Agenda

• 8:30 AM - 9:45 AM | Cornelius Minor
  Beyond Kind, More Than Nice: Equity in The Context of The Work That We Do Every Day
  The experiences we have shared over the last few years have made the nuanced challenges of our work visible. Ensuring that all children have opportunities to learn powerfully is already complicated. Doing so in a social, political, and economic ecosystem that does not always value all children and families feels overwhelming and beyond our reach. What do we do when what we see reveals truths that feel impossible? What happens when there is no recipe for what must come next? In this session Cornelius will explore ways that teachers can walk the many paths ahead of us.

• 10:30 AM - 11:45 AM | sujatha baliga
  Fostering Meaning & Belonging: Cultivating Collective Care through Restorative Processes
  Creating a sense of meaning and belonging in the classroom setting is no easy task, especially given the competing interests in the limited time teachers have with their students. We know that meaningful relationships are built at the speed of trust – but how can we find the time necessary for creating such spaciousness in our own lives, let alone in our classrooms? In this session, we will explore how, in a world measured by bell schedules and semesters, restorative practices can create space sufficient to build true communities of care. In so doing, restorative justice and restorative practices can be reclaimed from how they’re too often misused – as tools of classroom control – and returned to their rightful role in building beloved school communities.

• 12:00 PM - 1:15 PM | Lorena Escoto Germán
  Textured Leaders: Community, Culture, and Sustainability
  Considering the oppressive structures found in schools, it is evermore necessary to re-envisioning the learning spaces and our systems in classrooms as we interact with students. Of the four traits of Textured Teaching, flexibility seems to be the toughest one for educators to envision. Why does flexibility lead to confusion, questions, and hesitations? Flexibility in education requires reflection, patience, and practice. In this session, we will explore the foundations of Textured Teaching and explore a framework specifically for implementing a flexible approach in schools and classrooms that leads to equity, anti bias, and anti racism learning.

• 2:00 PM - 3:15 PM | Gabriel Saiz
  Indigenous Teaching Methods and Inclusive Science Communication
  Utilizing Indigenous teaching methods can improve learning outcomes for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous students in STEM education. Through highlighting examples of Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Western Science interfacing in real world situations, Indigenous teaching methods will be suggested as ways to make the natural sciences approachable for all students. Topics introduced will include ways to make scientific methodologies relevant to individual experiences, opportunities for students to achieve self-actualization through science literacy, and to explore the ethical implication of new technology.

• 4:00 PM - 5:15 PM | Dr. Teaira McMurtry
  "What It Look Like": Becoming (and Supporting) Arbiters of Black Linguistic Justice
  “It’s the thing that black people love so much—the saying of words, holding them on the tongue, experimenting with them, playing with them…” -Toni Morrison (1981)

  Black Language consistently contours Mainstream American English. You’ll notice this by steaming your favorite TV series, listening to your preferred podcast or radio station, or scrolling through your desired social media site. Black Language resounds everywhere; it is both admired and mocked. While popularized and promulgated through various forms of media, Black language has never been given the respect it deserves. Accordingly, educational settings have consistently ignored the linguistic wealth of Black learners by disregarding the way they embody language as informal, diminishing it as simply slang or street talk, and relegating it to be spoken only at home. Decades of research to date have demonstrated (a) how traditional ELA instruction disservices (and even harms) Black language natives, and (b) how instructional valorization of the standardized White American dialect (commonly referred to as Academic English) is detrimental and limiting to all students. This is exponentially problematic given that the Revised Wisconsin ELA Standards (2020, p.55) call for students to be able to: 

  • Demonstrate an understanding of how language functions in different cultures and contexts

  • Apply this knowledge to meet communicative goals when composing, creating, and speaking, and to comprehend more fully when reading and listening.

  • Be able to justify intentional language and convention choices and explain how those choices differ for culture and context. revised WI ELA standards

  These equity-oriented, anchoring standards listed above demonstrate that the use of standardized forms of English is not always contextually appropriate and, hence, it is necessary for all students—but Black learners in particular—to draw upon their linguistic capital to demonstrate mastery of the anchor standards. And, they should be able to do so stylistically (i.e., linguistically flex in their speaking and writing). Thus, both the shifting linguistic landscape of our society and the revised standards call for teachers to embrace and actuate artful language instruction that is anti-racist.

  But how? 

  Representing and building on the research that shows how artful and antiracist language instruction looks in today’s classroom, this session will touch on the what, but will focus on the how. During this session, participants will (a) be shown authentic examples of how this kind of instruction translates across K-12 classrooms, (b) glean and develop ideas to start, sustain, or support anti-racist language instruction, and (c) will leave the session armed with a wealth of resources to actuate Black linguistic justice. 

NOTE: Registering for the Winter Institute will give you access to the entire day (all sessions and presentations). The automated confirmation email will contain ONE Zoom link for the entire day. You may attend as your schedule allows that day.

Training Format

• American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters will be available during each of the sessions.

• These sessions will be facilitated online using the Zoom Webinar platform.

• Participants will be able to engage with our online platform. Sutra will be available to create an online learning experience that fosters a supportive space for engagement, sharing, and meaningful conversation.