Events

On Saturdays, October 2 and October 9, 2021 the Smithsonian Science Education Center will host the Integrating Culturally Based Instructional Practices into STEM Classrooms virtual professional development.

This free PD will help educators to understand the evolution of culturally competent instructional practices and explore how they overlap with principles of universal design for learning (UDL), to prepare them to develop goals that:

• Prioritize culturally relevant, responsive, and sustaining teaching.
• Ensure that all students regardless of ability, have stimulating and meaningful STEM learning experiences.

The first of the two-day PD will begin with expert-led presentations and discussions that explore definitions and strong examples of culturally based strategies and accessible practices, before asking teachers to think about the similarities between both practices and how educators have successfully managed to account for both in their lesson and classroom design.

Using the content from the first day, teachers will spend the second day applying their learnings to a framework for socio-scientific issues (SSI). The second day will wrap-up with sessions dedicated to individual goal setting and networking, to encourage participants to identify a specific area of growth they want to work on and how they plan to attract support from newly formed and preestablished relationships to achieve their goals.

Professional Development Schedule

Saturday, October 2, 2021, 10am - 5pm Eastern

• Culturally Relevant, Responsive, and Sustaining Teaching
• Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
• Cross-Pollination of Culturally Relevant and Universally Designed Teaching Practices

Saturday, October 9, 2021, 10am - 2:30pm Eastern

• Framework for Socio-scientific Issues
• Individual Goal Setting
• Networking

For questions, please contact Sherrell Lewis, LewisSM@si.edu.

URL:

https://ssec.si.edu/event/culturally_based_PD