Culturally relevant/sustaining pedagogy in a diverse urban classroom: Challenges of pedagogy for Syrian refugee youths and teachers in Turkey

Abstract

This study focused on whether and how teachers implemented the principles of culturally relevant and sustaining pedagogies and the challenges teachers faced while trying to implement these principles with Syrian students in Turkey. The study was built on the four components of pedagogies: academic achievement; cultural competencies; sociopolitical consciousness; and the sustainability of culture. Qualitative data were obtained through interviews and field notes with four teachers who had Syrian students in their classes and four Syrian students. Content analysis was used to examine the data. The findings revealed that both teachers and students had low expectations of academic achievement. Teachers conducted the teaching–learning process entirely according to the perspectives of students who were from the mainstream culture. Teachers tried to improve the cultural competencies and enhance their sociopolitical consciousness of the Syrian students; however, the attempts were limited and inadequate. Although teachers were aware of the importance of sustaining the Syrian culture, they did not know how to do so. The teachers did not have sufficient competencies or experiences to make revisions or to carry out an effective instructional process tailored to the needs of Syrian students because of an absence of skills and knowledge of multicultural education.

Needs analysis for developing culturally responsive teaching for remedial education: What do teachers need?

“…Students are likelier to have a good learning attitude when learning is fun and entertaining. Other than that, exciting learning experiences can help students learn better, expand their knowledge, and develop critical thinking skills important for self-development (Kotluk & Aydin, 2021). In remedial education, teachers use real-life examples to solve problems and explain a learning concept differently, aiding students to learn in the remedial classroom.…”

Teacher Education Reimagined: A Letter to Teacher Educators on Preparing Teachers to Educate Refugee Students

“…The study found that teachers' practices included both inclusion-oriented and exclusionoriented actions concerning the redistribution, recognition, and representation dimensions of Fraser's social justice framework, which offered a window into inclusive education for imagining new ways of supporting refugee students and their teachers. Kotluk and Aydin (2021) used culturally relevant and sustaining pedagogy as a theoretical lens to examine the challenges teachers faced while trying to implement the principles of this pedagogy. The findings of the study showed that teachers had low expectations of academic achievement from refugee students and designed the teaching-learning process exclusively by considering the perspectives of students from the mainstream culture.…”

Integrating Local Science and School Science: The Benefits for Preserving Local Wisdom and Promoting Students’ Learning

“…Studies on culture and learning suggest that learning should integrate culture into classroom lessons (Günay & Aydin, 2015;Shidiq, 2016). In the case study in Turkey, the teacher did not have sufficient competence or experience to carry out an effective learning process tailored to the needs of Syrian students due to the absence of skills and knowledge (Kotluk & Aydin, 2021). Therefore, these innovations rely on the support of teachers because they were assumed to be their teaching knowledge (Milne et al, 2015).…”