Teachers’ perceptions of multicultural education: a study of middle and high school social studies teachers in Jordan

Abstract

Jordanian social studies teachers’ viewpoints on teaching multicultural education in social studies classes need further exploration to understand and explain the existing phenomena and eventually to find a solution. It should be pointed out that most research studies conducted on multicultural education in Jordanian social studies classrooms focused on textbook content analysis. None have focused specifically on multicultural education in social studies at the secondary school level, particularly on secondary and middle school instructors’ teaching strategies. The researcher interviewed 15 Jordanian middle and high school social studies teachers about their perceptions of teaching multicultural education. Two groups of (middle school) and (high school) teachers were selected using “purposive” sampling. The data was analyzed qualitatively including the translations of the interviews, the Ministry of Education’s teaching guidelines, and textbook teacher manuals. The study's results indicated that Jordanian social studies teachers are not very familiar with the definition and teaching strategies of multicultural education. The Jordanian Ministry of Education does not require teachers to teach multicultural education. In addition, teachers’ guidelines from the Ministry of Education textbooks focused largely on content with only minor references to teaching multicultural education. The current study concluded that the current Jordanian social studies curriculum is deficient in terms of multicultural education. In addition, Ministry of Education guidelines related to teaching social studies at the middle and high level revealed little discussion of multicultural education and do not suggest strategies to aid the teachers in the instructional process.