SUCCESSFUL STRATEGIES FOR TEACHING SCIENCE TO AFRICAN AMERICAN AND PEOPLE OF COLOR STUDENTS
- Integrate course content and lab activities that are authentic and relevant to minority students' daily life, interest, and experiences. Stress the application of science content to everyday life.
- Provide access to challenging, activity-based, inquiry instruction. Science activities are ideally suited to language development, especially when pursued in teams and when they encourage questioning and verbal explanations for solutions.
- Explain the underlying principals related to the subject matter, rather than asking learners to discover the principles for themselves. Elicit and be open to expressions of how learners feel about the subject.
- Encourage parents to stimulate their children's interest in science. Have a parent science night where adults do fun science activities with their children. Put together a monthly directory of science activities that parent can do at home. Explain to parents how important it is for them to encourage their son/daughter to enroll in challenging science courses all through secondary school.
- Provide guidance relative to the types of careers, job opportunities, and entry requirements in the sciences.
- Provide opportunities for students to interact with role models, including minority men and women in scientific careers and successful college science students.
- Bring minority professionals into the science classroom to talk with students. Encourage them to act as role models and mentors by leading science activities, engaging students in research, providing tutoring, enrichment, and internship opportunities.
- Write notes to your minority students congratulating them on doing especially well on tests, labs, or class discussions.
- Be patient, tactful and exhibit personal warmth. Be empathetic and sensitive to the complex needs and attitudes of linguistically and culturally different students.
- Remember that cognitive academic language proficiency takes much longer than basic interpersonal communication skills. Good oral language may be accompanied by unsuccessful academic progress for a period of time.
- Whenever possible, use multiple media in the classroom. This reduces the reliance on language and places information in a context that is more comprehensible to the students.
- Alternate activities to address the visual, aural, tactile, and kinesthetic nodes of learning. When reteaching and/or reviewing information, choose a 'different mode or method of instructional delivery.
- Use visual displays (e.g. graphs, charts, photos), objects, and authentic materials, like newspaper and magazine clipping, in the lessons and assignments. These help provide non-verbal information and also help match various learning styles.
- Supplement-the text by bringing in objects related to the science concept being studies; use games, role playing, and simulations.
- Minimize competitive activities and encourage group learning and cooperation. Facilitate small group work whenever possible so that students gain confidence and learn to use each other as a resource.
- Encourage cooperative learning activities. Cooperative learning promotes interaction between students (one of the most important conditions for language acquisition), increases student self-esteem, and raises student's academic achievement levels.
- Assign students to small groups for experiments. Students• will feel comfortable practicing the written and spoken language needed for working together and organizing information.
- Make use of peer tutors, peer study or problem solving groups.
- Mentally divide your room into quadrants. If students in all quadrants don't participate, you can say, "Let's hear from someone in the back right corner.
- Solve problems by multiple methods. This appeals to students with different learning styles and backgrounds.
- Incorporate students' comments into lectures/discussions. This technique validates the students' understanding of concepts.
REFERENCES
Atwater, M.M. 1989. Including Multicultural Education in Science Education: Definitions, Competencies, and Activities. The Journal of Science Teacher Education 1(1):17-20
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