Understanding and Managing Cultural Difference Lisa Finkelstein, Page: 1

Understanding and Managing Cultural Difference

Estimated sample workshop for thirty participants in 90 minutes.

Created by Lisa Finkelstein with

direct support from Rebecca Weiner,

Director of Education, Congregation Sha'ar Zahav

The goal for this sample 90-minute workshop, lesson plan, or training outline is to strengthen the ability of the participants to teach, role model, and/or transmit the topic of understanding and managing cultural differences to others. As a group, we will be defining cultural differences, as well as discussing issues of class, race, and nationality (or national origin). While we are speaking about cultural differences, we will not specifically focused on all topics of diversity including religious denominations, gender identity, and family structures as this is covered in a different training. Specifically, this workshop aims to have the following learning objectives:

1. To define, re-familiarize and understand what are cultural differences. 2. To challenge participants to look at cultural differences with a new lens. 3. To help participants learn how to manage and advocate for cultural differences. 4. To practice managing cultural differences.

Time Activity Aim Materials 10 Min.

Introductions & Agenda Setting Introduce yourself as the facilitator. State the goal of the workshop: to strengthen the ability of the Coordinators to teach, role model, and/or transmit the topic of understanding and managing cultural differences to others. Agenda check-in 1. Introductions: Introduce facilitator, state the goal of the

workshop, along with the agenda, and introductions (10 Minutes) 2. Creating Safe Space: Housekeeping & Ground Rule-Setting (5

Minutes) 3. Ice Breaker: Up/Down, What our cultural difference looks like

(10 Minutes) 4. First-breakout: Three Scenarios/Three Groups: Read, Discuss,

Act-out, Deconstruct & Suggest Solutions (30 Minutes) 5. Process First-Breakout: Three Scenarios- Breakdown (5 Minutes) 6. Break (5 Minutes) 7. Second-Breakout: Pairs – Three Clear Actions (15 Minutes) 8. Resource Sharing (5 Minutes) 9. Evaluation (5 Minutes) Go-Around Introduction Directions In a couple of sentences please share with us:

1. Your name 2. Your gender preferred pronoun (example, She/Her) 3. Where you call home

To share information about the content of the workshop and other practicalities such as the ground rules, housekeeping, goals, agenda and names. To help people get to know each other a little and feel relaxed so they can get more out of the workshop. *Be crafty with the presentation tools you choose, PowerPoint is just one of many useful applications i.e. Prezi, Keynote, etc.

Distribute Papers. Write the Go-Around Questions on a Flip Chart, white board, or place in a PowerPoint*. Write a simplified agenda on a Flip Chart, white board, or place in a PowerPoint. Write the Ground-rules on a Flip Chart, white board, or place in a PowerPoint.

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4. What we would learn if we Googled you today. Try to keep it short so we get a chance to hear everyone. (Start by introducing yourself to model how short contributions can be.) Housekeeping & Ground Rules Remind people to take a bio break when needed. Suggest a few ground rules and then ask the group if they have rules to add. For example, 1. Stay on task; no side conversations. 2. Listen to others. 3. Speak with kindness. 4. Use a “parking-lot” for topics off-topic or off-agenda

10 Min.

Ice Breaker – Up/Down*: What our cultural difference looks like Overview Start with everyone sitting down in one large circle, standing in a circle, or sitting at the tables and explain the directions. Read the statements** loudly and clearly so everyone can hear. After each statement, encourage everyone who is standing, who raised their hand, or who took a step into the circle to look around and see who they share something in common with. If the time is right, you can ask someone to share something about them. Directions “One of the ways that we can define cultural difference is within the sum of the ways that people are both alike and different within issues of class, race and nationality or national origin. Even within a set-culture, there are differences that continue to define our identities. The dimensions of these differences can influence the ways we experience the world and how the world experiences us. As a show of how this is true, even within our small group, I am going to read a list of statements. If the statement is true for you, stand up—and take a look around at everyone else either standing with you or not standing with you. After I read the statement, please sit back down between statements until another statement applies to you.” Stand up if…

1. You participated in piano lessons. 2. You have played an instrument around a campfire. 3. You can talk on the phone for as long as you want on a school

or work night because you do not share your phone with anyone.

4. You attended summer camp. 5. You attended a Jewish summer camp. 6. On Saturday’s your family participated in sport activities like

attending soccer games, going to the movies or skiing. 7. You have a child in your home that relies on you to make

them meals. 8. You have a relative who is disabled. 9. You have lived with a grandparent, or a foster parent. 10. You’re fluent in a language other than English

An activity designed to acknowledge the cultural difference in the room, help the group look at one another with a more thoughtful lens, engage the group with quick questions, and open the participant’s minds to new and creative manners of thinking and engaging with each other. *Depending on the physical abilities in the room you can choose to raise hands or stand-up/sit-down respectively. **Be sure to alter the questions to match the community of participants you are working with. Ask yourself questions about the participants in regards to country of origin, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Challenge your own cultural understanding or

Have the questions printed out on a private piece of paper to have the facilitator read out-loud***. .

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11. Not everyone in your immediate family has the same skin color.

12. You have felt discriminated against because of the way you look.

13. You are a vegetarian. 14. You were born or were raised in a country outside of the

United States. 15. You have gone swimming on vacation in Hawaii. 16. Someone you had not met previously, came up to you and

asked, “What are you?” 17. You have heard a racial slur describing your own identity by

someone in your extended family. 18. At least one of your grandparents attended college.

privileges to ensure the questions have a diversified response. ***Make sure to have an extra piece of paper with the questions written in case a participant is hearing impaired

30 Min.

Three Scenarios: Act, Deconstruct & Suggest Overview Have the participants break into three different groups that explore three different scenarios that may emerge in the populations that they work with. Directions “I will be dividing you into three groups. I will want each group to nominate one person to read out loud one of three scenarios that I will provide your group with. Once you read the scenario, please discuss how you can use a few volunteers within each group to role-play the scene and how as a group you might suggest a solution to the question posed. It will be helpful if you remember to use only respectful language even as you role-play in front of the full group. There are issues of inclusion and exclusion as well a visibility and invisibility in each of the scenes, please pay attention these so we can unpack them as a group after the scenes are played out. As a group, we will discuss the stereotypes, racism, and classism that we saw within each of the scenes and what we might do differently. Each group will have five minutes to review the story together. Five more minutes to prepare the scene and then we will use the remainder of the time to act out each of the scenes.” Scene One Yael is fourteen and is Julie’s older sister. Julie is training for her Bat Mitzvah and her class regularly does not end on time. Yael’s mother requested that she knock on the door to the classroom to alert the teacher that instead of waiting outside in the parking lot like usual that she and her mother were going to wait next door at the coffee shop instead. The teacher, Ms. Quarashi confirmed that she would let Julie know to head immediately to the coffee shop instead of looking for them in the parking lot. When Yael closed the door and walked away, a classmate of Julies named Max asked loudly, “Who was that?” Ms. Quarashi stated that it was Julie’s older sister. Ms. Quarashi then announced that Julie should meet her family in the coffee shop next door after class instead of the parking lot like usual. Max immediately remarked, “That can’t be Julie’s sister. They look nothing a like!” Julie became visibly uncomfortable at Max’s statement.

The aim in this exercise is to recognize how cultural distinctions can shape a group, to practice how to behave as culturally inclusive and to prepare for those delicate situations where you may or may not know the best way to be an advocate. We will discuss how cultural difference can be thought of as the sum of the ways that people are both alike and different as well as how to be mindful of the nuances of difference.

Simply have the stories printed on separate pieces of paper to distribute to each participant within the three unique break-out spaces.

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If you were the teacher, how would you handle the situation? Scene Two Donny is an impressive athlete and scholar. While he may be only a sophomore at San Mateo High School, he is already being scouted for college baseball and is on the varsity track and field team. He is also a straight A student. Donny’s parents were both born and raised in the Former Soviet Union and moved to San Francisco years before Donny was born. While Donny speaks Russian and English fluently, he has never actually been to Russia. In school last week, one of Donny’s classmates, Chloe asked the world affairs teacher, Mr. Sparks, about why so many people were angry about the Winter Olympics happening in Sochi, Russia. The teacher, Mr. Sparks not knowing how to answer the question, hastily recalled that Donny was Russian and quickly assumed that he must know the answer. Mr. Sparks responded to Chloe’s question by saying, “Donny, your family is from Russia. You must know the answer.” Donny became visibly uncomfortable at the question and for the first time had nothing to say in class. Chloe chimed in and said, “I understand it is because everyone is so corrupt and poor there. Is that why your family left, Donny?” If you were the teacher, how would you handle the situation? Scene Three Ruby is seventeen and is in her senior year of private high school at San Francisco’s Urban Academy. She has been working as a classroom assistant at her synagogue for three-years. While the income is not great, it is helping her with her clothing budget and lunch money, something her family cannot afford to help her with. Ruby is getting increasingly nervous because as she was able to secure a four-year scholarship to high school she has not yet secured a scholarship for college. Ruby is beginning to think that she may need to ask to begin to work more hours as a classroom assistant at the synagogue while attending a local Junior College. One afternoon, a fourteen-year old student in Ruby’s class named Sasha made a statement that Ruby would not know what it was like to be poor because everyone knows that Ruby attends one the most expensive schools in the city. Ruby was visibly uncomfortable with the question. Instead of responding to Sasha, she quickly excused herself from the classroom and on her way out the door mentioned she needed a 15-minute break. If you were the teacher, how would you handle the situation?

5 Min. Three Scenarios - Breakdown Directions After the scenarios, ask everyone to get together again and discuss what are things that come up when facing these situations. What came up for the groups when acting out?

Begin to plant seeds about ways we can use mindfulness and compassionate leadership to make a difference in the ways a group might look and interact with each other.

Have the three different scenarios written out on a Flip Chart, white board, or place in a PowerPoint.

5 Min. Break

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15 Min.

Pairs – Three Clear Actions Directions Then you should have the teens break into pairs this time. Each of the pairs need to come up with three clear actions on how they will take from these scenarios and put them into their work as coordinators. If helpful, give an example, such as suggesting a multicultural speaker at an event or program that the coordinators are responsible for.

To further explore cultural difference, the pairs will work to come up with three creative ways to incorporate cultural difference into their conversations and local programs.

Break the group up into pairs and make sure that they have a pen and a piece of paper.

10 Min.

Resource Sharing Directions Ask a volunteer to help write on the board a list of resources that the group can brainstorm and come up with together. Give examples of books, websites, and organizations that they can reach out to but encourage participants to share resources themselves. • Insider/Outsider: American Jews and Multiculturalism by David Biale • http://bechollashon.org • Multicultural Posters • Jewish Multicultural Text Study. What text works? Text about the

proverbial Jewish tent? i.e. Vayikra - Leviticus - Chapter 23.42 “For a seven day period you shall live in booths. Every resident among the Israelites shall live in booths”

Provide accessible resources for further exploration and learning. Explain that exploring difference and managing cultural difference makes for a more engaging and meaningful community.

White Board or Flip Chart Pen or Marker One Volunteer Scribe

5 Min. Evaluation – Go-around Directions With everyone having the chance to speak (or request to pass) in turn without interruption, ask the group to tell you: • One thing which worked well for them and why. • One thing which did not work so well for them and why. • Something new that they learned.

Ask a volunteer to write the responses up on a flipchart as they talk.

With the aim to help your learning as a facilitator as well as to give the participants an easy chance to express their thoughts or feelings about how the workshop went, do a go-round.

Large Notepad Two Markers One Volunteer Scribe