Asset-based Approaches: Teaching for and about justice, equity, and inclusion in K12 geography classrooms

Keywords: geography education, K12, secondary, equity, justice, inclusion, asset-based pedagogy
Abstract Type: Paper Abstract

Abstract

Geography in schools, influenced by the western tradition in many parts of the world, inspired a geographical education that worked to maintain status-quo power relations, and center Eurocentric views. Despite the evolution of geography as a discipline and as a school subject, there continue to be documented challenges associated with its teaching across social difference and contexts, which is particularly problematic for minoritized students. Utilizing asset-based approaches that embrace students’ identities and communities in the design and enactment of geography lessons requires agentive, curriculum-makers. This paper examines ways in which asset-based pedagogies (i.e. culturally responsive, culturally sustaining/revitalizing, community responsive) and teaching for/about justice are understood in the literature. It also attempts to document the reasons why there is so little written about teaching socially-just geography. For instance, K12 geography education has been slow to recognize and critique the normalization of western explanations of the world and to take up issues of race/ism in the curriculum. Despite these challenges, exemplar practices derived from the international literature suggest ways forward for building on students’ assets, incorporating students' identities, and centering the communities from which young people derive. Identified themes include examples from geography education that focus on access to particular kinds of knowledge and that relate to building students' consciousness and encouraging social action. Working with students' personal and community assets and linking these to geographic ways of thinking may assist geography in maintaining curricular space in K12 schools and could also reinvigorate the field of geography education research.