The demographic of United States (US) K-12 students continues to grow increasingly diverse. In Fall 2020, the total enrollment of public-school students was 48.1 million. Of the total public-school enrollment, 13.4 and 7.2 million students were identified as Hispanic and Black, respectively (National Center for Education Statistics, 2020). While the student demographics are becoming increasingly diverse, the demographics of public-school teachers remains majority White, middle-class, and female (National Center for Education Statistics, 2019). For decades scholars have proposed and advocated for culturally relevant practices that acknowledge, respect, and meaningfully integrate students’ cultural experiences into the classroom to support student success (Ladson-Billings, 1992/2014). Gay & Kirkland (2003) noted that culturally relevant teaching involves purposefully utilizing the cultures, experiences, and perspectives of historically marginalized students as “filters through which to teach them academic knowledge and skills” (p. 181). The inclusion of students’ cultural experiences in the classroom often rests on the shoulders of teachers, many of whom may not share similar cultural identities or experiences with students.
At the authors’ institution, a central departmental goal is to “prepare change agents who promote access, equity, and justice for all students while working to improve schools.” Similar to other teacher education programs, the current book chapter is a response to programmatic initiatives aimed at providing teacher candidates with a critical praxis that values the diverse cultural perspectives of students in K-12 classrooms. The authors endeavor to take up this charge by conceptualizing teacher cultural dispositions through the lens of Gloria Ladson-Billings' (1995, 2002) three tenets of culturally relevant pedagogy (CRP). The following section will define the broad term of teacher dispositions and propose a definition of teacher cultural dispositions.
Teacher Dispositions
Dispositions can be defined as teachers’ attitudes, beliefs, and critical values that impact what teachers say, think, and do (Jensen, Whiting, & Chapman, 2016). The Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium’s (InTASC) list of dispositions for teaching, highlights that teachers should be able to “realize, appreciate, have enthusiasm for, believe, respect, value, recognize, be sensitive to, be willing to, be concerned about, be committed to, understand, take responsibility for any number of ideas, all of which seem right and worthy to most members of the professional community” (Murray, 2007, p. 381). Educational scholars also identified the need for cultural dispositions that focus on pre-service teachers’ empathy, meekness, and social awareness (Jensen, Whiting, & Chapman, 2016).
Cultural dispositions are further understood as “the attitudinal beliefs of teachers regarding diverse populations” (Vázquez-Montilla, Just, & Triscari, 2014, p. 578) or “teachers’ inclination to meet the needs of the diverse learners in the classroom” (Schussler, Bercaw, & Stooksberry, 2008, p. 107). Teacher attitudes, values, and beliefs can impact their behaviors which in turn can have an impact on student learning outcomes (Taylor, 2000). Allen et al. (2017) noted “The problem is that teacher candidates have not truly internalized the importance of developing a CRP disposition, regardless of the community or context in which one will teach. CRP is for all students.” (p. 8). Therefore, the current authors argue that developing teacher candidates’ cultural dispositions is an essential aspect of developing teacher candidates’ dispositions.
Teacher Cultural Dispositions
Building on the aforementioned definitions the authors define teacher cultural dispositions as the beliefs and attitudes that teachers possess about culturally diverse students. Minimal research focuses on the development of teacher dispositions specifically with respect to culturally diverse students (Edwards, 2011). Often standardized curricula and pedagogy have continued to place diverse students at the margins by devaluing or disacknowledging their knowledge and lived experiences (Sleeter, 2012). To challenge this marginalization, Sleeter (2012) suggests the following to teachers:
- 1.
There is a clear need for evidence-based research that documents connections between culturally responsive pedagogy and student outcomes;
- 2.
There is a need to educate parents, teachers, and education leaders about what culturally responsive pedagogy means and looks like in the classroom;
- 3.
There is a need to reframe public debate about teaching, especially teaching in diverse and historically underserved communities (pp. 578-579).