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concerns that, without the proper guidance, education leaders and individual educators can adopt simplistic views of what it means to teach in culturally responsive ways

key scholars and teacher educators Gloria Ladson-Billings, Geneva Gay, and Django Paris

Increasing Depth, Complexity, and RigorAnother way to develop curriculum for gifted learners is to incorporate greater depth, complexity, and rigor. You can achieve this through a variety of strategies. One simple method is to provide students with questions requiring a higher level of critical thinking. Discussion groups, such as Socratic seminars and fishbowl discussions, in which students explore such questions are particularly effective--you can ask your students to paraphrase their peers' responses and then add on or pose other questions.

Using traditional teaching methods, educators may default to teaching literature by widely accepted classic authors: William Shakespeare, J.D. Salinger, and Charles Dickens, for example, adhering to widely accepted interpretations of the text. Culturally responsive teaching, on the other hand, acknowledges that there’s nothing wrong with traditional texts, Childers-McKee says, but strives to include literature from other cultures, parts of the world, and by diverse authors. It also focuses on finding a “hook and anchor” to help draw students into the content using their past experiences.

When integrated into classroom instruction, culturally responsive strategies can have important benefits such as: Strengthening students’ sense of identity  Promoting equity and inclusivity in the classroom Engaging students in the course material Supporting critical thinking

1. Activate students’ prior knowledge.