2. Diverse Learners

Four Analogies

This activity will help you introduce the concept of culture to your class. For this activity, there is no right or wrong answer. Rather, this is an opportunity for students to share their meaning of culture. PowerPoint Presentation

Resources for non-ELA instructors teaching ELA students

Links and information for non-ELA instructors teaching ELA students From Kate Hess, Iowa City

Differentiating Instruction for All Student Needs

Closed Captioning in Course Videos

This packet contains instructions for closed captioning videos in different scenarios.

Closed Captioning

This document explains several aspects of closed captioning as related to Kirkwood.

Community Partnerships Strengthen Learner Success

The end of February presented several events that raised Kirkwood and the community’s awareness of issues our minority students and their families face. On Saturday, February 21st, a positive dialogue about law enforcement and community relations was hosted at Kennedy High School in Cedar Rapids.  Several Kirkwood faculty, including Juanita Limas and Chris Cronbaugh, attended […]

We Are Kirkwood: Multiple Perspectives on Diversity & Inclusion

As a positive step towards making Kirkwood Community College a more diverse and inclusive environment, a diversity track was added to Collaborative Learning Days, featuring 16 sessions that addressed issues of diversity and inclusion.  This was a great first step towards bringing diversity issues to the forefront, prompting us all to be more reflective educators. […]

Applying Dr. King’s Philosophy to Kirkwood Community College

Photo from the U.S. Library of Congress: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cph.3c22988/ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is seen by many a cultural icon of the United States and a hero to the Civil Rights Movement throughout the world.  Some may argue that these perceptions of Dr. King make him out to be greater than human, giving us permission […]

Students Care If You Care

“When students feel like their teacher cares about them, they are generally more inclined to participate in their learning and also to take responsibility for their learning. When this happens, the learning experience is more robust than a traditional one-size fits all approach,” says Sarah Rissler, ELA instructor, who is this month’s featured Professional Development […]

Kirkwood’s First Global Service Award Reception

On a rainy afternoon of Friday, September 5th, the International Programs department hosted the first ever Global Service Award Reception.  In attendance at Linn Hall were most of the global service awardees, the International Programs staff, a few Study Abroad Faculty Leaders,  President Mick Starcevich, and other supporters of the awards, including KCELT.   The […]

Revisiting Differentiated Instruction

Richard Johnson, English faculty at Kirkwood’s Iowa City Campus, was “knocked back in his chair” by a reading from last semester’s Culturally Responsive Classroom regarding differentiated instructional strategies.

Diversity Conferences in Eastern Iowa

Within the time span of a month, the Eastern Iowa region has had several conferences dedicated to diversity in higher education institutions, acknowledging the continuously changing demographics of our community.  In fact, recently the Pew Research Center, published an engaging website about the Next America.  I recommend that you take a quick glance at this […]

The Culturally Responsive Classroom Pilot Project: A Reflection, part 2

This is the second of a two-part series based on my reflection of the Culturally Responsive Classroom pilot project, which ended in mid-November 2013.  I helped develop and co-facilitate this pilot project, which you can view at http://kceltculture.blogspot.com.   The difference between the first and second parts of this blog series is that this one includes […]

Building Leadership Capacity for Latino STEM Students

This post is an adaptation of slides from a keynote presentation for the 27th Annual Conference of the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities given by Dr. Jimmy Reyes, Dean of Nursing, and Juanita Limas, Assistant Professor in the Math/Science Department. Session Objectives Demographics of US changing Latinos and STEM fields How are we addressing […]

The Culturally Responsive Classroom Pilot Project: A Reflection, part 1

This is the first of a two-part series based on my reflection of the Culturally Responsive Classroom pilot project, which ended last week Thursday.  I helped develop and co-facilitate this pilot project, which you can view at http://kceltculture.blogspot.com.   The difference between the first and second parts of this blog series is that this one only […]

Nzelu: Sociocultural Perspectives on Learning & Intelligence

This is something I wrote on another blog several months ago before the Fall 2013 semester began.  I wanted to share it with you now in retrospect with the Culturally Responsive Classroom pilot project halfway completed.  I also wanted to add a little more on what I have learned since the original posting. In the […]