Trace Taylor, MLA
Phi Kappa Phi, Φ Κ Φ; Omicron Delta Kappa, Ο Δ Κ
Interdisciplinary Studies Curriculum & Instruction PhD program, USF
Socratic Method, Multiple Intelligence Theory, Multiple Learning Styles Theory, Universal Design Learning (UDL), Neurodivergent Thinking, Quantum Transcendence Intention, Interdisciplinary Studies: inclusive organic, dynamic curricula and instruction for dynamic, organic learners at every age and academic level. It’s that simple.
Paulo Freire made it clear; learning happens best when learners are organized around related, relevant topics and organize themselves and their actions around these topics. My job is to teach people to think critically and organize themselves into critical action.
Numerous studies show increased student choice, freedom of expression (voice), and involvement increase learner engagement, motivation, investment, all of which amp up students’ LOVE of learning, and this leads to more academic success and achievement and a sense of contribution and self-confidence. Most noted and respected educators around the world and their research say so. My own personal experience as a neurodivergent thinker and learner says so. My professional practice, experience, and field research say so.
The Pedagogy of Access
In order to shift power from Oppressors to the Oppressed, a pedagogy “must question the status quo in the name of social justice” (Freire 1970). Such a pedagogy would need to be a situated pedagogy open to (the) diversity that provides “…a rich lexicon of practice and dialogue” (Freire 1970), adaptable to many places, spaces, and circumstance; “student centered, constructivist, and critical of inequality, (as) …no pedagogy can be neutral” (Freire 1970). An effective pedagogy must promote talent development, building on strengths rather than focusing on weaknesses and what a learner lacks (Astin 1984, 1985). A multicultural pedagogy must respect and incorporate the multicultural, multiethnic, and experience diversity that comprises each individual if the Oppressed are to gain access to the evolving language of power and their political voices (Freire 1970; The New London Group 1996; Ladson-Billings 1995). A Pedagogy should seek “to perpetuate and foster—to sustain—linguistic, literate, and cultural pluralism as part of the democratic project of schooling. In the face of current policies and practices that have the explicit goal of creating a monocultural and monolingual society, research and practice need equally explicit resistances that embrace cultural pluralism and cultural equality” (Paris 2012). The Critical, Social-Justice Pedagogy (attraction, engagement, self-realization, awareness, self-governance, and diversity), the Multicultural Pedagogy (attraction, engagement, self-realization, awareness, self-governance, and diversity), the Multiliteracies Pedagogy (all eight intelligences equally engaged and applied to interdisciplinary study), and the Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy (inclusive of cultural diversity), are all fundamental to the Pedagogy of Access. The Pedagogy of Access is an evolution of Freire’s Pedogogy of the Oppressed (1970). It is the next evolution of the most effective means by which to empower the voices of the Oppressed across the broadest spectrum of the global human population.
nclusion occurs at the cost of exclusion. Inclusion equals representation. Representation equals access. A Pedagogy of Access therefore exercises inclusion over exclusion for maximum results. Research in various fields of Anthropology and the Social Sciences, Education, Neurology, Biology, Physiology, Psychology, Technology, Economics, Physics, and the Arts supports experience being key to maximum engagement, connection, motivation, meaning, assignment of value, brain development and maturation, self-realization, awareness, and self-governance which is to say political voice. Dr. David Rose’s Universal Design for Learning (UDL) serves in the collective construction of an Access Pedagogy. By multiple means, methods, and modes of transmission, engagement, application, and expression (transmission), UDL ensures the greatest percentage of representation (access, choice, political voice) across the human collective. It speaks to the majority rather than the questionable average or norm defined by oppressive influences. Gardner’s research (2006) supports that the individual is a complex construct of multiple intelligences, fingerprint learners rather than constructed averages or norms. It reinforces the need for multiple means, methods, and modes in an Access Pedagogy. Dr. Richard Allington and countless educated others experienced in concentric fields of study have shown substantively that the Systematic Institutional Pedagogy serves neither teacher nor student in the achievement of maximum access and on multiple occasions advise movement towards a more inclusive, multi-representative approach. Proven most-effective pedagogies, proven most-effective practices, and proven scientific understandings construct the Pedagogy of Access framework, but what might the content look like? (Rose 2002, 2008, 2010; Freire 1970; Rubin 2011; Kholi 2014; Allington 2002, 2006, 2010; Roberts-Mahoney and Garrison 2015; Spann 2015; Hult 2014; Macedo 2018; Gardner 2006; Page 2014; Shor 2018; McNeil 2000; Chen 2008; Smythe 2015, Hartstone 2018; Owen 2015, 2016; Meyer 2010).
To read the rest of the article, go to https://thetracetaylor.com/2018/08/27/pedagogy-of-access/
“Trace told me several times, ‘I don’t want to change your words. I want to make sure that what we are doing here is your voice.’ This is very significant, especially when a second language learner is trying to express their words, and they don’t know how.”
English Language Learners
“My job as an instructor is not to teach someone how to say what I think they’re trying to say. It’s to teach them how to figure out for themselves what they want to say and how they want to say it” (Taylor, 2025).
Education-Focused Qualitative Arts-Based Research
A Trace Taylor-Charles Vanover qualitative arts-based research film of a play Vanover scripted from his ethnographic interviews at an urban public school in Chicago, a play directed by Bob Devon Jones and first performed at Studio@620 in St, Petersburg, Florida.
