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Promises and Puzzles of Culturally-Sensitive Teaching

Publisher: Practicing Anthropology, 17 (3)
Page Numbers: 22-25

Teachers, parents, students, and other concerned citizens need to think carefully and collectively about the implications of bringing cultural knowledge into schools and about good ways to do that. The University of Arizona Funds of Knowledge for Teaching Project, which seeks to improve the experiences of non-mainstream, or "culturally different," students in schools, is one arena for such discussion and deliberation. While this project is a thoughtful and brave attempt to move into a new and more radical area of applied work, the author discusses the concern that relevant insights from previous anthropological work might be overlooked in the process.