Abstracts Language, Literature, and Linguistic

Culturally sustaining practices in action for linguistically diverse students

by Laura Quiroz Unknown

The purpose of this single case study was to question how classroom communities of linguistically diverse students in a school experience culturally sustaining pedagogy both through teacher and student perspectives. The focus of this study was on linguistically and culturally diverse students as this is a growing group of students with urgent needs who have been historically marginalized. The findings support the need for teachers to practice culturally sustaining pedagogy (Paris & Alim, 2017) with linguistically and culturally diverse students. Linguistically diverse students who participated in learning communities where culturally sustaining practices took place built strong relationships with teachers, felt safe and supported, and had greater access to the content. Linguistic pluralism promoted learning while denouncing deficit-based approaches. Teachers intentionally planned linguistic and cultural pluralism in order to provide a culturally sustaining learning environment. However, cultural pluralism was implemented at various degrees based on the teacher's comfort level with discussions of race and culture. When fully implemented, Students of Color were given the power and tools necessary to question systems of oppression. Implementation of culturally sustaining pedagogy took place regardless of the teacher's race/ethnicity, even if their identities didn't align with the student's race/ethnicity. These findings influenced my creation of the Practitioner Continuum of Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy (CSP) which was inspired by the research by Paris and Alim (2017) and was created using the theory in practice with this particular group of teachers and students.