Pedagogies of Inclusion 10/29/2017 Pedagogies of Inclusion CLASP Module #1 Anna Plemons and Jordan Engelke Template-Primary on 201-shield

CLASP Project Goals: to develop a practice of productive, on-going questioning of our own pedagogy not a deficit model (neither students nor teachers are “broken”) not an expert discourse we recognize that training is secondary to lived experience – want to encourage story- telling between teachers

Unpacking the deficit model 10/29/2017 Unpacking the deficit model Deficit model: the tendency to focus on students’ weaknesses rather than their strengths, the belief that circumstances in a students life prevent them from learning i.e.: “students are coddled or entitled,” or “students must develop skills valued by mainstream society” Teachers should set high standards, teach from where students are – not where we want them to be Encourage a malleable view of intelligence “Academic reading is really challenging, but the more you do it the easier it gets. When I was first in college…” For further reading: https://radicalscholarship.wordpress.com/2017/03/17/rethinking-grading-as-instruction-rejecting-the-error-hunt-and-deficit-practices/ https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/rejecting-student-deficit-model For more on rejecting the deficit model, see our presentation on stereotype threat. Template-Primary on 201-shield

CLASP Outcomes 1. Method for self-reflection 2. Collection of best practices for classrooms (versus particular, isolated ways of engaging small groups of students)

Pedagogies of Inclusion In working towards a definition we offer: A broad statement A non-definition An observation A mapping of the landscape

1. A broad statement: We want to “think critically about [our] own educational practices, institutional contexts, the learners and colleagues [we] encounter and [our] views, opinions and philosophies of education” (Goodley 2)

2. A Non-Definition: Goodley using Barton (2004): “…social and educational exclusion has many compounding forms of differing exclusions; is not a natural but a socially constructed process; has no single factor that can remove it and is in constant need of conceptual analysis. For our purposes… it is crucial that we keep a broad view of the kinds of learners involved in debates about inclusion” (3)

3. An observation: Adrienne Rich: When those who have the power to name and socially construct reality choose not to see you or hear you ... when someone with the authority of a teacher, say, describes the world and you are not in it, there is a moment of psychic disequilibrium, as if you looked in the mirror and saw nothing.

4. A mapping of the landscape: Goodley talks about “socially just” classroom, with change happening at three levels: macro: government policy meso: institutional policy, institutional culture, institutional organization micro: teacher initiated critical reflection on their own pedagogy

10/29/2017 “I say matters of integrity and parity must become realized rather than desired or aimed for because I believe that, for the most part, the desire already exists. It’s just that the way has not quite been found.” -Victor Villanueva Template-Primary on 201-shield

Toward a Pedagogy for CLASP No teacher can hear everything; our experiences and knowledge dispose us to listen for particular voices and cues and not others. The asymmetries of listening always affect who and what will be heard, and it is hard to know what to listen for. So how can we listen for what we don’t even know is there in the classroom? (Kerschbaum 63)

Toward a Pedagogy for CLASP CLASP Pedagogy ought to be predicated on responding to spontaneous, oftentimes fraught encounters with others, in which you take cues and respond in unique, personalized, and unpredictable ways.

Questions for discussion: 10/29/2017 Questions for discussion: 1. Explore the elements of a definition of “inclusion” for a comp classroom. 2. From Goodley: To what extent does an agenda for inclusion require us to rethink our pedagogy? 3. What types of questions would be involved in an on-going critical self-reflection of our pedagogy? 4. How would we know if our classrooms were inclusive? 5. Examples of particular lesson plans/assignments/readings that support an inclusive pedagogy. 6. What are the problems/pitfalls/reasons to resist an inclusive framing of our pedagogy? Template-Primary on 201-shield

In the Next CLASP Module: Stereotype Threat and First-Generation Students

References Dan Goodley, “For Inclusion: Towards a Critical Pedagogy with Marginalised Learners.” Stephanie L. Kerschbaum, “Avoiding the Difference Fixation: Identity Categories, Markers of Difference, and the Teaching of Writing.” CCC. vol. 63, iss. 4, 2012. Victor Villanueva,  ”Maybe a Colony: And Still Another Critique of the Comp Community.” Adrienne Rich, Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose, 1979-85