Prompt 2 - Shor

Being in such a diverse classroom, it is all but transparent when you look at the different sociocultural differences that each child has. Each has a diverse linguistic and ethnic background that makes each student their own. Keeping this in mind, the teacher should be able to teach so that it both reaches everyone in the same way, but so that he/she is teaching to each individual child’s needs. Not all children learn in the same way. One child may be more of a visual learner while another may learn better by listening. Although a teacher wants to send out the same information to each child, he/she needs to remember that each child learns at his/her own speed, and her own way.



The theorist that this “idea” relates to the most, in my opinion, is Ira Shor. He says that each child has a right to learn, “Students in empowering classes should be expected to develop skills and knowledge as well as high expectations for themselves, their education, and their futures. They have a right to earn good wages doing meaningful work in a healthy society at peace with itself, and the world,” (Shor 68). Shor is stating that having an empowering classroom is beneficial for both the student, and the teacher. It brings the children up to become meaningful, functional people in society. Personally, if I were a teacher, I would feel absolutely amazing if I were able to do that just by teaching differently to each child’s needs. Whether it be a linguistic, ethnic, or sociocultural characteristics of a child that requires them to learn in a different way, the teacher should make a plan in order to help these children learn as well as the other children who don’t need to be taught differently. “An empowering educator seeks a positive relationship between feeling and thought. He or she begins this search by offering a participatory curriculum. In a participatory class where authority is mutual, some of the positive affects which support student learning include cooperativeness, curiosity, humor, hope, responsibility, respect, attentivemess, openness, and concern about society,” (Shor 24). Shor explains how the attentiveness of the students and the open-mindedness of the teacher is essential in order to have a functioning classroom that reaches every child in a special way.

My classroom is filled with children that are in second grade that read at a first grade level. About ¾ of the class started the beginning of the year not being able to grasp grammar while the other ¼ picked up on the reading very quickly. The teacher is not able to teacher both the beginner readers and the intermediate readers at the same level, so she has a helper come in and work with the intermediate readers do their work while she works with the beginner readers. This is a great idea because the children are able to receive individual attention by a teacher and also work with the other children at their level. It encourages the children to read with each other and improve as their classmates improve.