Reimagining Culturally Responsive Learning Spaces Collective Voices and Shared Practices

Welcome Letter
Annadel Melendez, School Social Worker

Introduction
Marlee S. Bunch, Lauri Johnson, and Yoon Pak

Part I: Foundations of Culturally Responsive Practices

Chapter 1: Exploring Culturally Responsive Teaching in Our Past: The Case for Intercultural Education
Yoon Pak

Chapter 2: What it Means to be a Culturally Responsive Evaluator: A Conversation with Dr. Denice Ward Hood
Yoon Pak and Denice Hood

Chapter 3: The Past, Present, and Future of Culturally Responsive Leadership in Uncertain Times
Lauri Johnson

Chapter 4: Oral History as Collective Action
Marlee S. Bunch and Lauri Johnson

Part II: From Theory to Action and Implementation

Chapter 5: Before the First Lesson: Building Classroom Community with Intention Across K–12
Laura Falk

Chapter 6: Reframing SEL for Culturally Responsive Practice
Brittany R. Collins

Chapter 7:  Diné (Navajo) Educators’ Perspectives on the Teaching of Nihizaad, Nihina’nitin, doo Nihiáda’ooł’įįł (Our Language, Our Culture, and Our Lifeways)
Oliver Tapaha

Chapter 8: Latina/o/e Studies as a Guide to Re-imagine Curriculum
Mirelsie Velázquez

Chapter 9: Poetry, Selfhood, and Shared Worlds in Culturally Responsive Practice
Jordan Stempleman and Marlee S. Bunch

Part III: Emerging Best Practices and Case Studies

Chapter 10:  Reflections of a Preservice Teacher: Becoming an Authentic and Culturally Responsive Educator
Christine Kim

Chapter 11: From Policy to Practice: Lessons from the Board Room on Leading with Community at the Center
Gianina Baker

Chapter 12: Aya—In Search of the Fern: Culturally Responsive Teaching and Afrocentric Educational Practice
Jasmine Porter-Rallins

Chapter 13: Culturally Responsive for Whom?
Taylor Masamitsu and Casey Masamitsu

Afterword
LeVette Harmon, Principal

Biography

Marlee S. Bunch is an interdisciplinary educator and scholar. She is a National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellow and serves as a Senior Research Associate with the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute at Rutgers University.

Lauri Johnson is Associate Professor and former Chair of Educational Leadership and Higher Education at Boston College.

Yoon Pak is Professor and former Head of Education Policy, Organization, and Leadership at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

“Reimagining Culturally Responsive Learning Spaces is essential reading for anyone committed to cultivating learning spaces where all students thrive. Drawing on the collective research, wisdom, and experiences of diverse educators and scholars, this volume serves as a critical resource for anyone seeking to deepen their understanding of culturally responsive practices and transform teaching and learning.”

- Terah Venzant Chambers, Professor, MSU College of Education Associate Dean, MSU Graduate School, Michigan State University

“Nurturing conditions in classrooms where students experience joy and deep engagement requires educator self-reflection on culturally responsive practices, which includes the essential elevation of student voice. When we move into authentic partnership with young people, we co-create flourishing, student-led learning communities that are identity affirming and rooted in true belonging. This collection of essays bridges research with culturally responsive practices—expanding the field's conversation and inviting educators to dialogue, reflect, and grow in our own pedagogical journeys to ultimately center and impact the student experience.” 

- Sabrina Chen, Inclusive & Responsive Education Manager, Chicago Public Schools

“Every teacher, principal, curriculum specialist, and counselor needs to read this book of collective voices about culturally responsive education. The specialists have created an exceptional resource explaining how to design a school where students are at its center. Places where all learners feel and know they belong and the curriculum and classroom reflect the community. Educators need to appreciate student lives, families, cultures, and language. I highly recommend this easy -to-read text that identifies vital leadership practices and curriculum strategies for culturally responsive pedagogy. As you prepare your classroom, ask yourself, ‘How well do I know my students, their dreams and their passions?’”

- Valerie Ooka Pang, Professor Emerita, San Diego State University

"As a teacher educator, I am always looking to update my courses with readings that support preservice teachers’ development as critically self-reflective and culturally responsive and sustaining educators. The beautiful collection of chapters in this edited volume will help me to achieve this and so much more. It weaves together reflective insights from authors’ personal narratives and research while providing a wealth of reflective prompts and practical strategies to develop and deepen pre- and in-service teachers’, leaders’, researchers’, and evaluators’ reflexive and culturally responsive praxis. From considerations of community voice and reciprocity in evaluation to the importance and power of building community with and a sense of belong for students and families before the first day of school to centering Diné, Latine, and Afrocentric perspectives in curriculum, this book is a valuable resource and guide for educators seeking to create learning environments that honor students' and their communities’ histories, heritages, and ways of knowing." 

- Shaneé A. Washington, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Justice and Equity in Teacher Education, College of Education, University of Washington