Today’s Discussion on Nieto

Today’s discussion in class helped me to better understand how Nieto’s position about diversity in the classroom. I knew little about the three different cultural shifts that the educational system has gone through. It is strange that the methods of teaching in the 1800s still have an effect on the educational system today. I thought that it was interesting that during the industrialization era, teachers tried to produce students that were obedient, efficient, and predictable so that they would be successful working in factories later on in life. I also didn’t know about how the classroom has changed over time, including the decline of majorities and the increase of minorities in the classroom. I have, however, had experience with differently-abled ‘mainstreaming’ in schools. In my high school, I volunteered in my special need classroom, and many of the students in the special needs program spend some of the school day in classes with other students, such as speech, physical education, and drawing. Inclusion for these students is very important because it gives them the opportunity to work with other students and students with abilities different from theirs. I found it surprising that while the number of African American students has increased in schools, the number of African American teachers has decreased. I’m not sure if there is any reason for that. Although a more diverse classroom can cause some tension with different cultures and religions coming together, but I envy the opportunity that students have today. Although I’m not much older than students in junior high and high school, my school wasn’t very diverse, and I have had very few experiences and knowledge of other cultures and ethnic groups. With all of these changes causing so many problems in the classroom, I was a little discouraged; that was until we talked about one of the major positive effects of a diverse classroom. These changes will create a lot of tension in the classroom, but along with this tension comes opportunity. This gave me hope and motivation to understand the needs of each of the students in my classroom (whenever I have my own classroom) and use their differences to create a successful learning environment.