City Too Far from Tampa Blues. New York: Holiday House, 1975. . ...
Research Interests: Psychology and Self Image
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... Moodley, 1999). Mary Poplin and Joseph Weeres (1992) also found that many of the students they interviewed brought up the issue of racism without being asked, while virtually none of the adults in the school even mentioned it. ...
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Foreword by Donaldo Macedo Introduction PART 1: Beginnings PART 2: Fear/Courage PART 3: Pedagogy PART 4: Praxis PART 5: Conscientizacao PART 6: Politics PART 7: Love PART 8: Study/Dialogue PART 9: Freedom References and General... more
Foreword by Donaldo Macedo Introduction PART 1: Beginnings PART 2: Fear/Courage PART 3: Pedagogy PART 4: Praxis PART 5: Conscientizacao PART 6: Politics PART 7: Love PART 8: Study/Dialogue PART 9: Freedom References and General Bibliography About the Editor and Contributors
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Through the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century, American youth culture and literature grew up with Puerto Rico. The contemporary US tradition of youth literature and media, along with how young people, as authors, narrate... more
Through the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century, American youth culture and literature grew up with Puerto Rico. The contemporary US tradition of youth literature and media, along with how young people, as authors, narrate their part in social struggle, is inseparable from Puerto Rican thought and writing. Youth literature, media, and youth-led movements have played a prominent role in portraying the political and cultural relationship between the US and Puerto Rico—from the US acquisition to Puerto Rican writer’s pleas for a place in US letters and culture. During the early colonial encounter, children’s books were among the first kinds of literature produced by US writers introducing the new colony, its people, and the US’s role as a twentieth-century colonial power to the American public. Subsequently, youth literature and media was an important tool of Puerto Rican cultural and educational elite institutions and Puerto Rican revolutionary thought for negotiating ...
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Given the shameful differences in the academic outcomes and graduation rates of students of color compared to many Asian and white students, one would expect policies and practices related to students' race and ethnicity to be high on... more
Given the shameful differences in the academic outcomes and graduation rates of students of color compared to many Asian and white students, one would expect policies and practices related to students' race and ethnicity to be high on the reform agenda. Of course, there is widespread discussion of the "minority achievement gap," but solutions on the public agenda are invariably color-blind. It is widely assumed that what works for white and Asian American students will work for students of color—if only we did it more often.
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... for a Multicultural Society James A. Banks, Peter Cookson, Geneva Gay, Willis D. Hawley, Jacqueline Jordan Irvine, Sonia Nieto, Janet ... programs, are useful in bridging home and school cultures for students from diverse groups... more
... for a Multicultural Society James A. Banks, Peter Cookson, Geneva Gay, Willis D. Hawley, Jacqueline Jordan Irvine, Sonia Nieto, Janet ... programs, are useful in bridging home and school cultures for students from diverse groups (Gutiérrez, Baquedano-Lopez, Alvarez, & Chiu ...
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As an educator whose work has focused on equity and social justice, I have long struggled with a conundrum: how to reconcile meritocracy – an idea at the very heart of U.S. thinking – with the reality of inequality and injustice. I’ve... more
As an educator whose work has focused on equity and social justice, I have long struggled with a conundrum: how to reconcile meritocracy – an idea at the very heart of U.S. thinking – with the reality of inequality and injustice. I’ve spent my professional life – whether teaching, mentoring, researching, or writing – trying to make sense of these conflicting beliefs. I’ve been on a quest to learn how to teach and write about them with some sense of integrity, with neither an unrealistic Pollyanna-ish optimism nor a doomsday negativism. In this essay, I address what this quest has meant for my teaching, research, and writing. I present two major lessons I’ve learned: one, being humble about what we know and do is essential if we want to collaborate with, and learn from, those who are most impacted by injustice in education, that is, students, their families, and teachers; and two, education is a political endeavor.
Research Interests: Psychology and Education
Multicultural education has always been concerned with furthering social justice and providing children with a relevant and rigorous education. This concern involves an understanding and appreciation of diversity, the examination of power... more
Multicultural education has always been concerned with furthering social justice and providing children with a relevant and rigorous education. This concern involves an understanding and appreciation of diversity, the examination of power structures and relationships, a close look at the ideological underpinnings in the construction of knowledge, and the development of culturally responsive pedagogy. Even though we recognize that multicultural education has addressed a broad range of issues related to social justice and education, in this entry we will focus on the links between literacy and multicultural education. Keywords: ethnicity and culture; globalization; multicultural education; civil rights; discrimination; literacy
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In the past several decades, those who speak languages other than English have become a growing presence in the United States, even in areas where they had not previously been concentrated. In fact, in the past three decades their numbers... more
In the past several decades, those who speak languages other than English have become a growing presence in the United States, even in areas where they had not previously been concentrated. In fact, in the past three decades their numbers have almost tripled, from 23 to 60 million (Gándara, 2015). U.S. schools have felt the major impact of this growing population. Currently, about 9.1 percent, or 4.4 million students in U.S. classrooms, are classified as ELLs (English Language Learners), or emergent bilinguals (U.S. Department of Education, 2014).1 Many emergent bilingual students, although not all, are immigrants or refugees; others were born in the United States and speak only, or primarily, their native language until they arrive at school. Although some are in bilingual and ESL classrooms with teachers who have gained the necessary knowledge and expertise to teach them, many are in regular English-medium classrooms. Some receive no special language assistance at all. The growing...
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... Patricia Gándara (1995), analyzing the impressive academic achievements of 50 Mexican American adults who grew up in poverty and went on ... Sonia Nieto rather than an impediment to academic achievement, it appears that maintaining a... more
... Patricia Gándara (1995), analyzing the impressive academic achievements of 50 Mexican American adults who grew up in poverty and went on ... Sonia Nieto rather than an impediment to academic achievement, it appears that maintaining a strong sense of cultural and linguistic ...