Introduction
framed as a binary, so a critical facet of the work of identity-conscious practice is building knowledge about gender diversity. You’ll also have the opportunity to reflect on early messages you received about gender in order to create plans for meeting gender-diverse needs in the classroom and talk with students about gender diversity. Chapter 7 asks you to explore your relationship with disability. You’ll ask the question, “How does disability show up in school?” You’ll also examine what changes are needed to create curricula that accommodate students of all abilities and to talk about disability with students. Now that you know what the identity-conscious practice is and you have a working model for employing it in your life and work, you’ll turn your focus to what to do next. In part III, chapters 8 through 12 examine how your behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs move you to action and how you should respond to success and failure along the way. In chapter 8, you’ll explore the terms ally, accomplice, co-conspirator, and abolitionist as they relate to identity-conscious teaching and learning. Becoming an ally is not the end goal; it’s a first step. So, you’ll examine the limits of the ally role and imagine how you might move beyond it to answer the call to become an accomplice, co-conspirator, and abolitionist. Chapter 9 allows you to reflect on the role of failure in the identity-conscious practice. Despite their commitment to just action, educators will make mistakes and recognize harm in the course of their work with students and peers. The guidance in this chapter calls you to embrace failure as a path to growth and deeper connection with others on the journey. The focus of chapter 10 is gaining tools to extend your learning beyond the scope of this book. How do you keep learning about identity-conscious practice when you have so many competing priorities? How do you create structures of accountability in your work? Together, we’ll identify tools to help you answer these questions. My hope for you in this identity-conscious journey is that you build your practice to the point that you’re able to share it with others. To that end, chapter 11 prepares you to facilitate conversations about identity. You’ll learn a framework for noticing participants’ cues, and you’ll encounter six strategies for responding to challenges that arise in conversation so that you can keep the discussion moving forward. In chapter 12, you’ll review the model we’ve built for the identity-conscious practice so that you can incorporate other identities as you move beyond this book. My intention is to provide you with the habits and skills you need to become comfortable with the model’s framework and adapt it for your unique practice as you move beyond The Identity-Conscious Educator. This work of identity-conscious practice starts with us educators. And it starts here.
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