Teaching in an Urban Setting

While preparing for our first in-the-field work, we have been learning about the population of students who attend the schools in which we will be working. Since they are urban schools, we have been learning about teaching in urban settings.

I attended both suburban and urban schools during my years in school, and just being in the two different settings, I could observe many ways that it would be different to teach in each setting. Specifically, teaching in an urban setting might be unique because the students often have very different life stories and life styles than students in non-urban areas. For example, some students in urban areas may get minimal home support or less home support than students in non-urban areas. Because of this, a teacher may have to adapt lessons and teaching styles in order to ensure that students who do not have much home support are still able to grow and succeed. The teacher may have to expect that not as much learning will happen at home as in a school where the students have much parental support in their school work.

Another important factor we learned about that makes urban teaching unique is that often teachers must employ strategies of trauma induced care. While students in both urban and non-urban areas can be dealing with trauma, studies have found that students in urban areas are often dealing with it at a higher rate. I think it is important for urban teachers to be aware of this so that they can adequately and compassionately meet their students at the level they are on and still help them to grow and succeed.

However, even though some aspects of teaching in urban areas are different, at the end of the day, what matters most is just believing in your students and giving them the time and support they need to thrive, no matter where they are from.