As a retired educator, the author had been wondering how to make meaningful changes in their life. Marian White-Hood made a commitment to join the owner [of the new child care center] in her pursuit of intergenerational inclusivity. How do children learn their history, language, values, social emotions, or agency? Do children magically absorb the…

As a culturally diverse urban school, St. Mary's Nursery School has a unique landscape for work with young children. This diversity brings with it a myriad of different perspectives about the world, about education, and about children. At the school, using some of the tenets from Reggio Emilia have helped staff identify and use practices that…

Sometimes, innovation means recognizing and acknowledging when an approach needs to be refined and expanded in order to reflect new understandings about ourselves and society.

Innovations in content delivery abound in the world today, providing very effective tools for engaging students in meaningful learning. Social studies teachers have long known that having students memorize names and dates is a fairly useless exercise. Good teachers present material so that students can understand its application in their lives.…

The transition to a new age is always a difficult one, and we are facing a transition into the atomic age. What's next? One of the first groups of people to feel the responsibility of this transition is, of course, the teachers. Teachers are confronted with the problem of preparing the child to live in a world which is changing as rapidly as ours…

As populations migrate and seek refuge around the world, educators in receiving countries need information about how to provide meaningful education experiences. Refugee children have higher rates of school dropout and are faced with many challenges, such as acculturation stress, poverty, poor housing, dangerous neighborhoods, and psychological…

Language is one of the most important drivers of children's socialization and development of a sense of belonging within their school, community, and culture. For bilingual and multicultural children in particular, language plays a critical role in the development of their identity. If emergent language learners do not feel confident in their…

Teacher quality and the preparation of quality teachers have been at the center of debates and discussions related to improving educational outcomes among diverse student populations across the world. In New Zealand, the education system emphasizes high-quality, bicultural practice among teachers through regulations and curriculum that call for…

Recognizing the role of cultural audits in identifying a school's organizational and cultural characteristics, this article offers insight about developing school improvement plans. The multiple cultures that shape the "null curriculum" of a school, in which certain concepts and skills are left out of students' scope of…

Incidents of terrorism and other forms of heinous violence around the world are so dramatic and painfully wrenching that they often dictate change: in politics, in social convention, in battle, and in the classroom. The five years since the 9/11 attacks, in particular, have brought about huge shifts in the collective global view of Arabs, and it…

Some research studies indicate that a content knowledge gap exists between minority and non-minority children, especially young children from poor families. One factor contributing to this problem may be that teachers expect minority children to learn subject matter at a slower rate than their counterparts. It has been found that teachers'…

In the summer of 2007, the authors had the opportunity to lead a group of Hofstra University students, pre- and inservice, undergraduate and graduate, elementary and art teachers, to Sorrento, Italy, for interdisciplinary courses in both literacy and art education. The culminating project, a shadow theater play and performance, brought together…

Schools in the United States are more culturally diverse than ever before, and this trend is expected to continue. One way to prevent conflicts related to differences in ethnic, racial, or religious background is by using culturally sensitive children's books. In this article, the authors discuss the need of culturally sensitive children's books…

"The great teacher is not the man [or woman] who supplies the most facts, but the one in whose presence we become different people." This quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson is an important reminder that education involves more than just teaching academic content and meeting state, or national, standards. Teachers inspire, encourage, challenge,…

The achievement of students in urban schools across the United States lags behind that of their counterparts in rural and suburban schools, a disparity that is at the core of current public school reform. Although socioeconomic factors, such as poverty and its attendant variables, often hinder academic achievement, there is one critical…