Seeking Diversity in a Utah classroom

My first day of service learning was the week of Martin Luther King Jr's birthday. I told the classroom it was one of my favorite holidays as it also happens to be the day after my own birthday. Coincidentally, we were celebrating another student's birthday that day and she brought in donuts to share. Instead of singing the usual "Happy Birthday" song, I taught the classroom Stevie Wonder's rendition of "Happy Birthday," which I played off of my phone. I taught the class that there was actually resistance from certain Congressman to not celebrate the holiday, while Stevie Wonder became one the main figures in the campaign to have the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. become a national holiday. Throughout January and February we celebrated the importance of the civil rights movement with the story of Rosa Parks in Boycott Blues, as well as another book titled Child of the Civil Rights Movement, depicting the heroism of Ruby Bridges.

We encourage our students to seek out the diversity within themselves. During recess break I noticed one of our students drawing Mandarin Chinese characters on the electronic whiteboard. I studied Mandarin for two years in high school and wrote what I could remember. Through our conversation she told me she was adopted as a baby from China, and grew up speaking English as a first language. Her parents want her to learn Mandarin with respect to her heritage. Another student began writing in the Slavic alphabet next to us, and it was here I got to learn about his parents journey immigrating from Czech Republic. Linguistics is perhaps the smoothest approach through recognizing diversity, which is why I am learning Spanish for my language credit distribution. I look forward to building bridges and communities in my future teaching endeavors.