This book seeks to share the experiences of gay males in Jamaica on their formal schooling experiences through reflection. It examines themes of curriculum, teacher behaviour, school leadership and advocacy, the role of the guidance counsellors, and the dynamics of navigating home, school, community and church for LGBT students. It examines the perceptions of self-identified Jamaican gay men and their understanding of their formal schooling experiences between the ages of 6 - 18 years. A snowball sample of 121 self-identified gay men completed the online questionnaire, participated in focus groups, and engaged in one-on-one interviews. I felt obligated, since, as a researcher, lecturer of diversity studies in education, and leadership and a person of influence, it was my duty to come in front of my own work and share my own voice. When I was young, I did not see any gay role models, except for those on TV. I did not see the successful black gay man that would have given me courage and hope to know that I could become more than what the school and neighbourhood bully said I would become. Today, things are slowly changing and more and more of our young black gay men have possibilities. With the work of leading LGBT organizations, movements, advocates, and allies, we will continue to hope, work, and advocate for change. I hope that this book will be part of the continued change towards a more understanding Jamaica - where our LGBT people will have the space to grow, flourish, and be celebrated.

Foregrounding diverse lived experiences and non-dominant forms of knowledge, this edited volume showcases ways in which narrating and sharing stories of pain and suffering can be engaged as critical pedagogy to challenge oppression and inequity in educational contexts. The volume illustrates the need to consider both the act of narrating and the experience of bearing witness to narration to harness the full transformative potentials of counternarratives in disrupting oppressive practices. Chapters are divided into three parts - "Telling and Reliving Trauma as Pedagogy," "Pedagogies of Overcoming Silence," and "Forgetting as Pedagogy" - illustrating a range of relational pedagogical and methodological approaches, including journaling, poetry, and arts-based narrative inquiry. The authors make the argument that the language of pain and suffering is universal, hence its potential as critical pedagogy for transformative and therapeutic teaching and learning. Readers are encouraged to reflect on their own lived experiences to constructively engage with their pain, suffering, and trauma. Focusing on trauma-informed non-hegemonic storytelling and transformative pedagogies, this volume will be of interest to students, faculty, scholars, and community members with an interest in advancing anti-oppressive and social justice education.

Stop the Hate for Goodness Sake shows teachers how to confront racism and disrupt discrimination in order to deepen students’ understanding of social justice, diversity, and equity. Background information, statistics, and reports on incidents of hate will help students consider ethical and moral behavior. Forty step-by-step lessons involve discussion, oral and written narratives, case studies, assumption charts, and more. This thoughtful examination of today’s world will help teachers encourage reflection, foster inclusion, and inspire students to take action. This in-depth guide will show teachers of 8- to 14-year-olds how to start and manage important conversations that will lead to change.

Caribbean Discourse in Inclusive Education is an edited book series that aims to give voice to Caribbean scholars, practitioners, and other professionals working in diverse classrooms. The book series is intended to provide an ongoing forum for Caribbean researchers, practitioners, and academics, including those of the Diaspora, to critically examine issues that influence the education of children within inclusive settings. The book series is visionary, timely, authoritative and presents pioneering work in the area of inclusive education in the Caribbean, as part of the broader South?South dialogue. It is essential reading for students in undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, scholars, teachers, researchers and policy makers at the regional and international level. The first book in this series entitled Historical and Contemporary Issues will trace the history and examine the Caribbean’s trajectory towards the development of inclusive education in the 21st Century. The main premise of the book is that inclusion remains an ideologically sound goal, which remains elusive in the Caribbean. It will also provide a wider platform to discuss other factors that influence the development of inclusive education such as school climate, culture and ethos, LGBT issues, teacher training and professional development, pedagogy, pupil perspective, curriculum, policy and legislation.

Educators will find in this book an opportunity to examine the multiple, dynamic identities of the students they instruct and to consider the ways in which all teachers and students are shaped by their social and cultural settings. The volume is the first to examine theories of identity and elementary literacy practices by presenting data in a teacher-friendly format. The chapters highlight the influences of school and, to some extent, home contexts on students' identities as readers and writers, and give numerous implications for practice. McCarthey collected data from three sites in which teachers implemented writing workshop and literature-based instruction in grades 3-6. This book focuses on the students in these sites, who were from diverse cultural and social backgrounds. By providing information about the contexts in which students read and wrote, McCarthey demonstrates the power of the teacher-student relationship, the importance of the classroom curriculum, and the influence of parents and peers on students. Published by International Reading Association

Learn how to center, affirm, and develop Black immigrant literacies in ways that allow all youth to engage with and honor their literacies. This book presents a framework to revolutionize teaching in ways that draw on students’ assets for redesigning, rethinking, and reimagining literacy and the English Language Arts curriculum. This novel framework has five mechanisms through which Black immigrant literacies and languaging can be better understood: the struggle for justice, the myth of the model minority, transraciolinguistics, the local-global, and holistic literacies. Presenting authentic narratives of Afro-Caribbean youth, the author describes how teachers and educators can: (1) teach the Black literate immigrant; (2) use literacy and English language arts curriculum as a vehicle for instructing Black immigrant youth; (3) foster relations among Black immigrants and their peers through literacy; and (4) connect parents, schools, and communities. The text includes lesson plans, instructional modules, and templates that range in their focus from K–12 to college. Book Features: Details how teachers, curriculum, and instruction can benefit from understanding the experiences of Black immigrant students, and how that experience differs from other Black American students.Highlights authentic narratives that center the holistic voices of Afro-Caribbean immigrant youth from Jamaica and the Bahamas. Demonstrates how students grapple with racialization, becoming immigrants, and the responses of others to their use of Englishes in the United States. Offers research-based methods for teaching all students to draw on their metalinguistic, metacultural, and metaracial understandings in literacy and ELA classrooms.Presents concrete strategies for supporting Black immigrant populations in establishing and sustaining a sense of community across linguistic, cultural, and racial contexts.

Featuring a broad swathe of academic research and perspectives from international contributors, this book will capture and share important lessons from the pandemic experience for teaching practice and teacher learning more broadly. Looking at core teaching values such as the facilitation of learning, the promotion of fairness and equality, and community building, the book centres the records of teachers’ experiences from diverse educational phases and locations that illuminate how the complexity of teaching work is entangled in the emotional, relational, and embodied nature of teachers’ everyday lives. Through rich, qualitative data and first-hand experience, the book informs the decisions of teachers and those who train, support, and manage them, promoting sustainable, positive transformation within education for the benefit of educators and learners alike. This book will be of use to scholars, practitioners, and researchers involved with teachers and teacher education, the sociology of education, and teaching and learning more broadly. Policy makers working in school leadership, management, and administration may also benefit from the volume.