An Examination of World Language Teachers’ Perceptions of Social Justice Curriculum

Student populations are becoming increasingly diverse, and educators must integrate pedagogies to meet the needs of those students or risk broadening the achievement gap between white students and students of color. Culturally responsive pedagogy has been shown to lead to improved academic and social outcomes for students of all backgrounds. This site-specific qualitative study examines how well world language teachers understand and can define culturally responsive pedagogy as well as what professional learning they would like to receive on the topic. The main finding of this study was that the world language educators demonstrated a strong understanding of culturally responsive pedagogy. This is promising, as it means that culturally responsive pedagogy is already being implemented in some classrooms across the district. Further research would include examining teachers of other disciples and their understanding of culturally responsive pedagogy and what effect that making it the backbone of their practice would have on students, faculty, and community stakeholders.