Discover Social and Cultural Identities of Learners

<aside> 💡 Through opportunities to contemplate, express, and share their social and cultural identities and cultural pluralism, learners will feel encouraged to share and celebrate the diversity of identities represented in the class and feel a connectedness with each other.

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Specific Techniques

• Ask learners to share values in the co-creation of class norms.
• Provide an opening survey, questionnaire, or introduction discussion board that asks learners about career and academic aspirations, their majors, other courses they are currently taking, or interests in music, TV shows, movies, or sports.
• Ask learners to complete a Cajita project sharing their culture, background, and traditions through thoughtfully selected artifacts of value to them.
• Create community discussion boards for learners to informally share and get to know one another.
• Include long-term group projects where learners can get to know their peers at a deeper level.
• Write instructions in a way that welcomes learners to share their experiences and culture.
• Model sharing through class announcements and communications and/or by posting personal examples in discussion posts or assignment instructions.
• Select ice breakers that promote sharing in a safe space and in small groups.
• Select activities that provide choice so that if desired, learners can find show evidence of learning in a way that aligns with and expresses their social and cultural identities.

Overview

Discover Social and Cultural Identities of Learners is a DEI practice that affirms learners’ selves and provides a basis for social-emotional learning in an online course. Discovering learners’ social and cultural identities, what they are learning in other courses, and incorporating what you learn from them into your instruction and assignments may help build cohesiveness and good relationships between different ethnic groups in the course.

All learners and instructors benefit when they share experiences, values, and cultures with one another. Humans have an innate need to build an identity and openly share their identity with others. Learners shape their identity by recognizing and establishing differences in their identities based on gender, ethnic backgrounds, sexual orientation, etc. (Chickering & Reisser, 1993).

Learners are helped by discovering their social and cultural identity through the course content and beyond. They learn by hearing from others’ perspectives, based on their unique social and cultural identities. Instructors are helped by learning about their students and leveraging that information to help all students thrive in a course.

How to Implement the Practice

Course Modality Considerations

Asynchronous

Synchronous

Hybrid

References and Resources

Citations

Resources

Contributors

Jennifer Culver, Ph.D., Jenny S. Wakefield, Ph.D., Bethany F. Schultz, Ed.D., Kimberly Vincent-Layton, Ed.D.