Problems with a multicultural education?

Patrick Bitsui: There are so many good things about multicultural education, especially if it is well incorporated. However, here are a few problems that I have observed throughout my years in school. There are thousands of cultures in the world. Invariably some group gets left out, which can cause negative feelings. Personally, I feel that when there is too much emphasis on multicultural education it can even increase racist attitudes because it puts the focus on differences. This in turn can create scenarios where students feel like they have to "choose a side". Depending on how multiculturalism is inserted into the curriculum, it can take time away from more basic subjects such as reading and math. Also, it can cause skewed and inaccurate views (especially in history) if those creating the curriculum try to "make things fair" by introducing an "even" number of people from different cultural groups. Things that happened in the past weren't always fair, and I think if th! at isn't acknowledged some really valuable lessons are lost. The following example uses gender, but the same concept would apply for cultural and racial groups too. A teacher or curriculum specialist takes care to ensure that notable men and women from early american history are introduced in equal numbers for the sake of "being fair". While this sounds really nice and warm and fuzzy, it makes it seem as though men and women contributed equally to the major events in our country's history. This is historically inaccurate and, in my opinion, trivializes important things such as women's rights. After all, if women are presented as having influence equal to men all along, the significance of women gaining the right to vote is diminished considerably. Again, this scenario has similar implications for any group, not just gender. Although well-intended, I think that an over-emphasis on multiculturalism often does more harm than good. It takes a good, very aware teacher to impleme! nt multiculturalism in a truly beneficial way....Show more

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Davina Shindler: Issues In Multicultural Education

Evelin Turlich: There are many issues with the implementation of multicultural education in the classroom. 1) Some teachers have a bias against multicultural children being placed in the schools in the U.S.2) Some male teacher are opposed to having multicultural education methods implemented in their classrooms.3) Preservice teachers found that control over classrooms was lost when multicultural education was discussed.4) There was a very broad range of attitudes among teachers who discussed multicultural education for their classrooms....Show more