My students are a salad bowl of different cultures hungry to learn. What better way to appreciate and respect each other's differences than through the study of their peers' cultures through a book club, filled with challenging discussions and insight into racism and their classmates struggles?
My students represent a variety of cultures including Native American, Marshallese, Latino, European, Asian, and African American.
Many of them are second generation immigrants who have lost touch with their own cultures, in addition to knowing very little about each others' unique diversity. Despite their differences, 85% of these students live in poverty, and have very little understanding about the world around them, including their classmates, of whom they will one day be challenged to work together as our local communities merge into a larger global economy. Most of what they believe and value with respect to diversity comes from their caregivers. They have been given few opportunities to explore and see the funds of knowledge their classmates have to offer.
My Project
This book set(Boys Without Names) will allow our school to expand our small community of 875 students to the local, state, and world communities. Through education, which comes from reading and discussion on the benefits of, challenges, and racism faced by our peers, my students will be able to develop their own understandings and expand their paradigm of what it means to be brothers and sisters with different skin colors, different languages, even different thoughts and beliefs, but free from the influence of others. This book set will allow us to continue our book club and will sustain us for the rest of the school year. I will be able to meet with 20 students at a time for an entire month, and then begin a new club of 20 more students after this group is finished. The book "Boys Without Names" will be reused year after year.
By donating to this project, you will be able to affect countless students, their peers, and their families, as they learn to set aside their own differences by learning how to respect and value the differences in others.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. Crane and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
