The Culturally Responsive & Sustaining Pedagogy (CRSP) Framework provides the foundation for all work at Throughline Learning.

The framework is grounded in research, neuroscience, and the rationale of Geneva Gay, Zaretta Hammond, Gloria Ladson-Billings, Sami Alim, and Django Paris. The four domains build the capacity of teachers and students to disrupt inequitable systems and create more relevant and self-directed learning environments.

For a summary of the research base connected to the CRSP Framework, click here.

AWARENESS

COMMUNITY BUILDING

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

CRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS

 

AWARENESS

 

The Awareness domain recognizes that we must start with ourselves as actors within a racist, inequitable system. We must be conscious of the ways we perpetuate dominant norms and narratives and we must be aware of how systemic racism results in compliance-oriented teaching that produces dependent learners. The awareness that our worldview is not generalized - but profoundly influenced by life experiences and that we all bring a significant amount of personal bias into our interpersonal classroom relationships - opens the door to new levels of empathy and higher expectations for student success.

 

Practices

1. Build sociocultural awareness

2. Reflect on ways to promote engagement over compliance

 

COMMUNITY BUILDING

Rooted in a stronger sociocultural awareness, we build a strong classroom community and nurture academic mindsets.  A trusting, affirming, nurturing classroom culture lays the foundation for interpersonal and academic success through the school year. Together, the classroom community offers support when a learner is under the load of a cognitive task. 

 

Practices

3. Nurture a culture of trust and belonging

4. Develop learner identity, mindset, and confidence

5. Foster an academic community

6. Deepen student capacity for productive struggle

 

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

By leveraging relationships, a mindset around equity, and learning science, we disrupt a culture of low expectations and shift the cognitive load to students by developing their information processing skills. A constructivist approach to knowledge makes students' thinking visible, builds on their personal and cultural strengths, and empowers them to examine the curriculum from multiple perspectives.

 

Practices

7. Strengthen critical thinking skills

8. Differentiate using data

9. Use feedback and reflection processes to drive learning

10. Encourage student ownership through goal setting

 

CRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS

An important component of academic mindset is that school work "has value" for students. Students are more willing to engage in rigorous work when learning is relevant, interesting, and affirming of their identities and perspectives. Empowering students to leverage their growing cognitive skills to recognize and analyze systems of injustice - and take action against these systems - prepares students to use their education to improve their lives, their schools, and their communities.

 

Practices

11. Leverage student inquiry, analysis, and values to increase motivation

12. Apply and extend learning in ways that promote justice