8/17/2019 Best Practices for Opportunity Gaps

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SUMMARY OF BEST PRACTICES TO ADDRESS OPPORTUNITY GAPS 

Milner, H.R. (2010). Start Where You Are, But Don’t Stay There. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press 

1. Dealt with the presence ofrace and culture:

Teachers rejected color-blind, culture-blind, and diversity-blind ideologies. They sawthemselves and their students as racial and cultural beings and used that knowledge inworking with students and in teaching them.

2. Perceived teaching as

mission andresponsibility:  

Teachers cared deeply about their students and developed mission-minded approachesthat allowed students to reach their potential. They saw teaching as their calling and tookit personally when students did not succeed academically.

3. Developed criticalconsciousness:

Teachers critiqued the knowledge and information available. They consciously fought

against injustice; they spoke out against inequity both inside and outside of theclassroom and empowered students to do the same.

4. Rejected deficit no tions: 

Teachers concentrated on the assets that the students brought into the classroom andbuilt on those assets in the learning contexts. They also understood their own assets asteachers and used those as a foundation to bridge opportunity gaps in the classroom.

5. Did more with fewerresources

Teachers did not allow what they did not have to hinder their efforts, goals, and visionsfor their students. They did whatever it took to succeed and for their students tosucceed; they never gave up, even when resources were scarce.

6. Understood equity inpractice: 

Teachers understood the difference between equality and equity. They worked to meetthe needs of individual students and realized that their curriculum and instruction mightnot be exactly that same among all students at all times but would depend on theparticular needs of each student.

7. Built and sus tainedrelationships:

Teachers understood that students needed to get to know them and that they neededto get to know their students. They saw their teaching as members of a family affair andviewed their students as their own family. In other words, they engage in “othermothering” and “other fathering”. 

8. Understood powerstructures amongstudents: 

Teachers understood that there were power structures among the students. Theyrecruited popular students to embrace the vision of learning and engagement in theclassroom in order to get other students engaged and motivated to learn.

9. Understood the self inrelation to others: 

Teachers assembled knowledge and understood points of intersection andconvergence between themselves and their students. They used this knowledge andunderstanding to build and sustain relationships in the classroom.

10. Granted students entryinto teachers’ world : 

Teachers allowed students to learn things about them and made connections todemonstrate the commonalities that existed between students and teachers. Theyshared stories with their students and allowed them to share theirs in order to buildcommunity, collective knowledge, and points of reference.

11. Conceived of school as acommunity with family: 

Teachers conceived of school as a community that was established by all those in theenvironment. They allowed students to have voice and perspectives in how thecommunity would be defined. Teachers respected and cared about those in thecommunity as if they were family members

12. Stressed the value andimportance of learning: 

Teachers explicitl y conveyed the importance and value of education and learning tostudents. They helped students understand and embrace the reality that one can besmart and intelligent and, at the same time, cool and hip.

13. Immersed themselves instudents’ lifeworlds: 

Teachers attempted to understand what it meant to live in the world of their studentsthrough music, sports, film, and pop culture. They incorporated this knowledge andunderstanding into the learning opportunities in the classroom.

14. Incorporated pop culture:

Teachers understood the multiple layers of popular culture that students wereinterested in outside of school. They incorporated this understanding in developingrelevant and responsive lessons for students.