Dual Language Teacher, Massachusetts
Lotta Lara, African diaspora in Peru, El Niño, Student Advocacy and Action
My name is Theresa Cutter. I am a 3rd-grade dual-language teacher at the Mario Umana K8 Academy, a dual language K-8 school in East Boston, Massachusetts. I hold a master’s degree in Elementary Education from Boston College. This is my 11th year teaching, 8 of which have been at the Umana. I have taught 4th grade, filled the role of an instructional coach, and, most recently, am teaching 3rd grade in a self-contained bilingual classroom.
I began teaching as a Jesuit Volunteer in Andahuaylillas, Peru. I taught many different subjects over the course of 3 years in a rural Andean town that sits at 10,000 feet of elevation. I fell in love with multilingual education in a Quechua-Spanish bilingual school in Ocongate. It was formative for me as an educator to see how students who continue to learn their home language of Quechua not only allowed them to continue to speak to their elders and family members, but also permitted the passing down of generational wisdom, tradition, and identity.
Upon returning to the US, I desired to continue teaching in a dual language context to support L1 language acquisition (and maintenance), as well as, foster a learning space that supports and emphasizes connection – connection of stories, tradition, and identity – specifically in multilingual and multicultural communities.
It was such a gift and joy to return to Peru as a Fulbright-Hays fellow. It provided me an opportunity to deepen my understanding of Peru, both personally and professionally. Personally, the six week immersion humbled me in many ways. As a person who is not Peruvian, but has spent extensive time in Peru, I was humbled by the richness of history I had not known or learned previously. As an educator, I was impacted by our classroom observations, and student community involvement in change and advocacy. I have created a series of lessons that allow students to dig into their identity and positionality at a personal, communal, and global level. These themes directly tie to the topics which we were addressed in the Fulbright-Hays Education Group Projects Abroad, which include the history and representation of indigenous populations in Peru, the history of and the current education system, civic and community action of young peoples, as well as the rich history of arts, dance, literature, and gastronomy.
Paolo Freire wrote in Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1968) that “education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate the integration of the younger generations into the logic of the present system and therefore bring about conformity to it, or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which [individuals] deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world.” The educational practices we witnessed in Piura and Cusco embodied Freire’s words. My goal is that my lessons will, also, provide an opportunity for students to grapple critically with ways in which they can use their gifts to transform their communities and the world.