| Data collected and analyzed from English Language Arts teachers in urban, metro-city, and suburban school districts related to the use and extent of use of culturally relevant pedagogy (Ladson-Billings, 1994a), culturally relevant literature (Ladson-Billings, 1994a), activities and strategies from African American familial culture (Hale-Benson, 1986), and cultural modeling (Lee, 1993), showed similarities and differences in the pedagogical practices and methodologies among the three teachers in the three school districts. Three teachers from each respective district, urban, metro-city, and suburban, were interviewed once, at the initiation of the study and again prior to exit, on their perspectives of teacher education, relationships with principals and Districts, teaching philosophies and styles, teaching pedagogies, curriculum and content, State and National Benchmarks and Standards, and their inclusion of culturally relevant elements in their lessons. The nine teachers, from the three school Districts were also observed in their classrooms during three separate observation periods. No students were observed or had data collected on them. Analysis of interview and observation content showed that of the nine teachers, seven used culturally relevant pedagogy and literature to a great extent and that two used these elements to some extent. In the metro-city school district the relationships between the teachers and the District impacted the teacher's abilities to use culturally relevant pedagogy and literature, and administer the adopted curriculum. It was also found that the three Caucasian teachers in the study were observed to use culturally relevant pedagogy and literature, although their usage was unintentional. This was shown to be attributed to teaching styles. The similarities in the utilization of culturally relevant pedagogy, literature, activities and strategies form African American familial culture, and cultural modeling, among the teachers, were attributed to the teaching styles, the practice of providing supplemental culturally relevant materials, caring and affective pedagogies (Noddings, 2005), and positive relationships among the teachers, principals, and Districts. |
