Multicultural Curriculum Research Articles

Effects of Gender, Ethnicity, and School Equity on Students' Leadership Behaviors in a Group Game

Leadership skills and the perception of leadership by students and classroom teachers are examined in 10 desegregated elementary schools. The 10 schools were first divided into "high-equity" and "low-equity" schools based on the extent to which they met "integrative" educational criteria, such as multicultural curricula, multiethnic staff, minority parent involvement, and other factors. A random sample of 202 Hispanic and Anglo students participated in a cooperative group task in gender-segregated groups composed of 3 students from each ethnic group. Results indicate that trained observers found gender differences in nonverbal and verbal leadership behaviors among students across the schools, including higher activity rates overall in the high-equity schools. Observers did not find ethnic or gender differences in global leadership scores. Teachers and students rated Hispanic students lower on leadership, and this difference was most marked for Hispanic females in low-equity schools. The article includes a discussion of variation in school desegregation effects, as well as school and community leadership roles for Hispanics.

Teacher Attitudes to Multicultural Curriculum Development

This study reports teacher attitudes towards multicultural curricula developments in a sample of New South Wales state primary schools and the assimilation orientation of the respondents prior to the publication and dissemination of the state Multicultural Education Policy document. In general, teachers were favourably disposed to non-English-speaking minority children maintaining their ethnic identity, particularly through the use of their ethnic language. However they were negatively disposed to schools being actively involved in teaching ethnic languages, and to schools extending multicultural curricula. Teachers of English as a second language were more favourably disposed to the propositions than either of the other two groups (administration and class teachers). Class teachers were less favourably inclined to community language teaching and to the development of multicultural curricula. The second part of the study measured the assimilation orientation of teachers on a three-point scale: angloconformism, interactionism and pluralism. The most popular alternative was interactionism, with pluralism being an unpopular choice. The argument is presented that little attitudinal change has occurred since the implementation of the Multicultural Education Policy.

Designing Curriculum Materials for Multicultural Education: Lessons from an Australian Development Project

ABSTRACTThis article is concerned with the decision-making processes that took place in a multicultural curriculum development project. An examination of those processes has highlighted some significant issues concerning the nature of multicultural education.The project was entitled “An Indian Ocean People.” It sought to portray the family life styles of ethnic groups whose country of origin was in the Indian Ocean region but who were now resident in Western Australia.Four main issues emerged during the project team's deliberations. These involved consideration of how the cultural characteristics of ethnic groups can best be portrayed, the role of studying countries of origin as part of multicultural education, the pursuit of cultural maintenance or cultural awareness as outcomes of multicultural education and the role of multicultural education as a component of the existing school curriculum.The resolution of these issues was a complex process, yet in the end some important points were made. The problem...

Human Rights, Racism and the Multicultural Curriculum

Several countries are now experiencing serious difficulties in the field of race relations and human rights. Economic decline has sharpened social tensions and helped to foster the emergence of extremist groups. Increases in racial harrassment and violence have been recorded and institutionalized and individual racism is seen by visible minority groups as the main and central issue in the struggle for legitimate human rights, justice and equality. Decisions on immigration and nationality appear capricious and racially motivated. At the same time, early enthusiasm for the development of a predominantly ’folkloric’ multicultural education has waned, before the time has been available or the resources concentrated on the construction of a more theoretically well‐based and practically operationalized multicultural curriculum. Increasingly, there is dissatisfaction from all shades of political opinion with, on the one hand, the apparent legitimating function of multicultural education vis‐a‐vis the status quo ...

Review: Bilingual Education Research Handbook: Strategies for the Design of Multicultural Curriculum and Language Issues in Multicultural Settings Edited by Martha Montero

Review: <i>Bilingual Education Research Handbook: Strategies for the Design of Multicultural Curriculum and Language Issues in Multicultural Settings</i> Edited by Martha Montero

Schooling and Symbolic Violence: The Effect of Power Differences and Curriculum Factors on Hispanic Students' Attitudes Toward Their Own Ethnicity

This paper examines the relationship between two mechanisms of symbolic violence-power difference and curriculum factors and Hispanic students' attitudes toward their own ethnicity. Symbolic violence is studied in its effect on Hisp-anic students' attitudes toward their own ethnicity. These relationships are explored with a sample of sixth-grade Hispanic male and female students (n = 118) from an analytical sample of 10 elementary schools in California. The specific power-difference factors investigated are: student-power differences (percent Anglo and socioeconomic status of the school), parent-power differences, and staff-power differences. Curriculum factors are operationalized in terms of the level of multicultural curriculum in the school. Pearson product moment correlations are calculated between these school-level factors and individual Hispanic students' levels of ethnic salience in self identification and attitudes toward their own ethnic group. In general the findings indicate that these power-difference and curriculum factors are indeed mechanisms of symbolic violence as they are related to ethnic salience and attitudes toward students' own ethnic group. Differences are found in the pattern of relationships for the two dependent variables and in the strength of the relationships for males and females.

Race and Schooling: some recent contributions

why, has frequently been used to ridicule the short length of time each theory was fashionable, praise and optimism being replaced by scorn and rejection. Very few theories can have suffered so short an optimistic phase as those concerned with multiracial, multicultural education. Barely had a small section of the teaching profession been converted--the vast majority of teachers refusing to alter their 'colour blind', dominant culture curriculum-barely had a few local authorities begun to appoint multicultural advisers and curriculum development groups, when the critics began pouring scorn on the innovations, particularly those taking place in secondary schools. The attack has come from several directions, but most eloquently from those who suggest that multiracial education is, by and large, based on a false or simplistic analysis of the relationships between race, social class and education, and that the institutional developments so far most fashionable are more in the interests of teachers and their problems of classroom control than they are in the interests of the children they were supposed to serve. Some of these criticisms are developed in considerable detail in Maureen Stone's The Education of the Black Child in Britain [1], a book which will be widely read in teacher training establishments as it is good value for ? 1.95. The main theme of the book is that multiracial education--defined very narrowly as black studies for black children-has developed from a particular theory of education and been supported by particular types of research. It is based upon the view that: (a) black children have low self-concepts; (b) an altered curriculum will enhance these self-concepts; (c) the social pathology view of the black family predominates in the justifications

The Idea of a Multicultural Curriculum [1

The Idea of a Multicultural Curriculum [1

Teaching Strategies for Ethnic Studies

Preface. I. GOALS, CONCEPTS, AND INSTRUCTIONAL PLANNING. 1. The Multicultural Curriculum: Rationale, Trends, and Goals. 2. Developing a Multicultural Curriculum. 3. Key Concepts for the Multicultural Curriculum. 4. Planning the Multicultural Curriculum. II. THE FIRST AMERICANS AND AFRICAN AMERICANS: CONCEPTS AND STRATEGIES. 5. American Indians: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. 6. Native Hawaiians: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. 7. African Americans: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. III. EUROPEAN AMERICANS: CONCEPTS AND STRATEGIES. 8. European Ethnic Groups: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. 9. Jewish Americans: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. IV. HISPANIC AMERICANS: CONCEPTS AND STRATEGIES. 10. Mexican Americans: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. 11. Puerto Ricans in the United States: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. 12. Cuban Americans: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. V. ASIAN AMERICANS AND ARAB AMERICANS: CONCEPTS AND STRATEGIES. 13. Asian Americans: Concepts, Strategies, and Materials. 14. Arab Americans: Concepts and Materials. VI. MULTICULTURAL UNITS AND EVALUATION. 15. Multicultural Units and Evaluation Strategies. Appendix A. Ethnic Groups in U.S. History: A Chronology of Key Events. Appendix B. Videotapes on Multicultural Education and U.S. Ethnic Groups. Appendix C. Books About Women of Color. Appendix D. The Carter G. Woodson Award Books. Appendix E. Twenty Classic and Landmark Books in Ethnic Literature. Index.

Viewpoint: Notes toward a Multi-Cultural Curriculum

Viewpoint: Notes toward a Multi-Cultural Curriculum

Educational Policy Priorities and the Multi-Cultural Curriculum

Educational Policy Priorities and the Multi-Cultural Curriculum