Building Equity: Plan, Act, Persist

Outline

Content: Building community and enhancing student belonging through equity-driven driven strategies.
Real-time feedback to support the transfer of ideas from the session into their own practice.

Engagement:
* Small group problem solving using real-world classroom scenarios to collaboratively develop solutions.

* Sharing of strategies and solutions to improve thinking

* Role play

Time:
* Information delivery: 10 minutes
* Collaborative Problem-Solving Groups/Feedback: 30 minutes
* Role Plan, Sharing and presenting: 20 minutes
* Conversations discussing how the role play transfers to current situations: 15 minutes
* Wrap up, sharing insights and thoughts about moving forward: 15 minutes

Process:
*Introduction of materials, objectives and overview of strategies by presenters.

From this point on, the presenters move through the room giving ideas and feedback.

*Move to groups (4-8 depending on the size of the audience)
**Shared reading excerpts/strategies from "The Teaching Strategies Handbook" and other selected sources.
**Small Group selects roles and reviews their scenarios
**Small Group discusses the best strategies to use to resolve the issue presented in the scenario
**Small Group role plays the strategy and discuss the effectiveness. If it was ineffective, they try a different strategy.
**Participants move around the room sharing their problems and solutions garnering input.
**Participants return to their seats to work in pairs or triads to discuss how what they have learned will transfer to their own situations and develop a plan for return.
* Presenters bring the group together to wrap up and have participants share "brilliant ideas" they will use.

Outcomes

After this session, participants will be able to access a rubust toolkit for for creating a classroom where all students feel seen, empowered, and successful.

Participants will transfer the ideas and skills developed during the session to their own situation.

Supporting research

American Psychological Association (APA). (2025). Inclusive language guidelines. Retrieved from https://www.apa.org/about/apa/equity-diversity-inclusion/language-guidelines

Bailey, R. A. (2021). Conscious discipline: Building resilient classrooms (Expanded & Updated ed.). Loving Guidance.

Brown, B. (2017). Braving the wilderness: The quest for true belonging and the courage to stand alone. Random House.

Butler, J. (2022). Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity (3rd ed.). Routledge.

Feldman, J. (2023). Grading for equity: What it is, why it matters, and how it can transform schools and classrooms (2nd ed.). Corwin.

Gay, G. (2022). Culturally responsive teaching: Theory, research, and practice (4th ed.). Teachers College Press.

Hammond, Z. (2015). Culturally responsive teaching and the brain: Promoting authentic engagement and rigor among culturally and linguistically diverse students. Corwin.

Jensen, E. (2019). Engaging students with poverty in mind: Practical strategies for raising achievement. ASCD.

McLeskey, J., Barringer, M.-D., Billingsley, B., Brownell, M. T., Jackson, D., Kennedy, M., … & Ziegler, D. (2017). High-leverage practices in special education. Council for Exceptional Children & CEEDAR Center.

Nieto, S. (2022). Affirming diversity: The sociopolitical context of multicultural education (7th ed.). Pearson.
Resnick, M. (2018). Lifelong kindergarten: Cultivating creativity through projects, passion, peers, and play. MIT Press.

Ryan, C. L., & Hermann-Wilmarth, J. M. (2022). Reading the rainbow: LGBTQ-inclusive literacy instruction in the elementary classroom. Teachers College Press.

Saphier, J., Haley Speca, M., & Gower, R. R. (2018). The skillful teacher: Building your teaching skills (7th ed.). Research for Better Teaching.