Designing a representative curriculum for students of color through coming-of-age identity stories

CLIENT

Aim High

PROJECT TYPE

Educator

LOCATION

San Francisco

ROLE(S)

Seventh Grade Humanities Teacher

YEAR

2019

TAGS

Instructional Design, Coaching & Mentoring

In 2019, I taught 7th Grade Humanities at Aim High, a non-profit organization that offers a free summer learning and enrichment program for low-income middle school students in San Francisco. I worked at the Lick Wilmerding High School campus in Ingleside, which remains the most diverse neighborhood in a changing San Francisco.

I was excited to teach middle school students for the first time, as well as have my own classroom to decorate. At Aim High, I taught 55 students over three 50-minute class periods each day, modifying the provided curriculum to add a unit focused on identity, integrating cultural, coming-of-ages stories that reflected the student population.

Aim High provided Lead Teachers with a curriculum handbook that could be used for the entire five-week program, which included lesson plans, scripts and graphic organizers. In reviewing the material, I was concerned that the only reading for the program was Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese — would the Chinese American protagonist and comic book format have enough appeal for all of our students, who came from Latinx, African, Middle Eastern and other Asian backgrounds? I was not interested in replacing American Born Chinese as much as I wanted to feature other stories in class, providing additional opportunities for students to connect and empathize with, protagonists that looked, sounded and lived like them. I decided to add books to the curriculum, including Sherman Alexie, Erika L. Sanchez, and Veera Hirnandani as well as graphic novels by Tony Media and Thi Bui.

A letter to students

On the first day of class, I read a letter I wrote about myself to the students. I wanted to know how much I had overcome in my life in order to be standing in front of them as their teacher.

"My journey to becoming a classroom teacher started 25 years ago: I knew who I wanted to be, but was told to be someone else. In social situations, I was told I was not Asian or American enough. At work, I was told I wasn't good enough. For 25 years, I let the way other people saw me determine how I saw myself. Today, as a teacher, I can finally say I feel like myself. Our 6th Grade Humanities class is a deeply personal experience. I wish I had comics and teachers that I could speak to about the ways I felt seen, ignored and judged by others. By the end of summer, I hope we can all learn to celebrate who we are, and take our identities back for ourselves."

After reading the letter, I asked them all to write one back to me and Alex, my Assistant Teacher. They shared their athletic achievements, friends they wanted to sit next to in class, how they wanted to participate and some of their fears, including not feeling smart enough or worrying about their writing. It was wonderful to know a little about each student to start class; Alex and I picked up some of the conversation threads with them throughout the program.

What makes a good story?

We spent the first two weeks of class answering the question, What Makes A Good Story?, studying pre-writing techniques, story beginnings and endings, the narrative arc and story elements. Lessons were supplemented with readings that brought the lessons to life, while a writing pre-assessment was completed by the students, allowing me to modify lessons to meet learning needs of all students.

To bring the narrative arc to life, I had the students break down the Choctaw folktale, How Grandmother Spider Brought Fire, on a projection at the front of the classroom. (Following the activity, the students requested we use the narrative arc to plot “Frozen” and “Avengers: Endgame” which was the highlight of the first week.) Figurative language proved to be the most fun — similes, metaphors, personification and hyperbole — as students came up with their own versions.

As their final assessment for What Makes A Good Story?, students created a story narrative in a short story or comic book format, showcasing the new writing techniques they learned.

KEY LEARNINGS

Will be added soon!

Photos: Jonathan Oen-Lee

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