Planning for Equitable Classrooms – Equitable Teaching

Planning for Equitable Classrooms


Planning Overview

An equitable classroom environment starts with course and syllabus design, reaches through day-to-day interactions, and extends all the way to assessment practices for student work. Below is a range of resources that will assist you in fostering equity at every step of the way.

How to Use these Resources

The following resources guides provide materials, readings, and strategies to further one’s knowledge and practice regarding equity in the classroom. These resources represent the entire catalogue of resource guides found on our website and it is recommended that you use the different categories under the Planning Menu to find resources relating to a specific component of your classroom. Under the Planning Menu, found at the top of the page, you can find the following categories:

  • Set the Tone – Resource guides designed to help you create a foundation for equity in your classroom.
  • Instructor Preparation – Resource guides to allow instructors to ground themselves in key ideas and to offer specific ways to prepare equity materials and classroom discussions.
  • Syllabus: Language & Design – Resource guides offering strategies that may be useful in the planning stages, as instructors incorporate equity practices into the syllabus, plan course content, and structure classroom interactions.
  • Discussion Facilitation – Resource guides to demystify discussions by helping instructors to prepare the classroom for productive engagement and to employ charged moments as opportunities to inquire and learn.
  • Glossary of Terminology – While navigating through our website, you may come across new terms and/or ideas. This glossary provides definitions for terms that may be new or unfamiliar.

We are grateful to our colleagues in the Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, the Program on Intergroup Relations, the Comprehensive Studies Program, and many others for generously sharing equitable teaching materials they have developed over years of practice for use on this website.

This resource guide reviews potential "obstructions" instructors may have when it comes to creating an inclusive environment and suggestions on Read more
The following content and linked resources have been curated as a primer for instructors to better understand and attend to Read more
The following content and linked resources are a primer to understanding content warnings (sometimes called “content notices” or “trigger warnings”). Read more
This resource guide provides an overview of dialogic techniques to integrate with one's instructional strategies and course content. Read more
This resource guide details practices for creating inclusive assignments and assessments. Read more
This resource guide aims to provide instructors with both an overview of race, including its construction and historical context as Read more
This resource offers samples of inclusive discussion guidelines. Setting up expectations for discussion with your students at the beginning of Read more
The guide offers reflective questions for instructors to explore and suggestions for appropriate ways and forums to work through the Read more
This short document from the Commission for Social Justice Educators gives a concise description of strategies of multipartiality in discussion Read more
The following content and linked resources (found in the resource guide) have been curated as a primer for instructors to Read more
This resource guide provides strategies for responding to “hot moments”: the sudden eruption of tension and conflict in classroom discussion. Read more
This resource guide highlights characteristics of white supremacy culture, as outlined by Dr. Tema Okun, that can be pervasive in Read more

Reuse Permissions

We appreciate your interest in our site. Generally, we are very happy to have our resources widely used in educational settings of all kinds. Reuse in a classroom, webinar/ professional development, or for individual reflection are all appropriate, so long as it is not for commercial purposes. If you share our resources, we ask that you please include an acknowledgement of our website or specific page reference, as suggested in our Reuse Permissions Guide in APA or MLA format, in addition to any acknowledgement of the original authors. 

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