Building collaborative creations of power through pedagogy

Identity construction through language use is an ongoing, continuous, and dynamic process (Larsen-Freeman & Cameron, 2007). Furthermore, language is assumed to be central to human cognition and condition, identity construction and self-development (Edwards, 2009). Given these insights, it is assumed that speakers can also demonstrate their identity in the English language through their first or native language. Cummins, for instance, implores educators to reconsider their pedagogical practice as a form of cultural methodology, mobilizing knowledge of the English language through choice, affect, and presence. Teaching ELLs is more than transitioning a person to acquire a new language; it is about harnessing their potential to educate others on their cultural background, to celebrate diversity, and to increase the cognitive powers of the classroom through becoming a multi-lingual learning environment.

Undertaking this pedagogical orientation to its exhaustive extreme means being committed to challenging the Canadian colonial apparatus that contemporary curriculum practitioners have unconsciously inherited from exposure to teachers' colleges, professional learning communities, and institutional relationships of power and practice. According to Cummins, moving from a history of explicit practices of discrimination and colonization (e.g., punishment, isolation, and abuse all the while expanding territorial acquisition) - what he termed as "coercive exercises of power" - to the more subtle or "benign" choices on the exercise of power, such as ignoring opportunities to draw upon the cultural potential of the classroom to inform learning and teaching, all without exerting physical harm, is not a move from oppression entirely but one that has shifted into a different form. These contemporary choices nevertheless achieve a common historical purpose, which has been and continues to be to minimize and eliminate other ways of knowing and being in the world.

As an educator of students with various cultural backgrounds, I am challenged by Cummin's proposition. Indeed, decolonizing the classroom requires more than the intent and pedagogical affect of one educator, as the classroom itself is shaped from a myriad of external forces - social institutions, educational policy, socioeconomic factors, media, and educational stakeholders' values, beliefs, and practices. However, I can nonetheless challenge the deeply embedded and almost imperceptible Elephant in the Room - the collection of all power relations working to construct the dominance of English over other forms of expression, engagement, and collaboration. Cultivating patience, embracing friction, and fostering constructive criticism among educational stakeholders (i.e., parents, students, teacher colleagues, school administration) can pave a pathway open towards allowing a deeper sense of diversity make its presence in the classroom. Using multiple languages, celebrating inquiry-based learning with students' choices to describe their realities, and empowering families to build constructive partnerships between school and home in the languages they wish to use in support of English language learning are key elements in my pedagogical practice.

Cummins recommends designing and delivering upon a collaborative creation of power in that he means "power is not a fixed pre-determined quantity but rather can be generated in interpersonal and intergroup relations." Agents in this context work together to achieve a common goal or vision, and accordingly co-construct a notion of power that is relational, interdependent, and synergistic. In the course of a lesson, there are many opportunities to build this performativity in the classroom. Activities that draw upon the cultural insight and linguistic dimensions of minoritized learners enables all learners to challenge their existing cognitive schemas that are built up over time through exposure to dominant ways of knowing and being in the world. These include co-constructing iterations of familiar pedagogical archetypes but informing them with specific knowledge, practice, and reflection representing the voice, perspective, and character of the learners themselves, so that these learners "see themselves encoded in the work," thus the work becoming a personalized cultural artefact. Adapting such an archetype in this way makes visible what the Capacity Building Series (CBS; 2013) calls a "dialogic stance," a phrase that refers to the practice of engaging "students in conversation in order to share, shape and improve their understanding of a text, a topic or a problem" (p. 4).

Another practice that communicates the importance of ELLs contributions in the classroom community is in providing physical space on the walls, desks, and floors for the additive presence of other languages besides English (See CBS, ELL Voices in the Classroom, 2009). With having more than one student in a classroom sharing a common non-Anglophone vernacular, there is benefit to encouraging them to use their first language prior to resorting to the English language to demonstrate their understanding. Keep a record of these early attempts at working through problems in their first language, so that a portfolio emerges depicting growth, struggle, and the many cycles that learning a second language takes. Such a portfolio demonstrates a pathway of pedagogical documentation in that can also be used to inform peers about how language is learned and how important it is to build further knowledge upon already existing usable knowledge. Alphabet charts, journals, games, and diaries are a few of the examples where dual language documentation can be used to develop English literacy.

As an educator of ELL students, I Cummins' arguments for expanding and deepening the provisions of inclusive, equitable education for all students are convincingly succinct and timely. Ontario's Equity and Inclusive Education Strategy (2009) provides a policy window for school boards and schools to ensure that ELL students are recognized for their unique skills and insights, as well as challenged to succeed in a culture of high expectations. Educational institutions, including school boards and schools, as well as individuals, including educators and their pedagogical practices, can consist of and relay an array of barriers that impact the ability of individuals from showing their academic and social potentials. Under the auspices of the Ontario Human Rights Commission (2013), the Ontario Standards of Practice (2018), and similar other legislative provisions (See Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2010), it is my duty and privilege to draw from Cummins' viewpoint and accordingly re-evaluate my pedagogical barriers that are implicit in the array of teaching practices. This means allowing students from all walks of life to further share their backgrounds in the design and delivery of curricula, so that they vividly and consistently see themselves in the emergence of ideas, skills, and practices.