I am a teacher in Baltimore City at the Academy for College and Career Exploration (ACCE), where one of my responsibilities is to teach a college-level class to high school students. Although I have experience as a special educator, this was my first year teaching this particular course. My main goal was to build a relationship with students and strengthen my teaching skills by focusing on the ideas encompassed in Critical Race Theory (CRT).
CRT is relevant to the ICJS Teachers Fellowship because of its emphasis on intersectionality, which the Oxford Dictionary defines as “the interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.” I would argue that religion be included as a social category, and many CRT experts would agree..So I began the school year with these ideas as a framework and along the way, I’ve had several ‘aha moments’ with regards to myself, my teaching, and my students.
First, I learned so much about myself, about best practices, and about the world through listening and reflecting. We began the course at ACCE by discussing race as a social construct, and students asked wonderful questions. I didn’t know the answer to everything, but I felt obligated to answer. On one such occasion, I did some additional research once the class ended and discovered that I’d misspoken. I addressed the entire class the next day, made the correction, and had my first “aha moment:” When it comes to challenging or thought-provoking topics, it’s alright if you’re not the expert. The best teaching and learning is done through generating questions, discussion, and research. We’ve done all of these things throughout the fellowship. This realization also enabled me to push my students to do their own research to develop a deeper understanding of complex topics for themselves.
This led to another “aha moment” as it relates to the fellowship. I had the opportunity to choose any topic for research, discussion, and reflection once the AP exams were administered in early May, and I decided to focus on religion. Again, as with race, I was nervous about this particular topic—perhaps even more so. Not only can religion be a divisive topic, but it’s also a very broad topic. I felt that my personal experiences with religion, although deep in one particular sect of Christianity, were very narrow when considering the variety of possible religions. I felt more equipped to discuss race than religion. However, participating in the ICJS fellowship enabled me to see that other teachers had similar trepidation. Together we were able to brainstorm, reflect, and encourage each other to have tough conversations, question, and grow.
I took these sentiments into account when creating my culminating project for the ICJS fellowship. I asked students about whether or not they practiced a religion, and if they didn’t, how they developed ideas about right and wrong. I asked them about their families’ viewpoints on religion and whether they thought that religion should be talked about or taught as a class in schools. By encouraging the students to discuss and reflect, I was able to achieve my initial goal of creating an inclusive classroom and building deeper relationships with my students. I learned that in addition to the Muslim and Christian students, there were students who practiced Hinduism, Buddhism, atheism, and there were also students who wanted to learn more because they didn’t have many experiences with religion.
My takeaway from this experience is that it’s okay to not know everything, even IF you’re the teacher. But this shouldn’t stop you from exploring a topic in your classroom BECAUSE you can learn from your students AND allowing them to share their ideas deepens student-teacher relationships, strengthens understanding, and builds community.
Tonette Campbell teaches at The Academy for College and Career Exploration (ACCE) and was a 2022-2023 ICJS Teachers Fellow. Learn more about the ICJS programs for teachers here.
Opinions expressed in blog posts by the ICJS Teacher Fellows are solely the author’s. ICJS welcomes a diversity of opinions and perspectives.