Belonging Intersections: Monday

As an instructional coach, I get to see a ton of instructional design decision-making every day! The variety in my context means fresh opportunities every day to see ways for education to create belonging for all learners! The specifics of the consulting and coaching requests are always different, but belonging always seems the answer!

This week’s belonging opportunities? Social studies coaching, middle school science coaching, assessment literacy professional development, coteaching coaching, and trauma-informed PD.

One week, day-by-day:

Monday: Coaching social studies instruction-6th grade (ancient and modern)Eastern Hemisphere.

The inquiry methods we’re leaning into are about inviting student voice and the variety of perspectives that come from different lived experiences.

The region at hand? Modern Middle East and Africa — admittedly a unit the team has glossed over in the past. As a geography-focused course, it is actually foundational to the history that learners will encounter in 7th grade and high school world history in our state, not to mention current events for the next decade?

More than oil, religion, and pyramids: This is a chance to disrupt the single narratives told about such complex regions.

A chance to utilize geography to invite multiple narratives about complex regions that are at the heart of the Crusades, Trans-Saharan slave trade, the creation of Israel. I model a “notice and wonder” for the region with a mainly blank map. We share, we wonder together.

Notice that water that is on the perimeter of the Middle East region — does it pull the region apart unlike the Mediterranean that pulls three continents together?

Belonging creeps in. Student voices. Multiple narratives. Listening. Questions over answers.

Then a key coaching question:

What are some stereotypes of these regions that we need to anticipate and disrupt?

Yes, sixth graders will see the Tigris and Euphrates, familiar because of their study of Mesopotamia, but they can see modern Middle East through a lens of water too. This goes beyond river civilizations and agriculture. This goes beyond oil and religion.

This is about complex narratives and motivations. This invites authentic belonging.

Belonging opportunities are everywhere! It is our job to seek them and design them for instruction!

Check-in for Tuesday: Middle School science coaching and belonging!