v Innovative Approaches to Access and Equity for All Learners

Soja (2010) argues we should start with the “view that the spatiality of (in)justice affects society and social life just as much as social processes shape the spatiality or specific Teaching (for) Spatial geography of (in)justice” (p. 5). Generally, we believe (critical) educators are well served by focusing much more Justice is Teaching deeply on critical and place-based pedagogies that center the life experiences of students and their communities in order to work toward purposeful and relevant learning (for) Social Justice opportunities aimed at social/spatial change (Guillen & By: Kaitlin Popielarz and Timothy Zeichner, 2018; Popielarz, 2018; Schlemper, Stewart, Shetty, & Czajkowski, 2018). Such a practice challenges Monreal traditional methods because the knowledge and cultural heritage of students become the driving force of what is Toward a Spatial Justice Pedagogy taught and learned in the classroom (González, Moll, & As teacher educators, our teaching and learning practice Amanti, 2005). Thus, critical and place-based pedagogies aims to center critical and place-based pedagogies. By emphasize a more equitable and humanizing education rooting our methods, foundational courses, and field that also emboldens educators to link their experiences around the strengths, needs, teaching and learning practices to the and context of local place, we provide strengths and knowledges of local teacher candidates a model, and an communities (Katsarou, Picower, & opportunity to learn with and from Stovall, 2013). the community in which they will “Thus, critical and place-based teach. In this article, we (Kaitlin pedagogies emphasize a more In this short article, we provide and Tim) share learning equitable and humanizing examples as to how future and experiences that we used with education that also emboldens current teachers can develop an undergraduate students to educators to link their teaching understanding of critical and better connect issues of equity, place-based pedagogies to aid place, and social justice to and learning practices to the student success and build a classroom teaching and learning. strengths and knowledges of sustaining practice within their It is our hope that the lessons will local communities.” own classrooms. In this way, provide an impetus for classroom engagement in place extends to a teachers to integrate issues of spatial multitude of future spaces they will justice (Soja, 2010) into student-led (re)create and (re)encounter (Del Vecchio, projects or activism to deepen their Toomey, & Tuck, 2017; Tuck, McKenzie, & connections to the potentialities of their local McCoy, 2014). Significantly, this chapter fills a gap in communities (Stovall, Calderon, Carrera, & King, 2009). linking a practical understanding of place/space with developing, implementing, and revising critical and place- We root our thinking under the broad conception of based pedagogies for current and future teachers spatial justice (Soja, 2010) acknowledging that notions of (Helfenbein & Taylor, 2009). Acknowledging that our work space and spatial justice vary dramatically from physical for socially just and equitable teacher education is always place, to learning from the land (Simpson, 2014), to more becoming, we share collaborative dialogue about the post-structuralist understandings of relational space lessons we are actively learning from in order to model (Murdoch, 2006; Rodriguez, 2017). For this particular such a practice in higher education for teacher candidates. article we tend to leave more theoretical framings aside to focus on the material inequalities and unequal (power) While our work is situated within Detroit, Michigan and relations of physical place. In advocating for spatial justice, Columbia, South Carolina, it is our intention to engage the

Curriculum in Context ▪ Fall/Winter 2019 Page 7 v Innovative Approaches to Access and Equity for All Learners reader in generative thought about the possibilities and films like Detroit 48202: Conversations Along a Postal limitations of critical and place-based pedagogies for Route – acted as paired texts to the place-conscious social justice and equity within all of their own schools and learning experiences of teacher candidates. In addition, communities (Soja, 2010). Our hope is that this article teacher candidates engaged in adult ally workshops pushes teachers towards developing critical and place- facilitated by Detroit-based grassroots youth based pedagogies for their own teaching and learning organizations in order to connect the identities of practices (Agarwal-Rangnath, Dover, & Henning, 2016). students and local communities to the classroom Our objective is “to simulate new ways of thinking about curriculum. and acting to change the unjust geographies in which we Following this community-engaged learning experience, all live” (Soja, 2010, p. 5). teacher candidates utilized their community asset map to In turn, we may join with our students and communities inspire the curation of a lesson and/or unit plan project in collectively (re)creating more sustaining and grounded in critical and place-based pedagogies. Through humanizing school and community spaces (Ares, 2011; this experience, teacher candidates connected the Valenzuela, Zamora, & Rubio, 2015). For through critical Michigan K-8 State Standards and the NCSS C3 Framework and place-based practices, educational opportunities can to the community of their students for relevant and be a powerful agent to help remake our immediate justice-oriented learning opportunities. Teacher environments and locales (Taylor, 2018). candidates were prompted to break free from the confinement of traditional social studies curricular and Learning Experiences pedagogical practices allowing for students to engage in Kaitlin’s Example their role as active community members and citizens Within a PreK-8 social studies methods course, teacher (Ladson-Billings, 2003). For example, after learning more candidates participated in a community engaged learning about the necessity of climate justice to address the experience by taking the opportunity to learn about a growing concerns of rising water levels in Detroit, one specific person, event, neighborhood, community site, teacher candidate developed a unit plan for second grade and/or social issue within Detroit (Haddix, 2015). The students to (1) determine how human activity is causing assignment to curate a community asset map prompted the water levels of the Detroit River to rise, (2) analyze teacher candidates to focus upon the community cultural how rising water levels impact humans and the Detroit wealth of a particular aspect of Detroit, which correlated ecosystem, and (3) develop and present possible solutions to teacher candidates (re)learning of the social studies for to mitigate rising water levels in Detroit. This assignment elementary classrooms (Yosso, 2005). Following their was inspiring for this particular teacher candidate as she community engaged learning experience, teacher recently marched during the 2019 global Climate Strike in candidates shared their community asset mapping with Detroit, which was led by one of the youth-led grassroots their peers in order to engage in generative and reflexive youth organizations that visited our social studies dialogue pertaining to their developing cultural and social methods course. At the end of the semester, teacher awareness. In turn, each teacher candidate was invited to candidates expressed an increased capacity, knowledge, learn how specific people (Motown), event (Detroit 1967 and self-efficacy in developing critical and place-based Rebellion), neighborhood (The Heidelberg Project), practices within their current and future classrooms. community site (The Detroit Institute of Arts), or social Tim’s Example issue (climate justice and the Great Lakes waterways) in Within an undergraduate foundations of education class, Detroit could be connected to social studies for current Schools and Society, students participated in an and future students in order to make meaningful assignment to investigate how particular places are connections in the elementary classroom. Multi-modal (re)made. The assignment called on students to visit, and resources – practitioner articles from Rethinking Schools, then critically analyze, a (hyper)local place, specifically podcasts such as NPR’s Code Switch, and documentary one with a powerful, although often hidden, history of

Curriculum in Context ▪ Fall/Winter 2019 Page 8 v Innovative Approaches to Access and Equity for All Learners uplift, struggle, and/or continual in/justice. The goal being » Barr Street High School, Lancaster, SC: This high to interrogate what stories are told about places, by school is an example of a segregated school for whom, and why? Perhaps more theoretically why is this Black children that continues to serve as a place the space it is at this particular moment in time? community center. Not only did the student walk Further, how might we as educators include such the (former) school, but she talked with her intentional engagements about the “historical grandmother who attended the school. Through sedimentation of spatial injustice” (Taylor, 2018, p. 189) this conversation and visit the student remarked, within the curriculum? Taylor (2018) offers the example “although Barr Street was a segregated school, it of her high school which even as a former school for freed had quality education, sports, and staff. The people slaves had Confederate flags painted on cafeteria walls who worked with Barr Street cared for their and the “Lil’ Colonel” as its mascot. Taylor (2018) then students, and I think that’s why it was successful.” challenges educators to disrupt pernicious place-remaking The student reflected on how place can serve as a that “depends on an intentional and false separation way to (re)connect us with those around us and between educating young people in the present and suggested places such as Barr Street can be used histories of race, politics, and power” (p. 188). in/as the curriculum as an impetus for children to learn with/from their elders in the community. To develop a critical eye towards place(re-making), and the long reach of spatial injustice, students read, and the Growth, Possibility, and Implications for class discussed, a number of accessible articles and media pieces before starting the assignment. Some of these Classroom Teaching/Learning included two podcasts about community and school We contend that critical and place-based practices within segregation (Gross 2017; Hannah-Jones, 2015) and Ta- PreK-12 and higher education classrooms have the Nehisi Coates’ (2014) longform essay, The Case for potential to facilitate transformative social change in our Reparations, which highlights the lasting consequences of local communities. By engaging with our students in red-lining. Further, the class tied such readings to South learning opportunities rooted in the context of place, we Carolina’s abhorrent funding, and maintenance of public are inspired to push forward new ideas for humanizing schools, the so-called “Corridor of Shame” (Ferillo, 2005; teaching and learning. This has required us (Kaitlin and Wellington, 2004) that serve rural students of color. In Tim) to engage in active (re)learning alongside our final preparation for the assignment, Taylor’s (2018) students about the struggle for social and spatial justice in reflection of place-remaking served as a general the communities we teach. This is not easy. It is work that framework for students to follow. In an effort to share we approach with humility and openness, acknowledging (critical) knowledge about the places around us, students that we are often guests in new places. However, both created a brief five slide presentation to share with peers pedagogically and reflexively, this purposeful, slow, and in small groups. Beside visual representations of their visit, time-consuming work encourages us to ground our students discussed the place in relation to the critical teaching and learning in relationships to our shared material we covered in class, and the potential to bring communities (Ulmer, 2017). In turn, we often find this place into school curriculum. Two examples of ourselves challenged to move beyond traditional student selections include: education reforms as we collaborate with community members and grassroots organizations, rather than » The Carver Theatre, Columbia, SC: Built in 1941, it disconnected bureaucrats, for transformative social was one of Columbia's exclusive African-American change (Love, 2019). Although not immediate, we join our theatres during segregation. The student students as we weave spatial justice into our critical and mentioned that although she passes the building place-based pedagogical and curricular practices for every day, she had never taken the time to read the limitless possibilities understanding that we have much to historical marker, look inside, or engage with the learn and many different people/places to learn from. lasting legacies of segregation around her.

Curriculum in Context ▪ Fall/Winter 2019 Page 9 v Innovative Approaches to Access and Equity for All Learners

References studies (G. Ladson-Billings, Ed.). Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing. Agarwal-Rangnath, R., Dover, A. G., & Henning, N. (2016). Preparing to teach Social Studies for social justice: Love, B. (2019). We want to do more than survive: Becoming a renegade. New York, NY: Teachers College Abolitionst teaching and the pursuit of educational Press. freedom. Boston, MA: Beacon Press. Ares, N. (2011). Multidimensionality of cultural practices: Murdoch, J. (2006). Post-structuralist geography: A guide Implications for culturally relevant science education. to relational space (1 edition). London; Thousand Oaks, Cultural Studies of Science Education, 6(2), 381–388. CA: SAGE Publications Ltd. Coates, T.-N. (2014, June). The case for reparations. The Popielarz, K. (2018). The community as a teacher Atlantic. educator: Preparing critical conscious social studies teacher candidates in Detroit. Presented at the College Del Vecchio, D., Toomey, N., & Tuck, E. (2017). Placing and University Faculty Assembly 2018 Annual photovoice: Participatory action research with Conference, Chicago, IL. undocumented migrant youth in the Hudson Valley. Critical Questions in Education, 8(4), 358–376. Rodriguez, S. (2017). They called us the revolutionaries. In N. Ares, E. Buendía, & R. Helfenbein (Eds.), Ferillo, B (2005). Corridor of shame. Ferillo & Associates. Deterritorializing/Reterritorializing: Critical Geography González, N., Moll, L. C., & Amanti, C. (2005). Funds of of Educational Reform (pp. 79–97). knowledge: Theorizing practices in households, Schlemper, M. B., Stewart, V. C., Shetty, S., & Czajkowski, communities, and classrooms. New York, NY: Routledge. K. (2018). Including students’ geographies in geography Gross, T. (2017). A “forgotten history” Of how the U.S. education: Spatial narratives, citizen mapping, and Government segregated America. Retrieved on January social justice. Theory & Research in Social Education, 17, 2019. 46(4), 603–641. Guillen, L., & Zeichner, K. (2018). A university-community Simpson, L. B. (2014). Land as pedagogy: Nishnaabeg partnership in teacher education from the perspectives intelligence and rebellious transformation. of community-based teacher educators. Journal of Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, 3(3), Teacher Education, 69(2), 140–153. 1–25. Haddix, M. (2015). Preparing community engaged Soja, E. W. (2010). Seeking Spatial Justice. Minneapolis, teachers. Theory Into Practice, (1), 63–70. MN: Univesity of Minnesota Press. Hannah-Jones, N. (2015). The problem we all live with. Stovall, D., Calderon, A., Carrera, L., & King, S. (2009). Youth, Media, and Justice: Lessons from the Chicago Helfenbein, R. J., & Taylor, L. H. (2009). Critical Doc Your Bloc Project. Radical Teacher, 86(Winter), 50– Geographies in/of education: Introduction. Educational 58. Studies, 45(3), 236–239. Taylor, K. (2018). The role of public education in place Katsarou, E., Picower, B., & Stovall, D. (2013). Creating remaking: From a retrospective walk through my intentional partnerships in urban spaces: Schools, hometown to a call to action.pdf. Cognition and communities, and teacher preparation programs. In J. Instruction, 36(3), 188–198. Noel (Ed.), Moving teacher education into urban schools and communities: Prioritizing community strengths. Tuck, E., McKenzie, M., & McCoy, K. (2014). Land New York, NY: Routledge. education: Indigenous, post-colonial, and decolonizing perspectives on place and environmental education Ladson-Billings, G. (2003). Lies my teacher still tells: Developing a critical race perspective toward the social

Curriculum in Context ▪ Fall/Winter 2019 Page 10 v Innovative Approaches to Access and Equity for All Learners

research. Environmental Education Research, 20(1), 1– 23. Ulmer, J. (2017). Food, water, shelter, justice, love: Methodological axes for critical qualitative inquiry. International Review of Qualitative Research, 10(4), 378–394. Valenzuela, A., Zamora, E., & Rubio, B. (2015). Academia Cuauhtli and the eagle: “Danza Mexica” and the epistemology of the circle. Voices in Urban Education, 41, 46–56. Wellington, D. L. (2004). Summerton, South Carolina, and Become a Washington ASCD Member! Briggs v. Elliott. Dissent, (Summer), 45–51. Washington State ASCD is the only educational organization in Washington State that reaches Yosso, T. (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race practitioners at all levels of education and your theory discussion of community cultural wealth. Race, involvement is one of the keys to our success. As a Ethnicity and Education, 8(1), 69–91. member of WSASCD, you can take advantage of our Kaitlin Popielarz is a PhD Candidate and member benefits. teacher educator at Wayne State How will you benefit from joining WSASCD? University's College of Education. Kaitlin's research and teaching interests include » Professional development offerings at member rates connecting teacher education programs to the local grassroots community in order to provide future » Receive an award-winning eJournal, Curriculum educators the opportunity to learn community-based and in Context, twice a year culturally sustaining pedagogies for transformative social » Receive quarterly Newsletters and Newsflashes change. She is an advocate, action researcher, and via email to inform you about the latest WSASCD community organizer for education justice in Detroit. events and updates on educational issues in Washington. Timothy Monreal is a Ph.D. candidate in Foundations of Education at the University » Attend regional workshops covering topics of South Carolina. Tim has been a middle relevant to the needs of local educators school teacher for the past 11 years, mostly » Opportunities to earn clock hours when you in California and more recently in South attend WSASCD conference/workshops Carolina. His research interests include the New » Opportunities for leadership, networking, and to Latinx/Nuevo South, Latinx teachers in the Southeast, attend events that will promote professional social studies teaching, and teacher subjectivity. In growth and development of members addition to a number of book chapters, Tim’s work has » Membership in a community committed to appeared in journals such as Educational Policy, Latino promoting promising practices to ensure ALL Studies, Current Issues in Comparative Education, Journal students are safe, healthy, engaged, supported of Latinos and Education, and Middle Grades Review. Tim and challenged is a 2019 Spencer Dissertation Fellow and a 2019 Southern Regional Education Board Dissertation Awardee. Join online or call (360) 357-9535

Curriculum in Context ▪ Fall/Winter 2019 Page 11