Becoming a Culturally Responsive Teacher: Sustaining the Cultures of Young Children

Foster Learning Success for All Children with Culturally Responsive Practices

Each of us is a cultural being. The culturally responsive strategies laid out in this book help you to understand the influences of your own culture on your teaching and to center children’s cultures--including their knowledge, experiences, and languages--to build relationships and teach in ways that make learning more meaningful for them.

To help you meet the promise of early learning for every child you teach, this insightful text offers

• Reflection opportunities to dig deeper into your own cultural self, identify biases, and better harmonize your teaching with children’s and families’ cultures

• Clear explanations of culturally responsive practices and why they matter to children’s sense of self and their learning and development

• Strategies for practicing cultural humility and learning to know children and families as individuals

• Seven principles of culturally responsive practices that help you develop strong relationships with children, build responsive learning environments, and implement effective teaching strategies

• Practical examples that show how culturally responsive practices benefit children with a range of identities and contexts

No matter where you are on your educational journey, this book will transform your teaching practices--and make a lifelong difference for every child.

Rosemarie Allen, EdD

• Dr. Allen is founder, president, and CEO of the Center for Equity and Excellence, which provides professional development and consultant services to early childhood professionals for creating inclusive learning environments and ensuring equity and social justice

• An educational leader for over 40 years, Dr. Allen’s work is centered on ensuring all children have access to high-quality early childhood programs that are developmentally appropriate and culturally sustaining.

• A professor in the School of Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver, her classes are focused on ensuring teachers are aware of how issues of equity, power, and justice impact teaching practices.

• Dr. Allen has served in directorship roles with the Colorado Department of Human Services and assisted in the creation of Colorado’s early learning guidelines

• Dr. Allen serves as the president and CEO for the Institute for Racial Equity Excellence (IREE), the lead agency for ensuring equity in organizations throughout the nation and internationally. In this capacity she has worked with the United States Department of Education as well as numerous police departments, school districts, and other organizations to provide training on implicit bias, microaggressions, anti-racism, trauma healing practices, and racial equity.
• Dr. Allen resides in Lone Tree, Colorado

Dorothy Shapland Rodriguez, EdD

• Dr. Shapland Rodriguez is associate professor in the Special Education, Early Childhood, and Culturally & Linguistically Diverse Education Department at Metropolitan State University of Denver’s School of Education.

• She has more than 35 years of experience teaching preschool and elementary in public, private, and charter schools in Colorado and New Jersey.

• She has been a teacher leader and professional development provider and instructional coach for schools, centers, directors, and teachers throughout Colorado for the past 20 years.

• Dr. Shapland Rodriguez’s areas of expertise include effective, intentional, antibiased, culturally responsive, and traumainformed teaching and learning in early education, and traumainformed equity leadership for schools and centers.
• Dr. Shapland Rodriguez resides in Denver, Colorado.