Session 2: Reflecting on Our Equity Journey
50 minutes
discussion-based
Purpose
This session provides participants with an opportunity to reflect on the CS Principles professional learning equity sessions they engaged with throughout the year, as well as the progress they themselves have made in supporting equity in their CS Principles classrooms.
This session also supports participants in identifying next steps they want to commit to taking after the workshop as they continue to work towards the equity goal of bringing computer science to all students.
Objectives
- Participants will determine what an equitable and inclusive CS classroom looks and sounds like.
- Participants will reflect on and revise their equity commitments from their previous workshop.
- Participants will identify next steps they want to commit to taking after the workshop to create an inclusive classroom.
Supplies & Prep
Workshop Modality:
- Whole group
- Breakout rooms
Facilitator Supplies:
- Virtual Module 8 - CSP 21 - 22 - Slides
- Slide set-up:
- Decide if you want to do a stretch break during this session or not.
- There are enough breakout slides for 26 participants if you are putting groups in pairs. If you need more slides, add more in the slide deck. Currently, there are 13 slides for breakout rooms.
Participant Materials:
- None
Agenda
Looking Back (28 minutes)
Going Forward (22 minutes)
Facilitation Guide
Looking Back (28 minutes)
Producer support: Prepare to put participants in groups of 2 in breakout rooms for 6 minutes.
(12 minutes) Reflecting on Growth
Remarks
As a group, we’ve covered so much ground when it comes to developing as CS educators rooted in equity. Your contributions to discussions, brainstorming of solutions, and personal reflections have been valuable to us as a group, but also hopefully to yourself as well.
💷 Show the equity cycle to participants, highlighting that each step was important for developing as a CS teacher.
💷 Think-Pair
Prompts:
- What has been your favorite part about engaging with this journey, either during workshops or in your classroom with students?
- Which step(s) still brings up feelings of apprehension, anxiety, or doubt?
Think (3 minutes): Have participants reflect silently or journal about the prompts.
Producer support: Put participants in groups of 2 in breakout rooms for 6 minutes
Pair (6 minutes): Have participants share out with a partner in breakout rooms.
Remarks
Looking at ourselves, context, responsibility, barriers and opportunity, and commitments can be a complex process. We’re not looking for you to be a perfect equity champion tomorrow - just to be willing to reflect and grow.
Remember that you’re part of a larger community, whether that’s Black teachers in STEM, rural secondary teachers, or just this group. You can lean on and gain support from each other from here on out.
(9 minutes) Revisiting Our Commitments
Producer support: Prepare to put participants in groups of 2 in the same breakout rooms for 6 minutes.
Facilitator Tip
This activity requires that participants revisit the house slide that they created during AYW #3. Have the link to that slideshow handy to give to participants to root their reflection on their commitments. If a participant missed AYW #3, they can use this time to make a commitment on their own.
💷 Distribute the link to your cohort’s AYW #3 slide deck and have participants navigate back to their individual commitment slides. There is a place in the slide deck for you to update a link.
Remarks
Previously, we all worked on creating commitments relating to equity in CS education. We’re revisiting these commitments not to “grade” ourselves on our progress, but instead to check in and receive support.
💷 Think-Share
Prompts:
- What supports have you used to help you work toward your commitment?
- What measurements to track progress have you noted so far?
3 minutes: Think
Producer support: Put participants in groups of 2 in the same breakout rooms for 6 minutes
6 minutes: Group Share
(7 minutes) 💷 Evolving Our Commitments
Remarks
You may need to evolve your commitment to include new information or make it more realistic, and that’s okay. This allows our commitments to stay realistic and reflect our current realities.
Give participants five minutes to revise their commitment house slides either in the AYW #3 slides or by copying and pasting their slides into the AYW #4 slide deck. The choice is yours to make depending on your participants’ needs.
After five minutes, allow 2-3 participants to share how they revised their commitments.
Going Forward (22 minutes)
(10 minutes) 💷 Looking Forward to Next Year
Producer support: Prepare to put participants in groups of 4 in breakout rooms for 8 minutes
Remarks
💷 You will all be making a slide with other participants which answers the question of “What does your inclusive classroom look and sound like next year?” You can be as creative as you want with your slide but the slide should still be able to be “understood” without any additional narration because after about 8 minutes we are going to do a gallery walk to look at other slides.
Producer support: Put participants in groups of 4 in breakout rooms for 8 minutes
(5 minutes) Virtual Gallery Walk
Remarks
💷 Now we are going to take a gallery walk to look at other slides. As you look at other posters, identify aspects of creating an inclusive classroom that you really want to focus on next year. That is, what is one thing you want to see and hear next year in your CS classroom? When you are finished reviewing the other slides, write down that goal. This can be, but doesn’t have to be, aligned with the commitment you made and revised.
(7 minutes) Think-Share
Think-Share
Facilitator Tip
Your personal example is here to also demonstrate how your thinking about equity is also changing over time. It is a good way to model continuous learning and growth as well as vulnerability for your participants. For example, you might share “I used to think getting girls into my classroom was the easiest group to get into my room, and I now think that I need to think of which girls are getting into my classes - does the population of girls in my CS classroom represent the population of girls in my building?"
- 💷 Thinking back to what you have accomplished this year in our time together and in your classroom, how has your thinking around building an equitable CS classroom changed?
- Consider using the frame of “I used to think_, and now I think_.”
- For example, (facilitator to insert personal example here)...
2 minutes - Think
3 minutes - Group Share
Remarks
Thank you all for your engagement throughout this equity journey we have been on this year. Of course, you do not need to wait until next year to get started! You might find that you want to try some of the ideas you have out in your classroom and see what kind of impact it has on the classroom culture. You might even see ways you can build a more inclusive classroom like the one we imagined earlier today with the content in the last two units of the year. We are going to look at these next.