Inkshed #3

Lauren Christensen
March 5th, 2021

Chapter 5 discussed how to move conversations about inclusion and

reconciliation out of discussion and into practice. Focusing on relationships is one way
to do this. All students need to be included in the classroom community and see the
benefits everyone else brings to the room. Segregating minority students won’t help
achieve that. It’s crucial to remember it is a group effort to realize these goals of
inclusion and reconciliation and a group effort to heal. Working on intra, inter, and
spiritual wellbeing we can build learning communities that support the diversity and
inclusion of all out students.

Chapter 6 goes over the Response to Intervention (RTI) framework. RTI is a

learning framework that suggests keeping students that are struggling in class instead
of pulling them out if what they need would be helpful for all students to learn about. For
example, instead of pulling a student with anxiety out of class to go to a counsellor you
could teach all your students about dealing with anxiety because they will all face that at
some point in their life. Universal design is also outlined, including how it allows for all
students to have the option to learn and represent in many ways, not just students given
different options according to their deficits. The chapter ends with three strategies to
implement Universal Design, which include a nine lesson program on respecting
diversity, spirit buddies, and class meetings.

When I read about spirit buddies in chapter 6 I immediately thought of the

classes we’ve had with Nicki so far. Having those morning check-ins with classmates is
so wonderful, especially at the beginning of this program when we didn’t know anyone
yet. It definitely helped build a community within our cohort, and I think contributed to
why we are all so close today. I would love to implement something like this in my class
as well. Not only is it a nice way for students to check in with each other, but it also
would help ease them into a day of school.

I would be very curious to see how class meetings went especially if anyone was
able to call one at any time. I like the idea of teaching students positive ways to
communicate to solve problems, but I wonder if this might devolve into fighting even if
specific names or incidents weren’t being said. I think it would be worth trying because if
it could give students the communication skills they need to solve problems they’re
having what an amazing and important lesson that would be. One that many people
don’t learn until they’re much older (or at all).
 I found it strange that in one of the many lists about democratic classrooms, one
of the characteristics of a democratic classroom is that students demonstrate their
learning and receive feedback in a public setting. This seems like something that might
be really anxiety inducing for a lot of students and to list it as one of the 5 characteristics
felt funny. I definitely see the benefit in doing presentations to the class and community,
but I would like to know more about what makes this a part of a democratic classroom,
especially considering another one of the characteristics is student choice. Having
public demonstrations of learning and feedback seems like a great choice to offer your
students, but not something that should be required.

While reading both chapter 5 and 6 I was reminded of a quote by Blair Imani that
goes “If Black children are old enough to experience racism, then white children are old
enough to learn about it.” I like the idea of keeping students that are experiencing some
difficulties in the classroom and teaching all the students coping mechanisms instead of
pulling them out and just giving them private instruction. I still think individual
counselling is important and should be offered, but giving lessons on issues that might
be hard to talk about is important for everyone to hear. Not only will it provide important
information, but hopefully it will help students learn that asking for help is ok and might
give them some insight into issues their classmates are facing that they might not have
realized. Trying to shelter students from issues like racism or mental health troubles
doesn’t help anyone in the long run and is part of why things are so slow to change.