Marcia Davis, OFLA Secondary Language Learning Chair & OFLA Diversity Committee Chair
Assistant Principal/Former Spanish Teacher, World Language Middle School

In our district, our Core Instructional Framework (CIF) was designed to ensure equity in learning. The goal is that “each student has access to the resources, opportunities, and supports they need to develop to their full academic and social-emotional potential.” The CIF breaks down learning into five components: learning design, learning experiences, learning conditions, learning assessments, and learning from student work.

Culturally responsive practices are a fundamental part of our CIF. Culturally responsive practices involve “connecting academics to students’ daily lives, cultural backgrounds, and concerns in ways that support engagement, achievement, and empowerment.”

The World Languages classroom is the perfect setting to illuminate what culturally responsive practices look like in action. The current focus at World Language Middle School- a dual immersion school with French, Spanish, and ESL pathways- is for teachers to design and facilitate learning that helps to create a culture of care through learning conditions. Our specific focus has been to ensure that classroom discourse and interactions reflect high expectations and beliefs about all students’ intellectual capabilities and create a culture of inclusivity, equity and accountability for learning.

With the guidance of Dr. Kirby Childress, our French immersion students have been learning about narrative elements and plot structure by reading and dissecting folktales: Sixth graders are discovering Jean de la Fontaine’s fables, seventh graders are exploring legends from Quebec, and eighth graders are examining myths from Asian cultures. All students are using plot diagrams to outline and  summarize each folktale. They use their summaries to infer the lesson, whether it be a moral lesson (fables), a warning (legends), or an explanation of a natural phenomenon (myths). Later on, students will create their own characters (personified animals, anti-heros, monsters, and ordinary humans) to invent a fable/legend/myth of their own that they will share and discuss with their classmates in French. 

By studying and engaging in discourse with classmates, students have the opportunity to enhance their knowledge of cultural perspectives and practices, using French as the vehicle. With learning conditions as an integral part of their learning environment, students are able to foster relationships and provide space for building connections. As a result, their academic performance and language proficiency continue to flourish.

Marlene Graham’s sixth grade Spanish immersion students worked collaboratively to read, answer comprehension questions, and make inferences about “Mi nombre” by Sandra Cisneros.  After that, they researched the origins of their own names by conducting interviews with their family members, started a rough draft that they peer edited, made a slide presentation, and presented their research to the class.  Their research included responses to questions such as:

• ¿Quién te puso tu nombre? (Who gave you your name?) 
• ¿De qué lengua proviene? (What language does it come from?)
• ¿Cuál es el significado original de tu nombre? (What is the original meaning of your name?) 
• ¿Es un nombre típico para tu género? ¿Y tu generación? (Is your name typical for your gender? For your generation?) 
• ¿Sientes que tu nombre te define? (Do you feel that your name defines you?) 
• Si has sido nombrada por alguna persona en tu familia, ¿Quién es esa persona? ¿Cómo es esa persona? (If you were named after a person in your family, who is that person? What is s/he like?) 
• Si quisieras cambiarte el nombre, ¿Qué nombre escogerías y por qué? (If you wanted to change your name, what name would you choose and why?) 
• Famosos con mi nombre: Busca información sobre famosos que se llaman como tú. (Nombre, profesión,personalidad etc…) (Famous people with my name: Look up information about famous people with the same name (name, profession, personality, etc.)

It was interesting to hear and observe the pride exhibited by students as they shared such an important part of their identity with their teacher and classmates through their presentations in Spanish.

Creating a culture of care with our students goes hand in hand with the World Languages classroom. The possibilities are endless and the opportunities are as unique and diverse as the students with whom and from whom we learn. What will you do to ensure the existence of a culture of care in your classroom?