Cultural Competency: Not Just Lame PD

This past weekend, I went to the CES conference in San Francisco with my principal and two other colleagues. It helped me articulate some of my thoughts on cultural competency for teachers in multicultural classrooms.

I'd like to share one characteristic of cultural competency I think is crucial for teachers to have: understanding what you're teaching and why it's important.

It seems to me that there is a body of knowledge and skills that is appropriate to teach any student regardless of culture. In this category I would include: knowledge of the human body, world geography, mathematics, skills related to reflection and critical thinking.

There is also a body of knowledge and skills that is appropriate to teach so that students of diverse backgrounds know how to interact with the social customs and habits of the dominant culture. In this category I think of: social skills, body language, grammar, history, and leadership.

When educators don't understand this or don't take the time to distinguish between the knowledge and skills of the two, it often leads to problems. Learning to do this falls under the very important category of cultural competency. And I think all of us could use ongoing professional development for it.

Often when I hear my students call one of their peers "whitewashed," or refer to hobbies I enjoy in my personal life with phrases like, "That's so white," I wonder.

I wonder if the behaviors they interpret as being white are effects of different cultures OR if they're effects of growing up with privilege.

To illustrate, I'd point first to racquetball, a sport I play often. Many people might consider any sport with a racquet to be a "white" or "Asian" sport. And I would grant this is a situation that is almost certainly an issue of cultural difference.

On the other hand, social behaviors are also often characterized as "white." One example I can think of having heard is talking calmly through conflict. Or using active listening.

Two weeks ago, I showed some of my students a clip from the Jimmy Kimmel show when he asks parents to pretend they ate their children's Halloween candy and record their reactions. Most of the children at the beginning of the clip are white, and my freshman students (Black and Latino students) commented, "You know if they show a black kid he's gonna start yelling. White people cry, or they tell their mama, 'It's okay.' But you know some black people gonna yell and throw things." As if on cue, a black child is shown reacting by yelling and throwing things at his mother, who had just told him she'd eaten all his Halloween candy.

Is dealing with conflict like this an example of a cultural difference? Or are my students identifying a contrast in how the children of privilege (regardless of culture or ethnicity) and of lesser privilege react to conflict?

Or, take for example, the notion that whites and Asians tend to be more passive aggressive than Blacks and Latinos. Assuming this is true (I don't know if it is. I've only heard people say they notice it, and it tends to confirm my experiences), is this a product of culture? privilege? or both?

While I don't necessarily have any answers to the questions I posed above, I think they matter, particularly to teachers in multicultural schools.

If teachers believe that Standard American English grammar is knowledge that a child needs to know regardless of their background NOT because it will help them succeed among the dominant culture, but because it is a characteristic of a universally well-educated person, they will set up barriers between themselves and students. If teachers understand that SAE grammar is not indicative of raw intelligence, that a great many brilliant people never learned SAE grammar, and that it is mainly important as a means of accessing the dominant cultures social habits and customs, then teachers will be more likely to frame the teaching of it more successfully.

When I think about examples of this in the classroom, I think about the differences in the way two teachers might react to a student's poor use of SAE grammar. One teacher might zero in on the poor grammar usage, scold the student, drill and kill with grammar exercises, or think less of their intelligence. A different teacher might focus on the value of the content the student was communicating. They might make a mental note to help with the SAE grammar later, but respond positively to the obvious thought or intelligence the student included in the sentence, understanding that grammar rules are arbitrary and decided by elite members of society.

Realizing that many of the things you unconsciously thought were important for students to learn regardless of culture are actually important because they allow them to code switch when necessary is a key component to becoming a competent educator.

As a white male who was raised middle class, I found that teaching for more than a handful of years in multicultural schools was what helped me make many of those realizations.