On June 18, Dr. Gholdy Muhammad, Georgia State University associate professor of language, literacy and culture, joined the Literacy Lenses #G2Great Twitter chat to talk about critical topics from her book, Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy.
During the chat, participants discussed how to foster anti-racism practices in schools, and Dr. Muhammad’s Historically Responsive Literacy Framework to ensure equity in education and cultivate the genius of Black and Brown students by addressing the following learning pursuits: Identity, Skills, Intellect and Criticality.
The equity framework for teaching and learning presented in Cultivating Genius draws from Dr. Muhammad’s research on the learning pursuits of 19th-century Black literary societies, which promoted literacy as a conduit for lifelong learning, while countering racism and oppression.
You can view the full #G2Great Twitter chat hosted by Dr. Mary Howard, Fran McVeigh, Jenn Hayhurst, Valinda Kimmel, and Brent Gilson, here.
To learn more about Cultivating Genius, click here.
To follow news about Dr. Gholdy Muhammad and her book, follow @GholdyM and #CultivatingGenius on Twitter.
Here are some of the powerful moments from the discussion:
Welcome to #G2great friends! We're honored that Gholdy Muhammad is helping us engage in essential dialogue as we contemplate Cultivating Genius.
— Dr. Mary Howard (@DrMaryHoward) June 19, 2020
Please tell us who you are, where you’re from & what you do...@GholdyM@Scholastic@franmcveigh@hayhurst3 @vrkimmel @mrbgilson pic.twitter.com/CPLevgrXVL
Q1 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/k4sXBsnFEH
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great Black historical excellence is necessary because what we have been doing for decades has not fully served all children, especially Black children. We have been failing children. We have been failing teachers. We have been teaching within school walls of whiteness. https://t.co/mg7gn19YZF
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great When we teach within the walls and standards of whiteness, we ignore the ways in which Black and Brown children learn—We ignore the instructional pursuits that Black and Brown children need. They need instructional pursuits of ant-racism, joy, Black beauty and love. https://t.co/mg7gn19YZF
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great Why should we use Blackness as THE model for getting it right with all kids? I say, why not? Blackness is beautiful. Blackness is excellent. No one has had our history of joy, oppression and thriving. We are a loving people with genius minds and beautiful hearts.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great Black historical excellence gives us all a model for teaching and learning that will benefit us all. Not just some or a few.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great More importantly, people need to ask, “Why SHOULDN’T Blackness and Black education be a model for all today?” Models derived from Black history are not JUST for Black kids. Why would we keep all that is excellent for ourselves. We are not a selfish people.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great @BLoveSoulPower reminds us that people are so energetic about learning about everyone’s body’s culture but Black culture. Blackness is so diverse and varied, and given the historical/current social times, we need to learn Blackness.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great we need to learn the culture of Blackness because the nation is struggling to get it right with Black kids the most. Let’s start there.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A1 #G2Great What gets in the way of this work is racism and people who don’t wish to disrupt whiteness and Eurocentricity or those who don’t see or center people other than themselves. This selfishness will never move education forward.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q2 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/mE88WJtJkQ
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A2 #G2Great We begin to cultivate the genius within our students by FIRST cultivating the genius within ourselves. The world will tell us that genius is reserved for a selected few. This is not true. We are genius. Be.the.genius.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A2 #G2Great We need to read, listen and trust leading thinkers. In #CultivatingGenius, I write about trusting Black people who have lived it and told us what to do to improve education. Leaders like @gjladson or Mary Mcleod Bethune. They give us the way forward.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A2 #G2Great We design and develop pedagogy using the historically responsive model. This includes 4 learning standards of identity (knowing self and others), skills (of each content), intellectualism (knowledge into action) and criticality (anti-oppression). This is a way forward
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q3 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/pF5kJI5VKb
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A3 #G2Great Everytime we put text in front of a child, ask (like @AlfredTatum taught me): Out of all the text in the world, why are you putting this text in front of children? We have to engage students with powerful, meaningful and consciousness-building texts.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A3 #G2Great Students should also be reading, writing, speaking up, debating, and engaged in anti-oppressive thinking in each content area, not just ELA or social studies. Teach the power and purpose of one’s pens. And create spaces where students can write to resist oppression.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A3 #G2Great If you are not engaging students in literacy (reading, writing, speaking and thinking) and activism across all content areas, what are you doing? We live in social times that warrant pedagogical urgency and social change.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A3 #G2Great If you aren’t connecting your content to social change/activism, this is highly problematic and you MUST do better. Improve your professional practice because you can’t be a dysconscious or apolitical teacher when our brothers and sisters are dying
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q4 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/9cxiUfPgje
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A4 #G2Great Again cultivating students’ identities begins with doing our own self work. Unpack yourself before teaching youth to know themselves. One has to first identify their own racism, bias, pain, assumptions and stereotypes related to the young people they teach.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Do the therapeutic work. If you can’t say Black lives matter, you can’t teach Black children. If you don’t love queer youth, you can’t teach them.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A4 #G2Great Every time teachers engage students in learning, they should ask themselves: How will my instruction help students to learn something about themselves or about others who are different (in any way) from them?
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Teachers should ask: How does this content/curriculum connect to my students’ identities? How do I ensure that I am not teaching about people of color from lenses of whiteness? https://t.co/PpandgyLv0
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A4 #G2Great We must unearth the stories and histories of people of color that have been made invisible or those that are simply absent from the curriculum chosen by the school district. We have to teach joy and beauty and not just stories seeped in resistance and pain.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q5 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/dEt6Mx6ujb
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A5 #G2Great We have centered skills in K-12 education and not cultural competence, identity or sociopolitical consciousness. It is highly problematic. We don’t live in a world where we only have to use our skills in math, science, ELA and SS.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
We ALSO need to know ourselves, others and have criticality to navigate the world.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A5 #G2Great We work toward the teaching of skills by finding engaging ways to connect the skills to real life and real life issues. Factory printed worksheets are trapped in smallness and are basic ways of teaching. We have to contextualize skills to be purposeful.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A5 #G2Great Students should never have to ask “Why are we learning this?” “What does this have to do with my future or my life?” As educators, we must be prepared to answer these questions. They are important questions.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q6 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/NeM5Weq6q4
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A6 #G2Great We read. We read the words and the world. We read and learn from diverse authors and thinkers. If we don’t cultivate our minds and deeply seek knowledge, what can we teach our children?
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A6 #G2Great And don’t just read to cultivate your intellect and not do anything positive with the knowledge. Intellectualism is knowledge into action and activism for the betterment of Black lives and so many others.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A6 #G2Great To work toward intellectualism, we must consider who the people are around us. Do your friends teach you and cultivate the genius within you? Do they challenge your thinking? Or (in the words of @RuizSealey) are they “status quo warriors?”
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A6 #G2Great To work toward intellectualism, we must consider who the people are around us. Are your friends anti-racists or do they remain silent?
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A6 #G2Great We need people around us to make us stronger thinkers, more knowledgeable. Period. All my friends are teachers so you know that I AM SMART! LOL
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A6 #G2Great How does one build, nurture and cultivate intellectualism in the classroom? You must be a scholar of your discipline. You need to walk outside and see the world in mathematics, in science, SS, music, physical education or ELA- whatever it is that you profess to teach
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q7 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/alAEJiP7mA
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A7 #G2Great The goal of criticality starts at home. Oftentimes folks demean “parent involvement” for Black and Brown parents but what about white parents or others who foster racist traditions and anti-blackness within their homes? What do we have to say to them?
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A7 #G2Great To cultivate criticality, we must work and strive toward being anti-racism teachers. Educators must stop with the thinking that just because their students are academically achieving with skills, that they are fine and don’t need anything else. That is not enough.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Some of our world's oppressors have been skillful and smart. So...why is this enough for our schools. Our youth deserve more.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A7 #G2Great Educators, parents and everyone need to ask themselves each day, how do I plan to disrupt racism and resist oppression? If you are not doing this work, what are you doing in education?
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A7 #G2Great When our students leave K-12 education, the goal is not for them to be neutral or silent beings when it comes to racism, sexism or other oppressions. Also the goal is certainly not for them to contribute to the oppression of themselves or others.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A7 #G2Great The goal of our K-12 education should be for students to leave our schools prepared to disrupt, unhinge and dismantle racism & other oppressions throughout our world. We want them to humanize- to feel, speak & act in response to the oppression of others & themselves.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Q8 @GholdyM @Scholastic #G2Great pic.twitter.com/1c68mvQNGu
— Jenn Hayhurst (@hayhurst3) June 19, 2020
A8 #G2Great In regards to state learning standards we have to first ask who wrote them? Who didn’t? What’s missing from them? I argue that explicit language around identity, anti-racism, intellectualism and criticality are missing. Why do we teach standards that are incomplete?
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A8 #G2Great We need transformation in four areas of our educational system: 1) state learning standards 2) curriculum we adopt or purchase 3) state tests and 4) teaching evaluations. I would love to see each of these grounded in identity, skills, intellect and criticality.
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
A8 #G2Great Collectively the 4 goals in the HILL Model (Histories, Identities, Literacies & Liberation) have the potential to transform teaching and learning in our schools--while humanizing our nation. It’s time for the system to keep up with what is needed and necessary. https://t.co/WZzInMk7GE
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Thank you #G2Great and @ScholasticEd! This was highly engaging. <3 https://t.co/qcUtfXMbyO
— Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) June 19, 2020
Literacy Lenses
