Multicultural Education in Today's Classrooms

Paper Summary:

The following paper presents information and statistics encouraging the use of multicultural education in classrooms. The United States has always been very diverse, but its diversity is growing more and more with each passing year. The paper first presents the numbers and statistics associated with this growing diversity as compared to the numbers in the past. Secondly, the paper points out some documented cases promoting the benefits of using multicultural education in classrooms. And lastly it presents some ideas and recommendations, which can be used by educators to implement into their curricula.

From the Paper:

"The first example of cultural differentiation was perhaps one major basis for why the United States was formed. A group of people sailed away from the culture and religion they once knew, and ventured out to a new land, to seek the freedom they longed for. And now as our country grows more culturally diverse it is essential that students be taught to accommodate with our ever-changing cultural landscape. Today, with more than one-fourth of the U.S. population is enrolled in school; the student population is quite diverse. One-fourth of the population accounts for about 72 million people, which were in school throughout the United States in October 1999. Eight million were enrolled in nursery school and kindergarten, 33 million in elementary school, 16 million in high school, and 15 million in college. Among children enrolled in kindergarten, the majority were White non-Hispanics (60 percent), followed by Blacks (16 percent), and Hispanics (17 percent). Asians and Pacific Islanders accounted for 5 percent of children enrolled in kindergarten. (1) The numbers accounting for children enrolled in elementary school are the highest, which is why it is essential that multicultural education be introduced at a very young age. The Institute of International Education estimates that there are 450,000 international students in the United States, and most of these students come from Asian and Latin American countries. (2) The presence of multiculturalism in American education is indisputable, but it is still a minority movement. Many skeptics feel that by integrating diversity into the American education system, it would be impoverishing the "White European" cultural model, thus doing away with the classics of art and literature, and depriving the students of essential knowledge. However, others have argued for the benefits of multicultural education as an active approach to learning, which encourages the learner to create his or her own knowledge. (3) As teachers prepare for the many educational challenges of the next century, it is essential that they learn how to build bridges between students' home cultures and the cultures of their school environment. These bridges are essential for student academic success, and without them, a serious disservice is done to both students and the larger society in every day life that will ultimately benefit from the development of their special talents. (4) Therefore, because our society has become so diverse, more teachers should implement multicultural education into their classrooms."

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