Teacher Webinar: Saudi Government and Citizenship

The purpose of these workshops is to provide opportunities for critical global educators to develop culturally relevant curriculum, and concrete activities for their classrooms which also cover curriculum standards. We will refer mainly to the Middle School standards for teaching about world religions and cultural exchange, with reference to the religious identities of the Middle East. We will develop classroom activities based on images found in the media, academic images of the Middle East, entailing research of what daily life practices relate to these images. There is a need to go beyond “addressing stereotypes". Teachers are reminded often to address stereotypes. But how does one go about doing that? Focused time, spent on gaining substantive knowledge which counters stereotypes, but also the historic origins of stereotypes is needed in order to be prepared for a litany of stereotypes which arise along with the vocabulary words for 6th through 8th grade. In these workshops we will cover the deeper issues which undergird stereotypes, the origins of the stereotypes and how they continue their work despite our best attempts to resist stereotyping and othering.