Teaching History Through a Culturally Sustaining Lens
Aug 25, 2024 | 8 min read
Culturally Responsive Teaching - Importance of seeing history through a new lens.
Written by Stephane Manuel
Across the nation, our student population has undergone major cultural shifts within the last 20 years. Yet, they are being taught the same historical content from the same historical figures as generations before them.
Understandably, students struggle to see the relevance of their learning and often lack buy-in with the content because it is disconnected from their everyday experiences. As a result, teachers and school leaders can become frustrated with students and begin to believe that kids nowadays just aren’t invested in their learning.
This disconnect, all too often brought up in professional development, staff meetings, and hallway conversations, results directly from the lack of representation of marginalized peoples and their histories in the everyday curriculum. In order to effectively engage all students, social studies education must prioritize relevance, cultural responsiveness, and the inclusion of themes that resonate with students’ diverse backgrounds.
Teachers need to integrate a rich array of social and historical material that is relevant to students’ lives. Given the state of today’s conventional curriculum offerings…easier said than done. No amount of professional development can lift classrooms if the content remains outdated, irrelevant, and potentially harmful in its underrepresentation of key populations.
In order to effectively engage all students, social studies education must prioritize relevance, cultural responsiveness, and the inclusion of themes that resonate with students’ diverse backgrounds.
Educators should have access to diverse curricula, resources, and pedagogical frameworks aimed at facilitating teaching and learning for all students.
They don’t.
That’s why culturally responsive instruction has emerged as a prominent and widely appreciated pedagogy that effectively engages all students.
What is Culturally Responsive Teaching?
Understanding the history of culturally responsive and sustaining pedagogy is crucial to teachers’ growth in improving their own pedagogical practices. To be more culturally sustaining in the classroom, it is essential to trace its roots back to earlier frameworks that recognized the value of students and communities of color as assets within classroom curricula.
One of the pioneering voices in this field was Gloria Ladson-Billings, who introduced the framework of Culturally Relevant Teaching in 1995. Ladson-Billings' framework was inspired by her research into the practices of effective educators who achieved positive outcomes for their students, especially students of color. This framework includes three key components: student learning, cultural competence, and critical consciousness. Culturally relevant pedagogy aims to develop students’ abilities to grow as deep-thinking learners, learn about and affirm not only their own but also different cultures and cultural contexts, and analyze real-world problems that have driven movements for social (in)justice.
Expanding upon the foundation laid by cultural relevance and placing stronger emphasis on the role of culture as an educational tool, culturally responsive teaching emerged. In 2000, researcher Geneva Gay introduced her framework of culturally responsive teaching, which was further developed by Zaretta Hammond in 2014. Culturally responsive teaching leans into Ladson-Billings' work and expands to integrate students' lived experiences — their culture, traditions, personal narratives, and perspectives — directly into classroom instruction. By immersing learning in topics and themes relevant to students' lives, teachers help students create genuine meaning and make the content more engaging and applicable to their role in the world.
Culturally relevant pedagogy aims to develop students’ abilities to grow as deep-thinking learners, learn about and affirm not only their own but also different cultures and cultural contexts, and analyze real-world problems that have driven movements for social (in)justice.
Drawing from the principles of both culturally relevant pedagogy and culturally responsive teaching, Django Paris introduced culturally sustaining teaching to the educational landscape in 2012. This approach goes beyond cultural responsiveness by focusing on communities of color as the foundation of learning. Culturally sustaining teaching underscores the significance of the community as a collective force driving learning.
The aim of culturally sustaining pedagogy is to empower students and communities to collaboratively incorporate community history into all aspects of the curriculum, whether it's mathematics, reading, science, social studies, music, or art. By placing the local community at the heart of classroom learning, culturally sustaining teaching cultivates deeper understanding among students and nurtures connections between student agency and achievement.
Changing Trajectories
Incorporating everyone's history into the curriculum enables students to forge meaningful connections. When students' identities and cultures serve as the underlying thread throughout their education, they are better equipped to comprehend, relate, and critically assess their environment. It may go without saying that quality instruction and content must go hand-in-hand, but it must be said clearly and loudly that culturally relevant and sustaining instruction breathes life into the stories and events of marginalized peoples that have long been overlooked, offering students a fresh perspective on history that really means something to them.
Through culturally relevant and sustaining instruction and accompanying materials, students embark on a journey through time, gaining insights into how past events have shaped their present identities and future trajectories. This process not only deepens their understanding of the world around them but also makes their community come to life. By recognizing themselves as integral members of their communities, students become active citizens capable of contributing to their own growth and the advancement of society as a whole.
The team at TrueFiktion has seen the power of this work firsthand. When students and teachers engage history through the power of culturally responsive and sustaining media, they are able to:
See history through a new lens
Journey through time
Understand the world you live in
Bring your community's history to life
This process not only deepens their understanding of the world around them but also makes their community come to life.
See history through a new lens
Teaching history must include exploring everyone's narrative. Culturally sustaining instruction provides students with a fresh perspective on history, emphasizing the importance of teaching diverse histories, narratives, and counter-narratives. Students are able to learn about events through the eyes and mouths of participants often forgotten about whose stories have often been ignored or buried so as not to tell the full story of these critical moments in history.
Travel through time
Teaching everyone's history enables students to embark on a journey through time. In culturally responsive instruction, educators and students confront challenging topics without resorting to erasure, fostering a deeper understanding of historical complexities. Through this journey, students are able to understand how past events have shaped the present and influenced the formation and evolution of societies and societal practices.
Understand the world you live in
Culturally sustaining pedagogical practices empower students to comprehend the world around them more effectively. When we are able to tie content to personal experiences and perspectives, students are more likely to have higher engagement and investment in their learning. Culturally responsive classrooms encourage critical thinking and reflection, empowering students to analyze and interpret the complexities of their surroundings and the role they play in their world.
Bring community to life
History begins within local communities. By integrating community history directly into the classroom, educators help students make sense of their surroundings. Culturally responsive and sustaining teaching brings the history of students' communities to the forefront, fostering a sense of connection and relevance. By incorporating local histories and experiences into the curriculum, educators can make learning more engaging and meaningful for all students.
Through this journey, students are able to understand how past events have shaped the present and influenced the formation and evolution of societies and societal practices.
The art of storytelling has long been revered as a key means for sustaining elements of culture and language over the course of generations. Recent generations, however, have been overexposed to static content and rigid assessment, which is why materials that support authentic, culturally relevant storytelling are essential for effective instruction.
The medium of historical fiction comics is a particularly compelling lens since it offers both a visual and narrative depiction of events that resonates in a way that plain next never could.
Culturally responsive instruction empowers both teachers and students to confront challenging topics authentically while fostering a sense of belonging and agency among learners. By teaching everyone's history, students not only travel through time but also gain a deeper understanding of the world they live in and see their communities come to life.
As we strive for inclusive and equitable education, let’s commit to incorporating culturally sustaining pedagogy into our teaching practices, ensuring that all students feel seen, valued, and empowered in their educational journey.
Revamp your classroom pedagogy by integrating culturally sustaining practices to truly connect with your students. Empower learners to view history through a fresh perspective by introducing narratives of marginalized individuals, particularly people of color often overlooked in traditional social studies materials. Guide students as they journey through time, exploring how historical events have shaped not only their local community but the nation as a whole, spanning past, present, and future.
TrueFiktion helps you facilitate a deeper understanding of the world by teaching students their own history and drawing connections to contemporary social issues that continue to impact their lives. Through our suite of resources, we show you how to bring the local community to life by delving into its history, highlighting pivotal moments of social injustice that resonate with citizens today.
Are you ready to infuse culturally sustaining pedagogy into your classroom? Schedule a call to learn how you, too, can create a dynamic and inclusive learning environment where all students feel valued, understood, and empowered. Click here to schedule a consultation.
Find out more about cultural relevant, responsive, and sustaining pedagogy by checking out the researchers’ work below:
Gay, Geneva. Culturally Responsive Teaching: Theory, Research, and Practice. New York: Teachers College Press (2000).
Gay, Geneva. “Preparing for Culturally Responsive Teaching,” Journal of Teacher Education, Vol. 53, No. 2 (2002).
Hammond, Zaretta. Culturally Responsive Teaching & The Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students. Corwin (2014).
Ladson-Billings, Gloria. “Toward a Theory of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy,” American Educational Research Journal, Vol. 32, No. 3 (1995).
Paris, Django. “Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy: A Needed Change in Stance, Terminology, and Practice.” Educational Researcher, Vol. 41, No. 3 (2012).
