Download or read book Why Culture Counts written by Donna Walker Tileston and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Current models do not address the complexity of achievement gaps among racial and socioeconomic groups. As the National Task Force on Minority High Achievement and current assessment data show, children of color, even those who are not poor, often score lower on achievement tests than whites who are poor. Culture trumps poverty in its impact on achievement. Culture defines what children will focus their attention on, how they interpret the world to give it meaning, what background knowledge they bring to learning, and how they will value that learning. The focus of our interventions to close the achievement gap must therefore be to attend to the culture of the learner. This book shows how to build the necessary supports to move classrooms from the traditional, Eurocentric model to one that respects and incorporates the cultures of the learners.