Testimoniando the Graduate Student Perspective Consejos y enseñanzas for implementing Culturally Responsive Teaching Practices in Spanish as a Heritage Language (SHL) Classrooms

Abstract

At the University of New Mexico (UNM), about 19.2% of undergraduate courses are taught by graduate teaching assistants (UGW 2021). Within UNM’s Department of Spanish and Portuguese, the majority of enrolled Spanish graduate students are instructors of Spanish as a Heritage Language (SHL) undergraduate courses—a language retrieval course designed for students with cultural connections to the Spanish language. Oftentimes these graduate students may step into these roles with minimal teaching experience, and specifically, a lack of training in Culturally Responsive Teaching (CRT) methodologies. While there is extant literature on the CRT within classrooms, little research reflects on the unique experiences of graduate students who teach (Haynie & Spong, 2022). As instructors in introductory courses that can significantly influence undergraduate students’ lives and academic trajectories, learning to incorporate culturally responsive practices within their teaching is critical.

We reflect on our time as UNM graduate students as we entered the roles of SHL instructors and the lack of pedagogical and methodological preparation that would have better equipped us for teaching in SHL classrooms. This work centers our own testimonios, having gone through the process of self-learning, as a means of grounding our enseñanzas, or teaching moments, and consejos, or pieces of advice, so that we may provide a) a point of reference for graduate students in need of clarity surrounding how to incorporate CRT in their classrooms, and b) a call to action towards the incorporation of CRT methods in the initial and continuous training and development of SHL instructors.