This chapter by Kelli A. Rushek (Miami University) and Ethan Seylar (University of Iowa) explores how teachers can use collaborative curriculum design to strengthen their responsibility toward culturally sustaining literacy pedagogy (CSLP), an approach that honors students’ languages, heritages, and literacies. Through a reflective teaching case, the authors describe a “collective diamond mining” process, where educators excavate their curriculum to uncover biases, power structures, and opportunities for inclusion.

The study shows how critical literacy education—learning to question how texts shape identity and power—connects with reflective teacher practice. As teachers engage in this excavation, they analyze their own assumptions about culture and knowledge, recognizing how teacher identity shapes classroom interactions and student engagement. This process transforms literacy instruction from transmitting content to cultivating equitable, student-centered learning experiences.

By modeling collaborative reflection and theory-to-practice integration, Rushek and Seylar demonstrate how educators can design literacy curricula that sustain cultural diversity while deepening professional self-awareness. The “diamond mining” metaphor reminds teachers that meaningful reflection requires time, dialogue, and collective effort to bring new insights to the surface.

Faculty authors: Kelli A. Rushek, Miami University
Student co-authors: Ethan Seylar, University of Iowa
Keywords: critical literacy education, collaborative curriculum design, literacy pedagogy, reflective teacher practice, teacher identity
Publication details: “Collective diamond mining: using collaborative curriculum excavation to embrace the educator's responsibility toward culturally sustaining literacy pedagogy.” Culturally Sustaining Literacy Pedagogies: Honoring Students’ Heritages, Literacies, and Languages, eds. Susan Chambers Cantrell, Doris Walker-Dalhouse, and Althier M. Lazar. Teachers College Press, 2022.