TE+250+Cultural+Autobiography

Students in TE250 give positive feedback regarding the required cultural autobiography. The assignment has two components: the first requires students to examine how socially constructed identities such as race, ethnicity, social class, gender, sexuality, language, ability, and religion have influenced their schooling experiences and sense of self (how they think about themselves in the world) and how their identities affected their schooling experiences; the second asks students to re-visit their initial cultural biography and reflect on what they wrote by evaluating and analyzing their identity socialization and schooling through the lens of the course concepts, readings, and service learning experience. The first paper is due within the first two weeks of the semester, and the second in the last two weeks of the semester. I’ve included here, two sets of the cultural autobiography assignment. The first paper is due in the introductory stages of the course. Thus, we have not covered much content. I offer extensive feedback on the first paper to help prompt students’ thinking in light of the course themes and concepts we will cover throughout the semester. I do not offer much feedback in the way of comments on the second paper, though we do discuss their final cultural autobiography papers in our individual meeting during the exam week. I hold a 30 minute conference with each student at the end of the semester during which we discuss their growth and development in the class. It is important for me to talk with them about where they were in their thinking/beliefs/understanding of the course themes at the beginning of the semester compared to where they are in this thinking at the end of the semester—a sort of meta-conversation. Throughout the semester, I ask them to reflect on their own learning, though we don’t necessarily look at overall development. We discuss points of tension and discomfort in their learning and what types of experiences pushed their learning and their emotions during the learning process. Having pre-service teachers go through this meta-process models how teachers can help students think about learning processes, and is continual feedback for me in terms of **//how//** this group of student learns as each year it seems, there is a shift. For example, I have several students this semester who think racism is no longer “that big a deal” because President Obama has been elected. This indicates to me that how I teach—the process I lead students through—and maybe what I teach—the content—needs to change. The Works Home