Making Time for Culture: Embedding Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Across the Curriculum

by Maura McDonald

As educators, we are taught the importance of culturally relevant pedagogy, yet we live in a world where almost every bit of instruction is mandated by district expectations and curriculum requirements. We know that we need to create meaningful lessons for our students that showcase their values and identities, but the curriculum we are told to teach doesn’t align with our students’ cultures. Social studies is the subject that cultural relevance most naturally fits into, but because of pressure from standardized testing, the overwhelming amount of instructional time must be dedicated to math and ELA. In many of the classrooms I have seen, teachers are given one or two periods a week to teach either science or social studies. Sometimes teachers will teach science for one half of the year and social studies for the other half, which just undermines these two subjects, showing students that they really aren’t as important as math and ELA, and don’t need to be taken seriously. This becomes an equity issue, because many students in New York City especially come from underserved communities. Social studies would be the place where their cultures, histories, and communities are actually reflected in the curriculum. When social studies disappears from the curriculum, so does these students’ representation. So, how can we as teachers embed culturally responsive pedagogy into everyday instruction, despite time and curriculum constraints?

Culturally relevant pedagogy is not just about doing right by our students, there is actual research that shows when we center students’ culture in the classroom, we improve their academic achievement, their capacity for critical thinking and civic activism, and overall just give students a more positive school experience, which every student deserves (Peoples and Bolisetty). Ladson-Billings also points to research showing that “if students’ home language is incorporated into the classroom, students are more likely to experience academic success,” reinforcing the idea that honoring students’ identities can directly support learning outcomes (Ladson-Billings). Additionally, New York City’s own Department of Education framework calls for an “educational strategy that embraces students’ identities”. The DOE calls this culturally responsive-sustaining education (CRSE), and the goal of CRSE is for students to use elements of their own identities within their education, whether that be their race, language, nationality, social class, gender, sexual orientation, religion or ability. This framework acknowledges the benefits of CRSE, highlighting that when students learn this way their self-esteem improves, they are more active in class and they become better citizens, yet the DOE does not make it easy for us as educators to fit this into our instruction (New York City Public Schools).

Unfortunately, it is unlikely that as teachers our instruction schedules are going to change. Instead of hoping for a daily social studies period, it is time for us to start adding social studies into other content areas. The best way we can do this is through ELA instruction. When given a choice about what to read with the class, we must look at our students and find stories that represent them. Students can engage more deeply with texts when they are relevant to them and when they can see themselves within the stories. Additionally, writing assignments are a place where students should be asked to try to relate the curriculum to themselves, encouraging them to open up about their own lives and experiences. Finally, any free time can and should be used to integrate social studies. During morning meetings, or snack time, or instead of giving students a free period to play games on their tablets, we should provide social studies instruction time that is still fun. Many social studies topics actually are fun, and kids will be excited to take a few minutes to talk about where they come from, what holidays they celebrate, or their favorite traditional foods, and they probably won’t even miss their iPads. Both social studies and science allow for authentic integration of ELA and math, so we can take the time to teach social studies, and still relate it to the ELA content for the day without being worried about setting back our students. Ladson-Billings states that “culturally relevant teachers utilize students’ culture as a vehicle for learning”, so culture doesn’t necessarily need to be the whole lesson, but instead can be integrated and a way for all kinds of learning to happen (Ladson-Billings).

Ultimately, the issue is not that teachers do not value social studies and culturally relevant instruction, but that the structure of the school day often makes them difficult to prioritize. So as teachers, we need to do whatever we can within those constraints. By shifting our mindset and viewing social studies not as a separate subject competing for instructional time, but as meaningful content through which literacy, discussion, writing, and critical thinking can be developed, we create more opportunities for culturally responsive teaching. As Gloria Ladson-Billings has informed us, culturally relevant pedagogy extends beyond representation alone, explaining that students need to achieve academically while also maintaining cultural competence and developing critical consciousness (Ladson-Billings). Integrating students’ identities, experiences, and communities into everyday instruction allows us to meet academic expectations while also making learning more meaningful and equitable.

References

• Ladson-Billings, Gloria. “But That’s Just Good Teaching! The Case for Culturally Relevant Pedagogy.” Theory Into Practice [Columbus], vol. 34, no. 3, June 1995, pp. 159–65, https://doi.org/10.1080/00405849509543675.
• New York City Public Schools. “Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education.” NYC Public Schools, https://www.schools.nyc.gov/about-us/building-stronger-schools/culturally-responsive-sustaining-education. Accessed 21 May 2026.
• Peoples, Leah Q., and Sneha Bolisetty. “Under-Prepared for Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Education: Teachers Entering New York City’s Classrooms.” NYU Steinhardt, Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools, https://steinhardt.nyu.edu/metrocenter/under-prepared-culturally-responsive-and-sustaining-education-teachers-entering-new. Accessed 21 May 2026.