Session 4: Collaboration

LA 4.1: (30 min) Studying Students. Teachers return to the student they studied from the VideoEthnography—Vanessa Gomez, Ascuncion Valdez, or Xuan Machado.  They form one group for each of the three children studied. This allows for more ideas to be put forth as there will be more people to offer ideas. They are to create a partnership plan that is targeted to the student they studied, giving them practice for creating their own partnership plan. The partnership plan instructions are linked in the instructions, and they are to follow these instructions, putting their plan on a chart paper using chart paper and markers you bring. Each group will present their plan to the class as the other class members offer suggestions and ideas for making the plan better.  Bring chart paper and markers so they can create their chart to share it.

LA 4.2: (20 min) Organizing for Partnerships. For homework last week, they were to locate community-based organizations and faith-based organizations they could use for their own partnership plan. In groups, they will share some of the organizations they discovered, and discuss ways in which they might be able to utilize these resources in their own partnership plans. Then there will be time for a whole-class share.  

LA 4.3: (25 min) How WIDA Can Help Parents. Teachers refresh their memories of the WIDA levels and Can-do Descriptors by going to the first link. The second link takes them to a different page, and they are asked to scroll down to find Family Engagement—this has many ideas for teachers to utilize. I was surprised when I went to it to see an explanation to help parents understand that if their child is tested at Level 2 for example, they can learn what that really means. Once they have located some interesting resources, the group should discuss how they could use this site to assist parents and families in supporting their child.  

LA 4.4: (30 min) Expanding Understanding of People in Poverty. In homework from last week, teachers watched two TED talks about poverty, and they read a summary from the book, Disrupting Poverty by Budge and Porritt. Hopefully they have their note-taking sheets from all of these 3 items. Now you will lead a discussion. Begin it by asking for a shower of ideas they found interesting or surprising as they did that homework. Simply ask them at the start to share these ideas and you write them on the board. After you have a good-sized list, ask them to talk about stereotypes they or people they have known about people in poverty. Have them turn in their note sheets from the two talks and the article they read.   

LA 4.5: (50 min) Comparing Living Conditions around the World. Teachers will be introduced to Gapminder by listening to a TED talk by Anna Rosling. Prior to viewing the talk, have them download the note sheet and answer the questions at the top. Then show the talk and they can jot notes on the paper, but they don’t answer the final questions until the end of the activity. Model for them how to find the Gapminder that was shown in the talk. Model for them how to look for a row and then click on families one at a time. The idea is that we all think we are in the middle as far as wealth goes, but as they search through families, they will realize that we are in the part of the world that is in the upper end of Dollar Street. After they have discussed in groups, open up a whole-class discussion to talk about what they have learned.  

 Explanation of Homework

HW 4.1: Reflection on My Learning. This is the usual reflection they need to do weekly.  

HW 4.2: Prganizing for Partnerships. Teachers watch a video BYU made about a school in Las Vegas, Nevada, that illustrates the many partnerships this school has created with the community and families. They click on the link to see the film, and they need to click on the second link for the note-taking sheet. They should bring the notes to session 5. 

HW 4.3: Expanding Understanding of People in Poverty. This homework introduces teachers to the growth in population and wealth in the world in Gapminder. In a later session, they will understand more about this when they watch a TED talk dealing with poverty. They click on the link to see the video. And they click on the second link to get the note-taking sheet. After viewing the video, they read the short article at the end of the instructions to the learning activity, which includes a lot of vocabulary they need to understand. They bring the notes to class in session 5.  

HW 4.4: Uncovering Your Experience with Race and Privilege. Teachers will read the two articles that are linked in the learning activity. One is “White Fragility” and the other is “Whose Cultural Has Capital?”. After they have read both of these, they scroll down to read about a teacher who took this course in Salt Lake District. She shares her experiences as an Hispanic teacher who has born in this country. It opens eyes, and I was grateful she allowed me to share it with others. Again, they need to bring their notes to session 5.  

HW 4.5: Completing your Family Profile. This homework asks teachers to complete their family profile. They need to get working on this and the partnership plan as they will be presenting them in session 6. It reminds them that they need to bring a visual as well as the profile itself to session 6. I thought it best to have these 2 completed before they needed to do the Advocacy Position Paper and Presentation.   

HW 4.6: Complete your Partnership Plan. This homework again asks them to work on completing their partnership plans as well. It is also due in session 6

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