1. Recognition of One’s Own Cultural
Lens and Biases
A helpful step for all teachers is to explore
and reflect upon where their assumptions,
attitudes and biases come from and to
understand that how they view the world can
lead them to misinterpretation of behaviors
and inequitable treatment of culturally
different students (Weinstein, TomlinsonClarke,
Curran, 2004). This situation may
cause a teacher to request a referral to
special education when there is no disability.
There are several things teachers can do to
explore belief systems:
Read and discuss Peggy McIntosh’s
(1988) work on white privilege and
male privilege.
Write a personal “identity story” to
explore how their identities have been
socially constructed and how they fit
into a multicultural world (Noel, 2000).
See where they fit on the Cultural
Proficiency Receptivity Scale (Lindsey,
Roberts, Campbell-Jones, 2005), a
tool designed for self-reflection that
will also enable teachers to examine
the policies and practices of their
school.