Cultural Awareness and AIW

Recently I was asked an important question from a colleague in Iowa: “I’m curious about this, Dana. Is there online info about cultural awareness through AIW?”

Here’s what I know: the New South Wales crew in Australia added a cultural competency to their AIW framework. They call their framework Quality Teaching instead of AIW, but its roots are from Fred Newmann. This 2004 paper is a good place to start — you can also search on the internet looking up Wendy Amosa and James Ladwig’s work in New South Wales.

Here in Minnesota, one district has decided to integrate their AIW initiative with cultural competency as defined by the IDI scales used by Dr. Mitch Hammer. We are combining the AIW and cultural competency initiatives in a five-year plan so that the entire district has a “soul changing” shift in their pedagogy towards students. As this initiative moves forward, expect more posts.