Editor’s note: The application window for the 2016 Teaching Tolerance Award for Excellence in Teaching will be open through December 15, 2015. To give educators more insight into the awardee experience, we’ll be featuring Q&As with four previous awardees on the TT blog throughout the application window. This spotlight on Darnell Fine is the second post in the series. Find the first post here.
Tell us about yourself, including what you teach.
I'm a seventh-grade English teacher. At times, my dreadlocked appearance doesn't jibe with what people expect an English teacher to look like. I sometimes "march by the beat of my own drum," as a student’s parent once put it. I'm often pushing my students to find connections between canonical texts like Romeo and Juliet and their favorite pop songs. I challenge them to read print texts and analyze the rhetoric of TV-show monologues and the political messages in cartoons. When I teach, I strive for students to have thoughtful dialogue and to foster a deeper awareness of themselves and their identities.
What about the Teaching Tolerance Award for Excellence in Teaching made you want to apply?
Since my first year in the classroom, I've used materials from Teaching Tolerance. It started off with a film kit about the civil rights movement to help me teach Georgia history. I later used TT materials about Loving v. Virginia to relate miscegenation laws to current-event topics about gay marriage. After accepting a position as a humanities teacher, I found myself using even more resources from TT's toolbox of anti-bias and critical literacy activities. As my classroom became a site where students were doing wonderful work in critical literacy, I wanted to share my students’ stories and insights with a wider audience. This led me to submit my application.
What types of relationships did you build with fellow awardees, Teaching Tolerance staff, etc.?
When I first met my fellow awardees, I remember thinking that Anna East Baldwin is an absolute genius, and the way she incorporates multicultural literature in her classroom humbled me. Laurence Tan's dedication to social justice and teaching students to be activists inspired me to make curricula more meaningful. Lhisa Almashy's passion for creating school policy on a national level challenged me to widen my scope to broader U.S. reforms. And the care that Robert Sautter shows his kindergartners pushed me to foster an environment that considers not just what students should know and be able to do, but also how they should feel in the classroom.
Additionally, the Teaching Tolerance staff provided me with the best professional development of my career. I'm grateful for the sessions on dismantling the school-to-prison pipeline, critical classroom practices, making my English curriculum culturally relevant with Perspectives and much more. Beyond my development as a teacher, I will always consider my fellow awardees and the TT staff family. They are some of the most thoughtful, kind and caring individuals I've ever met.
What has the award meant for your practice (and, perhaps, your life)?
This award has opened up a number of opportunities for me to travel across the United States and lead workshops in culturally responsive teaching and cultural competency. I've counseled dozens of educational organizations on how to design and implement anti-bias, culturally responsive programming. Moreover, this award has pushed me to reflect thoughtfully on my own teaching. Whenever TT broadcasts new learning theories or instructional strategies, I attempt to incorporate them into my practice.
What recommendations do you have for people who are considering applying for the award?
Your students and your teaching experiences are multi-dimensional, so bring them to life in your application. Describe the moments that make you proud and why they’re so meaningful. Keep students at the forefront by describing their personalities and giving them voice, and let them exhibit what is so powerful about your interactions with them. Make explicit the relationship between your practice and anti-bias education. Share your realizations and reflect on how your stories will be significant and inspirational to other critical educators.
And last but not least, what tips do you have for how teachers can stay fresh and inspired in their teaching?
- Engage your students. If you aren’t interested in what you are teaching, then why should your students be? If your state-mandated standards seem a bit dull, how can you create enduring understandings and essential questions that are culturally relevant to you and your students? Ask students what they are curious about, and think about how you can tap into their trans-disciplinary skillsets, interests and knowledge that extend beyond the classroom.
- Teach critical literacy skills no matter your discipline. Students should read, write, speak and listen EVERY DAY in your classroom. If you work with students, you teach literacy in some shape or form. Through literacy, make sure students are critically thinking and problem solving. Your calling as an educator is greater than simply asking students to memorize and recall facts. Ask your students to analyze the world around them, evaluate information, and propose and communicate alternative solutions.
- Encourage students to become advocates of their learning. Make space for students to reflect on their own thinking. Teach them how to self-assess and evaluate their work. Teach them how to teach themselves, so even when no one is watching, their learning continues. Tell your students to hold you accountable by continuously asking, “Why are we doing this?” “Who cares?” and “Why does this matter?”
Thinking about applying? Learn more here!
