Teaching Social Studies from the Rupture: Eliciting and Responding to Contributions with Recently Arrived Immigrant Students

Abstract

This qualitative study explores teaching social studies in secondary classrooms with recently arrived immigrant students, building on literature at the intersection of social studies, immigrant education, and asset-based pedagogies. While the literature offers important insights about what can be designed for prior to instruction, including curriculum and classroom routines and structures, we know little about the contributions students make in the moment of instruction. Based on observations and teacher and student interviews in two classrooms, I found that students often made unique and unexpected contributions, which offered opportunities and complexities for educators and students alike. Both teachers created onramps for students to share, weaving a generosity towards ideas, languages and feelings together with supportive tools, structures, and processes. I theorize the importance of attending to the complexities of student contributions that stem from their histories and lived experiences, including their ways of knowing and ways of engaging with knowledge in classrooms. This study also makes the case for teaching social studies from the rupture (Aponte-Safe et al., 2022), in which complexities, such as tensions and vulnerabilities stemming from recently arrived immigrant students' experiences and prior knowledge, are explored to allow for new learning and less hierarchical classroom communities. Finally, it illustrates ways for teachers to create classrooms in which ruptures become visible and offers guidance for teachers who choose to create space for them.