Learner DIfferences

Week #1 Update #1

Theresa Schantz

Multicultural Education

It is no secret nor a surprise to anyone in education that multicultural education needs to be an addition to the curricula nationwide, across the board. This has been a well known fact for some time now, decades at least. So why hasn’t a good sound foundation of multicultural education been implemented in our K-12 schools? The answer may need to start at teacher education programs. Multicultural Teacher Education (MTE) has yet to implement a sound and solid base for teachers to work with.

In a study published in March 2020, it was indicated that pre-service teachers were not prepared properly for the depth of multicultural education needed to pass that knowledge onto our youth. Many of the programs studied, the extent of their multicultural education was one class on diversity. How are educators expected to incorporate appropriate multicultural education when they also were not privy to adequate education.

“Teacher education scholars have argued that the most effective way to prepare teachers to create equitable schools is to incorporate themes of equity and justice across teacher education curricula. However, in most cases these themes are not incorporated across teacher education curricula.”

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340023806_Supporting_Critical_Multicultural_Teacher_Educators_Transformative_teaching_social_justice_education_and_perceptions_of_institutional_support