Serving a Diverse Population

Brookside Elementary School is located in Northern California and serves students from

many different cultural backgrounds. From my thoughts and after some discussion with my co-

workers, I would rate my school a 4 out of 5 for effectively serving the diverse population of our

students. After reviewing the characteristics that effective schools have for serving a diverse

population of students, I feel that my school meets the majority of them and that is the basis for

the rating.

I feel that we promote literacy everyday with a program called Daily 5. This program is

not required yet by all teachers, but is being encouraged in classrooms at the elementary level.

The Daily 5 program is not a curriculum, but is an instructional method that allows students to

work at their own pace during literacy time. Also it teaches many strategies to promote better

reading and writing and motivates students to work and learn independently with guidance from

the teacher instead of direct instruction. I feel that this promotes literacy in children of all

cultures because it is student led and based on independence. Students have the opportunity to

learn at their own pace, choose what they want to read and write about, and share with their

peers.

Also, I feel that at Brookside, we do our best to address our students social and

emotional needs. We are lucky enough to have a counseling grant that allows students to receive

group and individual counseling with a referral from a teacher or family member. Also, the

school offers parenting classes as well as family counseling to help families in many situations.

In addition, we are constantly trying to get parents involved in the school and in their childs

learning. Our Parent Teacher Organization is very active in our school and organizing many

family functions. Also, at the beginning of the year, we organize a Back to School Night and
are required to have parent-teacher conferences within the first trimester. This is a great

opportunity to meet the parents of our students and learn about the culture that their child will be

bringing into the classroom. As Bowman writes in her paper, Cultural Diversity Academic

Achievement, Children learn to establish and verify perceptions and beliefs about the world

through direct teaching by the older people in their community and through identification with

those people who care for them and are emotionally important to them (2). I feel that getting to

know the people who care for the children will certainly benefit my ability to better their

education.

Our school does not have a curriculum for any of the academic subjects. We are

currently piloting a math program, but it is not even an adoptable program for the state of

California at this point. As a new teacher, I find it very difficult to research and plan each

lesson every day. We do have colleague collaboration, but the lack of required materials allows

for creativity, but also for crucial lessons to be missed. This is a struggle of mine because I

would like to have more information and resources available to me as I plan and teach.

Overall, I find that Brookside does have many of the characteristics of an effective

school. Our focus is student learning and we work hard to reach all students so they can learn

and be successful no matter what background they are coming from. Also, I feel that we support

and embrace the cultural differences between staff, students, and families in the district.
Works Cited

Bowman, Barbara T. "Cultural Diversity Academic Achievement." N.d. TS.