Session 1 Community, Assumptions, and PTA Standards

Prior to Session 1, each student must be given the pre-session 1 assignments.  It would be good if you made these copies and left them with the person in charge of getting teachers to sign up for the class.  It should be stressed that these are very important parts of what happens in session 1 and the must complete them prior to coming.   

This is what it is-- Pre-homework: Bring 3 objects that you feel show something about you and your culture. Write a one-page description explaining what you have brought and why you feel it expresses your culture.  Write a reflection telling what your culture is like, what is important to members of your culture, what is your culture’s position in American society, and how you feel about other people’s cultures. 

Complete the Common Beliefs Survey from Teaching Tolerance.  Bring it with you to the first session. 

Also bring to class your asset map from the Foundations course or create a new one as per directions sheet for your school community.  (There are 3 sheets that each teacher needs for this: the directions to create the map, the blank form, and the example form.)  

LA 1.1: Learning About Ourselves as Cultural Beings. Read the directions for the activity.  When the teachers begin sharing, walk around the room to observe what they are showing and saying about those things.  Be prepared to lead a discussion about culture’s importance in every person’s life.  Then have them fill out the culture section.  Hand out the form 1.1 found in the LA 1.1 folder and explain how they will take notes to show their participation in tonight’s learning activities. Conduct a class discussion to determine a list of what represents what culture is, and what doesn’t represent culture.  

LA 1.2: Identifying and Reviewing Community Assets. Teachers will need to have their asset map to participate in this activity. This is why they needed to bring the one from Foundations or create a new one (especially if they are in a different school from where they taught when they were in Foundations.

Help teachers to find a group for them to be in.  If there are more than one teacher from a school, that is the ideal group.  If there are teachers who are the only person from their school, have them group in ‘feeder school’ groups—there should be at minimum 2-3 teachers in each group. Once maps are posted, supervise the gallery walk.  The idea for this is to get ideas from other people’s maps that are things that might exist in your school’s asset map area.  Have them fill in the section on the session sheet.  

LA 1.3: National PTA Standards. Materials are in the folder LA 3.1F. Use the PTA standards. There are 6 and so you need 6 groups—each person needs to have the short article available so they can access it for the standard they are assigned. Bring chart paper or posters and markers for each group to create their chart and tape so they can post them.  Each student will also need a few sticky notes to post questions about each standard.  After the gallery walk, groups collect the sticky notes and prepare answers for sharing with the class.  Ask each group, one at a time, to shae their questions and answer them. Remember to have them response on the session sheet. 

LA 1.4: Assessing National PTA Standards. Be sure students have access to the PTA standards assessment guides.  Each group should receive the assessment guide that goes with the standard they worked on in LA 3.  Give groups time to read and discuss, and then have them share their findings with the class.  Have them return to the session sheet and add in the space for PTA standards their comments.  

LA 1.5: Uncovering Assumptions about Heritage. Make copies of the unconscious bias viewing guide.  The link is on the learning activity. Use these 3 questions to guide the discussion you have at the end of the talk.  To show the TED talk, google what does my headscarf mean to you and it will come right up.    

LA 1.6: Major Course Assignments. This asks you to briefly go over the three major assignments for the course.   Be sure students bring up on their computers the 3 assignments that are contained in LA 1.6 F.  

  1. Family Profile Project:  It requires two visits with a family of one of their students which includes a 2-3 page report.  They also need to create a visual to aid in presenting this family in small groups in session 6.   
  1. Partnership Plan:  Students are to prepare a partnership plan focusing on getting classrooms, schools, and community involved together in supporting children’s education.  They will write a document explaining it and report it in class in small groups. 
  1. Advocacy Position Paper and Presentation:  They will be assigned to groups or you may elect to let them choose their own groups, but all the groups must be around 4 or 5 students.  If you have 20 students, there will be 4 groups of 5 and if there are 25 students, there will be 5 groups of 5, etc.  Each group needs to think of everything they have learned in the endorsement program that they want to advocate for in their paper and presentation.  Each group produces a 3-5 page paper, turned in to the facilitator, and a power point to present their position of advocacy.   

Just go briefly over what the assignments are and their homework asks them to read carefully the directions for each of the 3 major assignments and bring questions to be answered at the beginning of class next week.  Keep this to a minimum of time. 

 Explanation of Homework--we leave 5-8 minutes at the end of each session to explain what teachers need to do for homework. Be sure to read through the homeworks prior to explaining them to the teachers.

HW 1.1: This explains that each week they will add to an online journal their reflections on their learnings in class as well as something they decided to try in their practice from today’s lesson and report on what they did and how it went.  It’s probably a good idea to ask them to send it to you as soon as they’ve finished it this first week so you can give them feedback.  After that, they should be able to do it on their own. At the end of session 8, they will send the completed reflections to you and they will be worth 200 points.  This is a big part of the class. It would be good for you to go over the reflection homework with them as it is the first time they will do it.  They don’t need to report on what they worked on as this is the first week.  They only need to respond to the last 2 bullets. 

HW 1.2: Students are asked to read carefully through each of the 3 major assignments for the course.  They will write questions they have about each one.  They will be able to ask the questions for you to answer.  One way to accomplish this is to have them sit in their table groups and answer each other’s questions…only go for 10 minutes or so, because there isn’t much time to waste, or ask them to stay after if they have any other questions.  

HW 1.3: CD-Rom study of a student and family.  Be sure they all know how to access the CD-Rom so they can watch the student of their choice.  They will watch all the different sections and write notes to bring to class in session 2.  

HW 1.4: This asks them to add to their asset map by color coding each of the things they identified on their maps as to which of the 6 categories they represent.  They also write a one-page guide to their asset map.  They bring it back to class and turn it in.   

HW 1.5: Using a reading guide, teachers read Ch. 3 from Funds of Knowledge, La Visita, which describes a visit to a family.  They fill in the reading guide linked in the homework activity and bring it back to class in session 2. 

Collect the Common Belief Survey they completed in the pre-session work. This is a good way to start their thinking for the course.  If they didn't fill it out prior to session 1, have them bring it back in session 2 and collect them so you can return them in session 8 and they can see how much they’ve changed. You should have received their first survey done in the Foundations course as the facilitator was instructed to give you a copy to keep. At the end of the course they will compare the first one from Foundations, the one they did for session 1 of this course, and the one they will complete at the end of this course. 

This content is provided to you freely by Equity Press.

Access it online or download it at https://equitypress.org/tell_facilitator_guide/session_1_.