Session 1: Laying the Groundwork | DEI in the Classroom

Why This Work Matters

Why Inclusive Classrooms Matter

Teachers are rightly focused on higher-order thinking, the analyzing, evaluating, and creating described in Bloom's Taxonomy. But that thinking only becomes reachable once a student's more basic needs, safety, belonging, respect, are already met. That single idea is the whole case for this session: an inclusive classroom isn't separate from academic rigor, it's what makes rigor possible for every student in the room, not just some of them.

Every classroom already holds real diversity, in background, language, ability, and experience, whether or not it's ever named out loud. An inclusive classroom is one where that diversity doesn't quietly decide who gets to fully show up and participate, and who doesn't. That's the groundwork this session lays: understanding what shapes how we each see our students, so that every one of them has an equal shot at the thinking we're asking of them.

Tap each level of Maslow's hierarchy below to see what it looks like when a need goes unmet in a classroom, often for reasons tied directly to diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Food, sleep, and basic health. A hungry or exhausted student cannot focus, no matter how well-designed the lesson is.

In the classroom: a student who hasn't eaten breakfast struggles to concentrate by mid-morning, regardless of ability.

Physical and emotional safety, and a predictable environment.

In the classroom: a student who has experienced bullying or discrimination stays on guard, and simply can't engage with new material from that state.

Connection, acceptance, and a genuine sense of being part of the group.

In the classroom: a capable student who feels excluded because of their identity, language, or ability quietly disengages, even if the content is well within reach.

Feeling competent, respected, and recognized for who you are.

In the classroom: a student who is repeatedly stereotyped or underestimated internalizes low expectations, and eventually stops trying.

Reaching toward full potential: creativity, deep thinking, and growth.

In the classroom: this is the only level where Bloom's higher-order thinking actually becomes possible, and it's only reachable once the four levels beneath it are secure.

Understanding Our Paradigms

Paradigms Are Like Glasses

A paradigm is simply the way we see the world. Our paradigms are shaped by our age, gender, culture, and experience. We can get very comfortable in the way we see things, but it's worth remembering there are always multiple perspectives. Our ability to step back and understand someone else's view is crucial to our growth as educators, and can be game-changing for our students.

"Paradigms are like glasses. When you have incomplete paradigms about yourself or life in general, it's like wearing glasses with the wrong prescription. That lens affects how you see everything else."

Sean Covey

Where the Lens Comes From

What Shapes a Paradigm

"Age, gender, culture, experience" is the short version. Here's the fuller picture, and what each one tends to look like once it's shaping a classroom. Tap through all five.

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Upbringing

The values, expectations, and sense of "normal" you absorbed growing up, often without anyone ever stating them directly.

In the Classroom

This shapes what you read as respectful, confident, or defiant, even when a student is simply behaving the way their own home taught them to.

A Powerful Idea

The Danger of a Single Story

This idea comes from the writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, from her widely watched 2009 TED talk of the same name. Her argument: when we only ever encounter one narrative about a group of people, through media, rumor, or a handful of limited interactions, that single story starts to feel like the whole truth. It isn't that a single story is false. It's that it's incomplete, and incomplete stories flatten real, complicated people into a stereotype.

"The consequence of the single story is this: it robs people of dignity."

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

In a classroom, a student who is only ever seen through one story, "the quiet one," "the troublemaker," "the smart one," stops being seen as a full person by the adults around them. The scenarios above are what that looks like in practice: a single story about "those people," about what a family looks like, about what a complaint is really worth. Multiple stories, gathered through actual relationship over time, are what get you closer to who someone actually is.

Interactive Activity

When We Don't See the Whole Person

There's always more beneath the surface of a person than we can see at a glance. That's not a flaw, it's just how people work, but it means our paradigms can create real blind spots. Below are four ordinary moments. Read each one, then tap to see what wasn't visible in the room, and how it landed.

Reflect

Your Own Paradigm

What factors, age, gender, culture, experience, have most shaped the paradigm you bring into your classroom?

Think of a student or colleague whose perspective is genuinely different from yours. What might they see that you don't?

Where in your teaching might you be assuming your own paradigm is the default, or the "normal" one?

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