Reclaiming Democracy Multicultural Educators' Journeys Toward Transformative Teaching

Reclaiming Democracy: Multicultural Educators' Journeys Toward Transformative Teachingrepresents a break from the more traditional expository text on democratic teaching techniques or methods. Instead, it examines the lives of educators who have struggledin the everydayto advocate forallstudents in their ongoing efforts to provide more equitable access to meaningful, challenging educational opportunities. In doing so, they have become aware of their own identities, strengths, and biases, and have spent a lifetime reconstructing their own framework of teaching and learning toward these aims. This book will help preservice and in-service teachers answer the questions: What is a transformative teacher--one who is committed to advocating for all students? Where do I begin? What is the process? The process of becoming democratic or transformative teachers is mystifying, and we do not generally help our students deconstruct the stories of others to identify the critical incidents and people who have guided their personal growth in a direction that is more socially just. This book does just that. It contains the narratives of teachers who have made a life commitment to advocating for all students. The narratives demystify the journeys--they are filled with barriers, biases that needed to be overcome, fears, and ongoing critical self-analysis pertaining to the development of their personal and professional identity. They help the reader understand how they have acknowledged and struggled to overcome their privilege, their prejudice, and their personal experiences either as perpetuators or recipients of the many "isms" that flourish in our society. Reclaiming Democracyis unique because it parallels many of the major topics in multicultural education and teacher education through the voices of teachers who have lived the experiences--immigration, social class, racism, gender bias, and white privilege, to name a few. It makes these topics more than methods, more than theories. They become real for beginning teachers as they see how other teachers have experienced them. Finally, this book is unique because it is based upon hope, that is, optimism with a memory. Every author has remained ahopemonger,one who persists in her or his dreams for all students and uses an eclectic array of strategies to continue to grow and to advocate for students. RATIONALE Upon examining the literature. on teachers and change, we see two alarming facts. First, the overwhelming majority of teachers continue to be white or European American and tend to teach in the way that they learn. Consequently, they are least able or willing to teach students whose culture, gender, sexual orientation, first language, and social class are different from their own. This gives an advantage to the privileged European American students who are middle class and higher, and continues to marginalize the other students. A crisis is looming: While we have classrooms with diminishing numbers of students who are European American, the majority of teachers are still European American. Many teachers misunderstand, fear, mis-serve, or ignore the growing minority-majority population in many states and cities, as if all students are the same or are like the teacher. We urgently need more teachers who realize this crisis and will commit to the uncomfortable task of becoming aware of and then reconstructing their own identities to become more inclusive--that is, more socially just. We need teachers who are willing to move past guilt, blame, anger, apathy, and hopelessness to persist in their work in schools and to commit to building collaborations and networks with diverse others in both the school and community to create more equitable schools and classrooms. Our extensive experiences in elementary, middle, and secondary schools and in higher education working with preservice and in-seRomo, Jaime J. is the author of 'Reclaiming Democracy Multicultural Educators' Journeys Toward Transformative Teaching', published 2003 under ISBN 9780130945211 and ISBN 0130945218.