University of the Visayas

MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION AND THE

CULTURAL CURRICULUM
(A Partial Fulfillment for the course ED 517: SEMINAR ON CURRENT TRENDS AND ISSUES IN EDUCATION)

Submitted to
Prepared by

ASKIN D. VILLARIAS DR. MA. CRISPY

MAED-English VELASCO
Professor
RECAP
• Multicultural Education: Nature, Historical Development,
Characteristics and Goals
• Principles and Approaches to Multicultural Education
• Race, Class, Gender and Disability in the Classroom
• Language Diversity in the Classroom
• Special Education in a Diverse Society
• Cultural Issues in Education
SEXUAL AND GENDER MINORITIES IN
MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION
INTRODUCTION
• Since sexuality has been considered a
controversial topic, LGBTQ, queer and
gender identity issues are hesitantly
considered part of multicultural education.
• The assumption that culture refers to a group
of people who have overwhelmingly
complete similarities provides an obstacle to
thinking about the relationship between
multiculturalism and seemingly non-cultural
forms of bias.
SEXUAL ORIENTATION, GENDER
IDENTITY AND EXPRESSION
(SOGIE)
• SEXUAL ORIENTATION- describes to whom a
person is sexually attracted (asexual, bisexual,
heterosexual, homosexual)
• GENDER IDENTITY- one’s internal sense of
self and identity (male, female, genderqueer)
• GENDER EXPRESSION- how one embodies
gender attributes, presentations, roles, etc.
(masculine, feminine, androgynous)
LGBTQIA+ ISSUES AND THE
SCHOOL CURRICULUM
• LGBTQ parents face barriers to their
participation in school and are concerned that
their children might experience harassment.
• LGBTQIA+ teachers may be concerned that their
SOGIE puts them at risk in their jobs, especially
if there is no existing specific and strong anti-
discrimination laws.
• Understanding the political and social histories of
sexual and gender minorities highlight work
against biases of all forms.
CHALLENGES TO HOMOPHOBIA
AND HETEROSEXISM
• Commonplace derogations through phrases such
as “faggot” or “dyke” indicate that
homosexuality is still a focus of disapproval.
• Forms of homophobia may also be directed
towards people living traditional, indigenous
identities.
• Dissent by members of communities from the
sexual and/or gender norms can result in a
feeling that community norms have been
disrupted.
THE BIG QUESTION IS…

Can we conceive of education as a

welcoming place that recognizes difference?
SEVEN WAYS TO DO TO IMPROVE FOR STUDENTS OF ALL
SEXUAL ORIENTATIONS AND GENDERS
• Understand the complexity of sexuality and gender identity.
• Think critically about how heterosexism and homophobia have structured
all of our understandings of ourselves and of our relationships,
communities, and education.
• Challenge the implicit and explicit heterosexism, homophobia, and gender
conformity in the curricula and other school-based practices.
• Understand the intersections among gender, race, sexual orientation, class,
and other aspects of identity.
SEVEN WAYS TO DO TO IMPROVE FOR STUDENTS OF ALL
SEXUAL ORIENTATIONS AND GENDERS
• Try to queer your own categories of normal; interrogate them for
problematic assumptions about sexuality, gender, and youth as well as
other categories of diversity and difference.
• Learn about diverse LGBTQ histories and cultures, and understand how
heterosexual allies have been critical to obtaining social justice.
• Know about community resources for LGBTQ youth, including ally
faculty and staff at your own school.
 SCHOOL INCLUSION AND
MULTICULTURAL ISSUES IN SPECIAL
EDUCATION
SPECIAL EDUCATION AS
SEGREGATION
• The racial disparities in special education
becomes one of the key indicators of
misdiagnosis.
• Significant changes included early
identification of at-risk CLD
(culturally/linguistically diverse)
students in the mainstream to prevent
referral to special education and
interventions to enhance culturally
responsive teaching and learning in the
mainstream.
STRATEGIES TO PREVENT
MISDIAGNOSIS AND
DISPROPORTIONALITY

• Klingner and Edwards (2006) proposes an RTI

model for CLD students.
• Response To Intervention (RTI) is a multilevel
prevention system designed to maximize
student achievement and reduce behavior
problems. Within each level of intervention, a
teacher provides high-quality intervention
using evidence-based strategies and closely
monitors student progress and learning
outcomes.
MONOCULTURE OF THE
MAINSTREAM EDUCATION

• Critics of the RTI model have increasingly

called for shifting the focus from assumptions
that patterns of disproportionality toward a
reexamination of the culture of a mainstream
public school system that marginalizes
differences and reinforces further disparities.
• This monocultural perspective is universal that
it does not acknowledge how that schools no
longer representing all children or even most
children and their families.
PARENT PARTICIPATION AND
WORKING WITH FAMILIES

• Parent participation on behalf of children from

culturally and linguistically diverse groups is
widely acknowledged as essential to effective
special education services.
• However, parents find themselves confronting
an educational system that purports to seek
their involvement but is unyielding and
uncompromising when responding to parent
and community values
CAUSES OF LIMITED PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT

• Mistrust towards professionals

• Majority culture ethnocentrism
• Negative cultural stereotyping
• Professionals’ limited knowledge of diverse cultures
• Heavy work commitments
• Conflicting family responsibilities
• Poverty
QUALITIES OF A CULTURALLY COMPETENT TEACHER

According to Cartledge, Goldenberg and Kourlea (2008), delivering culturally

responsive, evidence-based teaching for students with disabilities necessitates a teacher
to:
• create a nurturing classroom that honors and incorporates the cultural
and linguistic heritages of all student members
• make connection with students as individuals and understanding how
context influences their interactions with each other
• provide structured communal learning opportunities that enhance the
teacher-directed approaches characteristic of mainstream school
QUALITIES OF A CULTURALLY COMPETENT TEACHER

• develop learning skills through dynamic teaching utilizing explicit,

combined with brisk pacing, ample academic responding opportunities,
and positive and corrective feedback
• utilizing peer-mediated and peer mentoring activities
• provides English language and bilingual support services as needed by
children for whom English is a second language or one of several
languages that may be spoken by immigrant families
• provide structured communal learning opportunities that enhance the
teacher-directed approaches characteristic of mainstream school
INTRODUCTION TO CULTURALLY
RESPONSIVE CURRICULUM
WHAT IS A CULTURALLY
RESPONSIVE CURRICULUM?

According to UNESCO’s International Bureau

of Education, a culturally responsive curriculum is
a curriculum that respects learners’ cultures and
prior experiences. It acknowledges and values the
legitimacy of different cultures, not just the
dominant culture of a society, and encourages
intercultural understanding. It incorporates cultural
aspects into the curriculum, rather than adding
them on as an extra or separate module or course.
KEY ELEMENTS OF A CULTURALLY
RESPONSIVE CURRICULUM

1) A culturally responsive curriculum

reflects a diversity of voices.
2) A culturally responsive curriculum
represents all cultural identities.
3) A culturally responsive curriculum
supports a wide variety of learning
styles.
4) A culturally responsive curriculum is
open to difficult dialogues.
LEVELS OF INTEGRATING
MULTICULTURAL CONTENT INTO
TEACHING

• LEVEL 1: The Contributions Approach

• LEVEL 2: The Additive Approach
• LEVEL 3: The Transformation
Approach
• LEVEL 4: The Social Action Approach
LEVEL 1: THE CONTRIBUTIONS
APPROACH

• It is characterized by the insertion of ethnic

heroes/heroines and discrete cultural artifacts
into the curriculum, selected using criteria
similar to those used to select mainstream
heroes/heroines and cultural artifacts.
• When the integration of the curriculum is
accomplished primarily through the infusion of
ethnic heroes/heroines and contributions,
students do not attain a global view of the role
of ethnic and cultural groups.
LEVEL 2: THE ADDITIVE APPROACH

• It is characterized by the mere addition of

content, concepts, themes, and perspectives to
the curriculum without changing its basic
structure, purposes and characteristics.
• However, the content and materials in this
approach shares similar disadvantages with the
contributions approach when the students
neither have the content background nor the
attitudinal sophistication to respond to them
appropriately.
LEVEL 3: THE TRANSFORMATION
APPROACH

• It changes the basic assumptions of the

curriculum and enables students to view
concepts, issues, themes, and problems from
several ethnic perspectives and points of view.
• The infusion of various perspectives, frames of
references, and content from different groups
that will extend students’ understandings of the
nature, development, and complexity of the
learning area.
FOCUS/EMPHASIS IN VARIOUS SUBJECT AREAS IN
TRANSFORMATIONAL APPROACH OF INTEGRATING
MULTICULTURAL CONTENT

• For language arts, when students learn about the proper usage of a target language,
they may be helped to understand the rich linguistic and language diversity that have
influenced the development of the concerned language.
• For music, dance and literature, the teacher may acquaint students with the ways these
art forms among ethnic groups have greatly influenced and enriched the nation’s artistic
and literary traditions.
• For history, emphasis should be on how the studied country’s common culture and
society emerged from a complex synthesis and interaction of the diverse cultural
elements that originated within the various cultural, racial, ethnic, and religious groups
that make up the current state of the studies country.
LEVEL 4: THE SOCIAL ACTION
APPROACH

• It includes all elements of the transformation

approach but adds components that require
students to make decisions and take actions
related to the concept, issue, or problem studied
in the unit.
• The main goal of this approach is to educate
students for social criticism and social change
and to teach them decision-making skills.
THE COMPONENTS OF SOCIAL ACTION APPROACH

1) A Decision Problem/Question
2) An Inquiry That Provides Data Related to the Decision Problem
3) Value Inquiry and Moral Analysis
4) Decision Making and Social Action
GUIDELINES IN TEACHING MULTICULTURAL CONTENT

1) The teacher is an extremely important variable in the teaching of

multicultural content.
2) Knowledge about ethnic groups is needed to teach ethnic content
effectively.
3) Be sensitive to your own racial attitudes, behaviors, and the statements
you make about ethnic groups in the classroom.
4) Make sure that your classroom conveys positive and complex images of
various ethnic groups.
5) Be sensitive to the racial and ethnic attitudes of your students and do not
accept the belief, which has been refuted by research, that ‘‘kids do not see
colors.’’
GUIDELINES IN TEACHING MULTICULTURAL CONTENT

6) Be judicious in your choice and use of teaching materials.

7) Use trade books, films, videotapes, CDs, and recordings to supplement the
textbook treatment of ethnic, cultural, and language groups and to present
the perspectives of these groups to your students.
8) Get in touch with your own cultural and ethnic heritage.
9) Be sensitive to the possibly controversial nature of some ethnic studies
materials.
10) Be sensitive to the developmental levels of your students when you
select concepts, content, and activities related to racial, ethnic, cultural, and
language groups.
GUIDELINES IN TEACHING MULTICULTURAL CONTENT

11) View your students of color as winners.

12) Keep in mind that most parents of color are very interested in education
and want their children to be successful academically even though the
parents may be alienated from the school.
13) Use cooperative learning techniques and group work to promote racial
and ethnic integration in the school and classroom.
14) Make sure that school plays, pageants, cheerleading squads,
publications, and other formal and informal groups are racially integrated.
REFERENCES:

Banks, C. and Banks, J. (2010). Multicultural Education: Issues and Perspectives

(7th Ed). Wiley.

Hanover Research (n. d.). Culturally Responsive Curriculum.

https://www.wasa-oly.org/WASA/images/WASA/6.0%20Resources/Equity/DISCUS
SION%20GUIDE---
CULTURALLY%20RESPONSIVE%20CURRICULUM.pdf

University of Iowa (n. d.). Four Approaches to Multicultural Reform. https://

intime.uni.edu/four-approaches-multicultural-curriculum-reform