Running Head: CULTURE SNAPSHOT 1

Jose G Montalvo

Module 1 Application — Cross-Cultural Studies for Teaching ELLs

San Pancho, Mexico – La Escuela Secondario Junior High School – English Language Instructor

October 10th, 2018

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Culture Snapshot: Get to Know Yourself

To analyze the impact of culture on society and the educational system and the

importance of culture in addressing the needs of students for whom English is a new language,

an instructor must first begin the action planning process by creating a culture snapshot. Culture

snapshots provide an awareness to the teacher decision-making process to improve student

outcomes by raising scholastic achievements and closing learning-gaps. Implementing the best

system for learners to understand how their culture and second language acquisition can be

intertwined to promote cross-cultural understanding and sensitivity must first begin with the

instructor. Diversity is commonly measured on the surface-level through elements of race, color,

religion, gender, age, geographical location, and socioeconomic status. The concept conveys

much deeper meanings, however, through life experiences, ability, personal identity, opinions,

spiritual growth, and evolution of emotional intelligence. Knowing one’s individual

characteristics and applying them as an educator allows the learner to express themselves in such

a way where language acquisition and overall learning becomes shapeless, formless, and where

freedom of expression replaces traditional learning. Analyzing one’s strengths and weaknesses

offer a framework that eliminates biases and places the instructor in the learner’s eyes.

Moreover, culture snapshots address the needs of the learners within their diverse cultural,

socioeconomic, family, and educational backgrounds. This information is crucial for

instructional and learner success.

La Escuela Secundario Junior High School

La Escuela Secundario Junior High School in San Pancho, Mexico does little in the way

of promoting diversity among its students. Diversity is not conventional in terms of race,

religion, or culture but applies more to socioeconomic diversity. Most learners at La Escuela
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Secundario live in poverty (69%) and the school has a long way to go before it can be considered

a learning institution that has reached cultural proficiency. The Mexican educational system is

decentralized, meaning decision-making powers are delegated from the center to the bottom or

power is transferred to either intermediate governments, local governments, communities, or

within the schools themselves. Basically, the Mexican framework of decentralization covers the

development of the national curriculum and the approval of regional curricula, the evaluation of

the system, and the channeling of compensatory and extraordinary resources to the poorer

states (British Council, 2015). However, through instructors and learning institutions

constructing strategies by analyzing their strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities, learners can

benefit from instructional designs where they are allowed to be expert learners (Rao, Currie-

Rubin, & Logli, 2016) rather than inflexible “one-size fits all” learning environments (which

include goals, materials, instructional methods, assessments, and physical environments) that fail

to take account the diversity in classrooms, thus creating barriers to learning (Dickinson, 2017).

To consider how these socioeconomic barriers can be addressed and given effective solutions,

one must see themselves as an adept instructor who is willing to internalize and self-reflect on

the four different aspects of cultural awareness as they pertain to the current situation: Valuing

culture and diversity, leading for cultural inclusion, engaging the culturally diverse community,

and delivering culturally sensitive curriculum, instruction, and assessment.

Culture Snapshot Data Analysis

La Escuela Secundario Junior High School needs an extreme transformation of cultural

mindset from its administration, instructors, and most especially, parents. Parental involvement

only occurs when behavior and academic problems cannot be handled by the school.

Unfortunately, this mentality leaves the learner too far behind to catch up academically with their
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peers. In a country that is about saving face and more concerned about pushing learners through

the educational system, little is done to intervene with poor scholastic performance and the

learner is simply advanced to the next grade level or graduated with no recourse. Whether or not

parents in San Pancho want frequent, ongoing feedback about how their children are performing

is not clear. Parents may be feeling fear of failure, or frustration and anger if solutions are

elusive; therefore, it is about emotions and not facts (Schwartz, 2018), and the general attitude is

that education and discipline within school boundaries should be left up to the teacher and

administration.

Communication between the teacher and parents is extremely pertinent for La Escuela

Secundario. A teacher must choose their words carefully when communicating with parents

because the subject matter of their child is a personal one (Schwartz, 2018), and how a teacher

conveys the message to a parent can have a major impact on the child in terms of confidence,

respect, and work ethic. Generally, parents want a safe, learning environment for their child.

What is important is the instructor understand that the parents at La Escuela Secundario are often

too stressed about the on-goings of their daily work and family lives, and the last thing they want

to feel is overburden with worry as to why their child is acting out due to problems at school.

This is why results from the culture snapshot are relatively low (see Table 1).

Table 1
Personal Average
Cultural Awareness Criteria for La Escuela Secundario. Score

Valuing Culture and Diversity 3.5

Leading for Cultural Inclusion 3.1

Engaging the Culturally Diverse Community 2.7

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Delivering Culturally Sensitive Curriculum, Instruction, and 3.3

Assessment

Overall Average 3.1

Valuing Culture and Diversity

It is understandable that Mexico has not made any great strides in English language acquisition

when the board of education required English textbook series is Crossover Plus (Curwen, Day,

& Pontón, 2017) for 9th and 8th graders and Get Ahead (Kittrell & Martinez, 2018) for 7th

graders. These books are so high above the skill level for these learners who neither have the

basic vocabulary or reading skills to tackle such an insurmountable task. Not only are the

readings inundated with an unreasonable amount of difficult vocabulary words, but there are no

cultural connections to the text. For students who can barely read in Spanish, it is a defeatist and

daunting task to attempt a reading with no cultural relevance of this magnitude in a new language

for the learner and for the instructor to teach. Therefore, the challenge for the instructor lay in

trying to bring in supplemental material relatable to the learners that would then tie in material

from the required textbooks. For example, bringing in famous Mexican folk-tales via Olga

Loya’s (1997) book, Momentos Mágicos/Magic Moments, that convey the same morals and

messages seen in the sample reading from Get Ahead (see Figure 1) will help learners grasp the

material because of cultural familiarity. Creating culturally relevant material for each lesson

should always be at the forefront of the instructor’s mindset when implementing curriculum,

which is why Valuing Culture and Diversity for La Escuela Secundario has the highest score of

3.5 (see Appendix A).

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Figure 1. Sample reading from Get Ahead.

(Kittrell & Martinez, 2018)

Leading for Cultural Inclusion

While data is continually being collected for the learners at La Escuela Secundario to

better implement and create materials and assessments to garner academic success, there is little

instructor knowledge about local, state, and federal statutes and policies that relate to culturally

and linguistically diverse students and their families. The school does not have a mission

statement that is visible and even the director did not know when he was asked what the mission

statement of the school is. Allocating resources and delivering services in a manner that

addresses the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse students is not a problem so long as

the administration does not tie the hands of the instructor to adhering strictly to the textbook.

Supplemental material is often frowned upon by administration because of its strict policy of
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keeping pace with Mexican board of education curriculum standards. It is unknown if parental

approval or disapproval of the curriculum has been given. One can only assume that parental

consent is neutral and complete trust of the learner’s education is given to the school and its

policies and curriculum standards by the parents. Though there is much experience and skills in

serving culturally diverse students on behalf of the instructor, exposure in a Mexican educational

institution and culture is a relatively new experience. Therefore, having a process for evaluating

the short-term and long-term effectiveness of the services offered which are relative to culturally

and linguistically diverse students is still in its infancy. Advocating for programs, policies, and

services that support culturally and linguistically diverse students and receiving professional

development that builds cultural competency, cross-cultural communication, and conflict

resolution skills are the first steps towards instructor and learner success. These ideals must be

made a reality for any real academic progress to be ensured. However, there is definitely a sense

of optimism that these ideals can be achieved as reflected in the overall average of 3.1 (see

Appendix B).

Engaging the Culturally Diverse Community

San Pancho has a diverse business community where many expats and Mexicans own

businesses together. There have been attempts to reach out to these businesses to raise money to

improve school conditions. Classroom conditions are abhorrent and are not conducive for a safe

learning environment: Electrical wiring protrudes from the walls, desks are falling apart, broken

windows, and all the classrooms are always filthy. There are abandoned buildings on school

grounds that are grossly deteriorating which present a safety hazard for the students. These

buildings consist of an old theater, gymnasium, and library. Though these local businesses have

been made aware of the conditions of La Escuela Secundario, the only promise that has been
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made thus far is that these concerns will be mentioned in the next quarterly town meeting which

is scheduled for early December 2018. There is little hope even if an instructor possesses the

knowledge and experience to work effectively with culturally diverse students, their families,

and the community if the school has not implemented a parent involvement program, engaged

with the community on special projects and activities, or consulted with organizations,

advocates, and community experts to help with the underprivileged socioeconomic predicament

La Escuela Secundario is in. Solutions for the school are ultimately left up to the teachers and

students. However, with the teachers living in different towns over an hour away and the

students going to work after school, this leaves little room for motivation to improve conditions.

One can only continue to press the issue for the businesses to begin fund-raisers, hold

community events for the sake of the school, and coerce parents to also take initiative in helping

to improve their children’s learning environment. Consistent and constant reminding until the

December quarterly meeting will hopefully gain some attention and momentum heading into the

new year. This attitude is reflected in the overall average of 2.7 (see Appendix C), where is there

some optimism but some reservation that one will see a quick, positive conclusion.

Delivering Culturally Sensitive Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment

If followed accordingly, curriculum standards and the level of the required textbooks

would leave the teachers and students in a page-turning frenzy with no real language acquisition.

Since the school does not have resources such as internet, projectors, Smart Boards, or a speaker

system, much instruction must be handled through colored cutouts, mimicking, kinesthetic

activities, and student projects through graphic organizers. The textbooks are not culturally

relevant and the learners do not show much interest in other cultures other than the American

culture. Curricula from the textbooks do gloss over worldly topics such as traveling, food, and
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lifestyle but the language and grammar is so far above the learners’ skill level that the students

immediately shut down the desire to learn English. The only way to address linguistic and

content objectives is through principles of differentiated instruction, research strategies that

account for various learning styles, and second language learning and teaching strategies. Heavy

usage of cooperative environments, a loosely-based Universal Design for Learning (UDL),

simplifying text, inclusion of culturally relevant supplemental materials, and formative

assessments are incorporated regularly. There are no support programs to promote achievement

and provide intervention for at-risk students. However, intervention is handled in class by

pairing weak learners with stronger students and adhering to the different ways these at-risk

students obtain the information. These ways include student group projects, graphic organizers,

and open-book quizzes. Empowering the students by using their cultural strengths in classroom

planning and delivery is perhaps the most positive aspect of the teaching experience at La

Escuela Secundario, which is why the overall average for this section is 3.3 (see Appendix D).

The continuing drawback to this experience is the lack of administrative and parental support.

Culture Snapshot: Overall Response

For learner success to happen at La Escuela Secundario the administration, students,

families, and communities must all work together. San Pancho may be a poor rural Mexican

town that does not see the resources the bigger cities are given by the government, but there is no

reason to believe that La Escuela Secundario cannot be a top academic institution. Parental

support and involvement are the most important elements to this factor. The daily salary for the

average worker in San Pancho is $8.00 U.S. dollars a day. Therefore, having parental support is

a challenge where it does not involve the parents taking time off of work and losing wages. It is

difficult to suggest that parents not have their children working after school when most of the
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families comes from poverty. However, reaching out to the community to help improve school

conditions may help, especially if businesses are willing to give pay raises or night-school

programs are implemented for adults in the community to learn English or any other skills that

people from the community may be willing to teach on a volunteer basis. Students cannot be

blamed for poor academic performance. They are only giving back what they receive. School

conditions are not the only hindering factors as curriculum standards and the textbooks must also

be conducive for learner success.

Identifying Culture Snapshot Strengths

Simplifying texts and addressing textbook absences of culturally relevant topics and

materials are a recognized strength. Adhering to the learner’s needs rather than content and

curriculum standards are a continuing challenge with the administration. So long as standards

are learned, however, then it does not matter what avenue is taken to reach those objectives.

Initiative in reaching out to the community and communicating with some of the parents have

been taken. Moreover, an instructor who comes with years of teaching experience in other

countries should always observe cultural traditions, the learner’s L1, and learning habits and

attitudes. Most importantly, however, is maintaining an optimistic attitude that the situation can

change for the learners at La Escuela Secundario.

Identifying Culture Snapshot Areas for Improvement

A major area for improvement must be to take more initiative in reaching out to the

parents. Parental support is vital for learner academic success and more must be done to involve

parents in their children’s education in all content areas. Many parents do not speak English and

may see learning English as a lower-tier subject area. However, presenting facts that learning

English can actually help improve their children’s lives by entering better high schools or obtain
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better paying jobs that hire Spanish and English speakers (British Council, 2015). Educators

must also acknowledge the political arena stakeholders create in the discourse of learning.

Education is political because it is one place where individuals and society are constructed

(Ginsberg, 2015, p. 6). Though they may not show it here in San Pancho, all parents want a

voice in their child’s educational upbringing. Teachers may be experts in the field of

education, but parents often have inside information about their child’s learning style, study

habits and attitude that could be valuable to the instructor (Schwartz, 2018).

Conclusion

All teachers and their experiences come with their strengths and room to improve on

weaknesses. A culture snapshot provides the opportunity for an instructor to observe and reflect

on those strong and weak areas. The teacher and student experience at La Escuela Secundario

Junior High School can be positive and successful if the community promotes awareness for

improvement and parental involvement is consistent. This all begins with the administration

who should listen to the teacher and student concerns. It can be easy for an instructor to be

dismissive towards the school because of aesthetics or lack of funding, but the learners truly have

a desire to learn. Cultural awareness of Mexican attitudes towards education, understanding and

communicating with parents, and adhering to learners’ needs are all attributes of an excellent

teacher who is constantly striving for second language acquisition success.

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References

British Council. (2015). English in Mexico: An examination of policy, perceptions and

influencing factors. Manchester: British Council.

Curwen, H., Day, M., & Pontón, S. (2017). Crossover plus. Dayton: University of Dayton

Publishing.

Dickinson, P. (2017). Effecting positive change in English language learning with Universal

Design for Learning. IAFOR: International Conference on Language Learning (pp. 1-9).

Honolulu: International Academic Forum (IAFOR).

Ginsberg, M. B. (2015). Excited to learn: Motivation and culturally responsive teaching.

Thousand Oaks: Corwin Press.

Kittrell, M. D., & Martinez, L. A. (2018). Get Ahead. Mexico City: Transcender.

Loya, O. (1997). Momentos magicos/Magic moments. Little Rock: August House Publishers.

Rao, K., Currie-Rubin, R., & Logli, C. (2016, July). Universal design for learning (UDL) and

inclusive practices in IB World Schools. International Baccalaureate Organization, 1-7.

Schwartz, N. (2018). What do parents really want from teachers? Retrieved from Teaching

Community: Where teachers meet and learn: http://teaching.monster.com

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Appendix A
Valuing culture and diversity
Culture Snapshot Checklist Rating
Valuing Culture and Diversity 1 2 3 4 5
I consider cultural factors, such as language,
race, ethnicity, and customs, when selecting
curricular materials and designing and 
delivering instruction.
I acknowledge, respect, and respond to the
culturally and linguistically defined needs of
students and their families. 

I evaluate student outcomes on the basis of

culturally relevant objectives.

I check for inclusive/exclusive practices and
support celebrations/events that reflect various
cultures and introduce the community to new 
cultures.
Average Score: Valuing Culture and Diversity 3.5
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Appendix B
Leading for cultural inclusion
Leading for Cultural Inclusion 1 2 3 4 5
I regularly collect and analyze demographic and 
statistical information on culturally and
linguistically diverse students for use in
planning.
I allocate resources and deliver services in a
manner that addresses the needs of culturally
and linguistically diverse students. 
I receive professional development that enables
me to build cultural competency, cross-cultural
communication, and conflict resolution skills. 
I articulate and implement the school’s mission 
statement and goals relative to cultural
competency.
I am proficient (or I have the services of others
who are proficient) in the heritage languages of
students and who are able to communicate with 
them and their families easily to meet needs.
I am knowledgeable about local, state, and
federal statutes and policies that relate to
culturally and linguistically diverse students 
and their families.
I advocate for programs, policies, and services
that support culturally and linguistically diverse
students. 
I have a clear process for evaluating the short- 
term and long-term effectiveness of the services
I offer relative to culturally and linguistically
diverse students.
I communicate with and involve culturally and 
linguistically diverse families in all school and
classroom activities.
I have experience and skills in serving 
culturally diverse students.
Average Score: Leading for Cultural Inclusion 3.1
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Appendix C
Engaging the culturally diverse community
Engaging the Culturally Diverse Community 1 2 3 4 5
I possess the knowledge and experience to work 
effectively with culturally diverse students, their
families, and the community.

My parent involvement program promotes inclusion

of all culture and language groups.

I engage with the community on special projects and
activities that address cultural issues.

I communicate with culturally diverse businesses and 
other community organizations to actively seek their
support for my culturally and linguistically diverse
students.
I seek information from culturally diverse businesses
and other community organizations about the needs
of students and their families and the community 
resources available to them.
I consult with organizations, advocates, and
community experts before finalizing activities that
may have cultural impact. 
I consult with culturally diverse community 
organizations to learn more about the effectiveness
and responsiveness of my services.
Total Score: Engaging the Culturally Diverse 2.7
Community
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Appendix D
Delivering culturally sensitive curriculum, instruction and assessment
Delivering Culturally Sensitive 1 2 3 4 5
Curriculum, Instruction and Assessment
I actively pursue information about my
students’ values, beliefs, customs, and
languages. 
I consider student cultures and heritage
languages when developing/selecting
curricula and planning instruction. 
I examine district curricula and search for
cultural connections and ways to infuse global
concepts, vocabulary, and events into my 
teaching.
I work with culturally and linguistically
diverse students to maintain cultural supports
in their families and communities. 
I empower culturally and linguistically
diverse students by using their cultural
strengths in classroom planning and delivery. 
I apply my knowledge of cultural competence
in decisions about curricula, instruction, and
assessment. 
Literature selections and other teaching
materials reflect a variety of cultural and
linguistic perspectives. 
Curricula integrate global views, geography,
and history.

Linguistic and content objectives are
addressed for second language learners.

I apply principles of differentiated instruction,
research strategies that account for various
learning styles, and second language learning 
and teaching strategies.
I integrate technology into the teaching- 
learning process.
I connect teaching and learning to student
culture, heritage language, and prior
knowledge. 
I use authentic student assessments to 
complement standardized tests.
I use both formative and summative 
performance evaluations.
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I utilize support programs to promote

achievement and provide intervention for at-
risk students. 
Average Score: Delivering Culturally 3.3
Sensitive Curriculum, Instruction, and
Assessment