This article was downloaded by: [Ondokuz Mayis Universitesine]On: 11 November 2014, At: 12:58Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number:1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street,London W1T 3JH, UK
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Multicultural teachereducation for the 21stcenturyGeneva Gay a & Tyrone C. Howard ba Curriculum and Instruction , University ofWashington , Seattleb School of Teaching and Learning , Ohio StateUniversity ,Published online: 20 Jan 2010.
To cite this article: Geneva Gay & Tyrone C. Howard (2000) Multiculturalteacher education for the 21st century, The Teacher Educator, 36:1, 1-16, DOI:10.1080/08878730009555246
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MULTICULTURAL TEACHER EDUCATIONFOR THE 21st CENTURY
Geneva GayCurriculum and Instruction, University of Washington, Seattle
Tyrone C. HowardSchool of Teaching and Learning, Ohio State University
AbstractThis article explains several reasons why multicultural preservice teachereducation is important and suggests some ways it can be betteraccomplished. The authors make a strong case for teacher educationprograms to be more deliberate about preparing European Americans toteach ethnically diverse students of color. They argue that this explicitprofessional preparation is needed because of the increasing racial,cultural, and linguistic divide between teachers (predominately EuropeanAmerican) and K–12 students (increasingly from ethnic groups of color).Two other factors underscore the need for more multicultural teachereducation: the fear of diversity and the resistance to dealing with raceand racism frequently expressed by students enrolled in teacher educationprograms. To overcome these problems and better prepare preserviceteachers to work effectively with ethnically diverse students the authorssuggest a two-part program of professional development.
We seriously doubt that existing preservice programs areadequately preparing teachers to meet the instructional challenges ofethnically, racially, socially, and linguistically diverse students in the21st century. These doubts are prompted by several developmentsthat are already evident and others that are beginning to emerge.They involve students enrolled in both K-12 schools and in teachereducation programs, and changes occurring in society at large. Someof these are discussed in this article, along with recommendations onhow to better prepare teachers for the challenges of multiculturaleducation.
The Demographic DivideAccording to recent statistics from the U.S. Department of
Education (1999a, 1999b), 86% of all elementary and secondaryteachers are European Americans. The number of African Americanteachers has declined from a high of 12% in 1970 to 7% in 1998.The number of Latino and Asian/Pacific Islander American teachers
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is increasing slightly, but the percentages are still very small(approximately 5% and 1%, respectively). Native Americanscomprise less than 1% of the national teaching force.
Student enrollments are growing in the opposite directionracially. Sixty-four percent of K-12 students are European American.The other 36% are distributed accordingly among groups of color:17% African American, 14% Latinos, 4% Asian/Pacific IslanderAmericans, and 1% Native Americans/Alaskans (U.S. Department ofEducation, 1999a, 1999b). These enrollment trends are expected tocontinue to grow as the new century progresses. For example, theAnnie E. Casey Foundation (as cited in U.S. Department ofEducation, 1999a, 1999b), a private charitable foundation forbuilding better futures for disadvantaged children, projected that asearly as 2005 there will be significant changes in the number ofchildren in the U.S. by ethnic groups. European Americans areexpected to decline by 3%, but African Americans will increase by8% and Native Americans by 6%. The greatest increases arepredicted to occur among Asian/Pacific Islanders (32%) and Latinos(21%). Undoubtedly, these changes will be reflected in schoolenrollments as well. Students currently enrolled in teacher educationprograms will be affected directly by these radical changes in theethnic, racial, and cultural distribution of students in schools.
Furthermore, large numbers of European Americans andstudents of color really do not attend school with each other; nor aredifferent groups of color in the same schools. Most students go toschool with others from their own ethnic groups. Stated differently,despite over four decades of experimentation with desegregation,massive numbers of students continue to attend racially segregatedschools. For example, students of color are the majority in 70 of the130 school districts in the United States with a student population of36,000 or more. This majority ranges from 51% to 97%. Students ofcolor are 55% of the enrollments in the 449 school districts with apopulation of 15,000 or more. African Americans are thepredominate group of color in 75 of the 130 largest schools districts,Latinos in 33, Asian Americans in 6, and Native American/Alaskansin only 1 (Alaska). Only 4 of the largest school districts have a fairlyequal distribution of Latino, African, and Asian American students(U.S. Department of Education, 1999a).
An additional indicator of the racial separation of students inschools is evident in the geography of school enrollments. Students ofcolor are heavily clustered in large cities, urban centers, and
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occasionally in rural areas. Also, ethnic groupings of students arespecific to different regions of the country. African Americans areheavily clustered in the Southeast and the Great Lakes region; NativeAmericans in the Great Plains, Pacific Northwest and Alaska; AsianAmericans along the Pacific Coast and in Hawaii; and Latinos inNew York, Florida, and the Southwest.
Many teachers do not share residential backgrounds withstudents they teach, and ethnically diverse students are notnecessarily in the same classrooms. These two facts have majorimplications for teacher education. So does another developing trendin the profession—the many veteran teachers expected to retire in thenext three to five years. A tremendous amount of experience andexpertise is going to be lost with their departures. An even biggerconcern for multicultural education is the high percentage of teachersof color (especially African Americans) who will be among theseretirements. They will not be easily replaced because there are so fewstudents of color enrolled in teacher education programs. These areadded reasons why European Americans must be taught thoroughlyduring their preservice training how to be effective multiculturalteachers of ethnically diverse students.
Troubling Attitudes and AssumptionsCoupled with the growing "demographic divide" among students
and teachers are some troubling attitudes toward racial and ethnicdiversity, which have strong implications for multicultural teacherpreparation in the 21st century. It would appear that two of theseare particularly significant: fear of teaching students of color andresistance to dealing directly with race and racism in teacher preparationand classroom practices.
Fear of Teaching DiversityIt is a common occurrence for students in teacher education
programs to express various forms of subtle resistance to embracingthe multicultural imperative for quality teaching and learning, and towork diligently to develop the knowledge and skills needed for itseffective implementation. It has been the authors' personalobservations that this resistance takes many different forms,including fear, denial of the verity of ethnic and cultural diversity inteaching and learning, and reluctance to confront issues of racial,ethnic, and cultural diversity directly and substantively. Elementarypreservice teachers frequently declare that they are afraid of engaging
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different ethnic groups and multicultural education content in theirclassrooms. Secondary education students often express doubts aboutthe relevance of multicultural education for their content areas,especially the case for those in math and science. Both preservice andinservice teachers are puzzled about how they can teachsimultaneously for meeting standards of academic excellence andmulticultural education. Many think this is impossible, even as theyclaim to accept the need to do both.
When the reasons for these fears and resistance are examined,racial prejudices, anxiety about lack of knowledge of ethnic andcultural diversity, and doubts about teaching ethnic others quicklysurface. These attitudes are exemplified in statements made by theauthors' teacher education students, such as "I've never lived near orhad any close contact with Native, African, or Latino Americans;""There are too many cultures and ethnic groups and I don't knowenough to teach them all;" "I won't have time to teach everything elseand multicultural education, too;" and "There's nothingmulticultural about algebra, biology, geography, chemistry, calculus,or computer science." Some fears are more immediate and directlyrelated to multicultural experiences within teacher educationprograms. Illustrative of these are comments made by a significantnumber of students who enroll in our multicultural education classes.They are concerned about "inadvertently saying something stupid orhurtful and embarrassing themselves or offending people from otherethnic groups;" "political correctness being so strong that honest andsubstantive discussions would not occur;" "worrying over culture andethnicity while losing sight of 'valid' educational objectives;" and "notbeing able to move beyond superficial knowledge of other culturesand therefore perpetuating stereotypes." These are legitimateconcerns that need to be addressed explicitly in multicultural teachereducation programs.
Even some of those students who appear to be more receptive toteaching multicultural education express problematic attitudes andassumptions. When they talk about their preparation formulticultural teaching they often simplify it to "being aware andappreciative of cultural differences," "dialoguing about diversity," and"infusing cultural diversity into teaching." These students seem notto realize that cultural awareness and conversations about racial,ethnic, and cultural diversity without pedagogical action areinsufficient to change their teaching. Nor do they realize thatmulticultural infusion requires sophisticated cultural knowledge,curriculum design, and pedagogical skills.
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Resistance to Dealing with Race and RacismOther students point out that disparities in school achievement
and inequities among ethnic groups in the larger U.S. society aremore the result of social class, gender, economics, power, andprivilege than race and ethnicity. To support their claims thesestudents evoke such "evidence" as "people are more alike thandifferent," "there are more differences within than among ethnicgroups," and "regardless of ethnic or racial identity, middle and upperclass people (especially males) are advantaged over the poor." Whilethese students may be willing to participate in "dialogues" aboutracially and ethnically-related issues with members of diverse groups,they want these conversations to take place in "safe environments."These "safe places" usually are not clearly defined, but they seem toimply conversations that are devoid of controversy, conflict,confrontation, and contention. Also appeals frequently made toconcepts like "racelessness," "race as a social construction," and"privilege" found in social science research and scholarship maysupport claims that race and racism are not paramount in teachingmulticultural education.
Yet there is evidence that race and racism continue to be critical,influential factors in society and schools. One example of thisevidence is a recent report on race relations released by LeadershipEducation for Asian Pacifies (as cited in Kang, 2000). The reportindicated that although open hostility and bigotry against AsianAmericans have declined significantly since World War II they arestill perceived as "foreigners." One of the scholars contributing tothe report declared that, "No matter what their citizenship, how longthey may have resided in the United States or how assimilated theyare, the 'common understanding' that Asians are an alien presencein America is still the prevailing assumption in American culture"(p. A7). This perception is rather ironic, given that Asian Americansare the most educated of all ethnic groups of color in the U.S., andtheir presence and influence are strongly felt in high status arenassuch as academia, business, and high-tech industries. Aliens (1998)study on children's perceptions of race and class in the media revealedthat children from all ethnic groups are aware of ethnic and racialstereotypes presented (especially of African Americans and Latinos) inthe media at an early age, and understand the power of television andother media in shaping people's opinions about diversity.
According to Bartolome and Macedo (1997), "the popular pressand the mass media educate more people about issues regarding
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ethnicity and race than all other sources of education available toU.S. citizens" (p. 223). This media education is a form of ideologicalmanagement (Spring, 1992; Cortés, 1995, 2000). Cortés (2000) andDates and Barlow (1990) explained further that the importance ofmass media as sources of multicultural information goes far beyondthe question of inclusion and the accuracy of diversity. It is a matterof constructing, disseminating, and institutionalizing particular, oftendistorted, images of different ethnic and cultural groups. Studentsand teachers are bombarded with these images, and the attitudes theyevoke, on a day-to-day basis. Cortés (2000) suggested the mediainfluence (what he calls the "mass media multicultural curriculum")extends even beyond creating and disseminating images of ethnicgroups. It also involves
transmission of information (correct or incorrect, balanced or distorted,contextualized or stereotypical) . . . disseminating and influencing ofvalues and attitudes . . . shaping and reinforcing of expectations . . .providing of models for action and the disinhibiting of other actions. Inshort,. . . the mass media have contributed significantly to the corpus ofAmerican thinking, feeling, and acting in the realm of diversity, (p. 69)
These images, thoughts, feelings, and actions, in turn, have strongimplications for the nature and quality of multicultural teachereducation and K-12 instruction.
There also are direct correlations between power, privilege, andachievement, and the racial and ethnic identity of students' who aresuccessfull in school. African American, Latino, and Native Americanstudents perform at radically different levels (usually lower) thanEuropean Americans on all measures of school achievement that areroutinely examined in national and state-level assessment programs.These include school attendance and graduate rates, subject testscores, disciplinary referrals, enrollment in gifted and specialeducation, and college completion. A horrifying indicator of theeffects of the intersection of race, ethnicity, and school achievement isthe fact that the performance of poor 1 lth-grade Latinos and AfricanAmericans is lower than or barely equal to that of 8th-grade middle-class European Americans in the academic core subjects of reading,writing, math, and science (U.S. Department of Education, 1999a,1999b). Although the range of difference is somewhat smaller, theperformance of middle-class students of color is not comparable totheir European American counterparts (Gay, 1997).
These are not coincidences. Nor will they be corrected bydenying the significant role of race, ethnicity, and racism in the
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educational experiences of students from different ethnic groups.Thus, teachers need to develop knowledge and skills for transformingprograms and practices that perpetuate racism and otherwisedishonor ethnic and cultural diversity. This training should beginwith multicultural education being mandatory, explicit, and thoroughin all teacher education programs. Whether teachers intend to workin schools with students from predominately homogeneouspopulations or from multiple ethnic groups and culturalbackgrounds, all need to develop multicultural knowledge andpedagogical skills. No students should graduate from any teachereducation program and be certified or hired to teach without beingthoroughly trained in multicultural education. Such education willgo far beyond the one or two introductory survey multiculturalcourses that are typical of many current teacher education programs.
Acquiring Cultural Knowledge of Self and OthersInstructors of multicultural education spend much of their time
trying to persuade students of the meaning and significance ofculture and ethnicity in the lives of people. Although theseunderstandings are critical, developing them is not exclusively thetask of college of education professors. Our responsibilities lie morewith the application of culturally diverse knowledge and sensitivitiesto the various aspects of the educational enterprise. Yet knowledge ofcultural diversity is fundamental to the effective implementation ofmulticultural education. Therefore, a reasonable place to beginpreparation programs for multicultural teaching is withunderstanding the ethnicity and culture of different ethnic groups,including European Americans.
Many European Americans claim they have no culture orethnicity; they are simply "Americans." They assume that theirnorms, values, beliefs, and behaviors are universal givens, "just theway things are." This, of course, is not true. These claims—whatsome scholars describe as "taken-for granted assumptions" (Bowers &Flinders, 1990)—preclude European American ethnicity and culturefrom being contested, and automatically place other ethnic groupswho do not subscribe to the same norms in lower-status rankings
Critical Cultural ConsciousnessThe exploration of cultural consciousness and ethnic identity
development should be critical when students analyze their ownethnic heritages; analyze the assumptions and beliefs they hold about
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other ethnic groups and cultures; and compare their assumptionsabout cultural diversity with other groups' versions of knowledge,truth, and reality. For example, European American teachereducation students might critically examine what they think are thesocial priorities of various Asian American groups and compare themto what these groups declare are their own priorities. They also mayanalyze their perceptions of whiteness in comparison to how it isperceived by different groups of color. Or, what cultural values andsocialization are reflected in a variety of beliefs and behaviorsconsidered desirable or "normative" in learning, such as spotlightingthe most academically accomplished students, covering the subjectmatter content, and making individuals more important than groupsand organizations.
Unless European American teachers seriously analyze and changetheir cultural biases and ethnic prejudices (toward self and others)they are not likely to be very diligent and effective in helpingstudents to do likewise. Part of this self-examination is unpackingtheir own ethnicity and understanding themselves as racial andcultural beings. Central to this process is knowing and admitting thatracism permeates schools and society, recognizing the benefits theyderive from it, and making a conscientious commitment to stop itsperpetuation. In a recent book examining the role of EuropeanAmericans in multicultural education Howard (1999) supported thismandate. Using an insider's perspective and personal voice he advisedWhite educators to
look within ourselves and realign our deepest assumptions and perceptionsregarding the racial marker that we carry, namely Whiteness.. . . We needto understand the dynamics of past and present dominance, face how wehave been shaped by myths of superiority, and begin to sort out ourthoughts, emotions, and behaviors relative to race and other dimensionsof human diversity.. . . We must. . . transform both ourselves and thesocial conditions of injustice that continue to stifle the potential of toomany of our students from all racial and cultural groups, (pp. 4, 6)
Placing more of the responsibilities for implementingmulticultural education on the shoulders of European Americaneducators signifies a significant shift of emphasis. Previously the onushas been placed on educators of color. Too many people still makethis assumption, as evidenced by the frequency with which "hiremore educators of color" or "get more students of color into teachereducation programs" is the ready response to discussions about theneed to implement more multicultural education in schools.Expecting European Americans to be in the forefront of the
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implementation of multicultural education is both logical andrealistic. After all, they comprise 86% of all teachers (U.S.Department of Education, 1999b). However, this does not in anyway diminish the roles, responsibilities, and contributions ofeducators of color to multicultural teaching. It is simply that theycannot do the job by themselves.
Cultural and ethnic self-analyses and self-reflections areimportant skills for all teachers to develop because, as Walsh (1988)suggested, "Thinking critically is the antithesis of prejudicialthinking," and "A critical thinker strives for as accurate a worldviewas possible to make informed judgments" (p. 280). The open-mindedness and humility that result from understanding how cultureand ethnicity affect their own being and behaving also will maketeachers receptive to the validity of others' differentness. This kind ofreciprocity of rights to culture and ethnicity is imperative for effectivemulticultural teaching.
Techniques for Developing Ethnic and Cultural Self-AwarenessSome helpful guidance in how teachers can become more
consciously aware of their own cultures and how they influenceattitudes, beliefs, and behaviors about self and others is offered bySpindler and Spindler (1993). They have developed a techniquecalled "cultural therapy." It combines acquiring cultural knowledge ofself and others with developing culturally informed pedagogicalactionin classrooms.
These self-analysis strategies can be further enriched by othersgleaned from Howard's (1999) personal reflections on the process oftransformative White ethnic identity development, which heconsiders essential to effective multicultural teaching by EuropeanAmericans. These include (a) critical honesty about the culturallyconditioned assumptions of White dominance and perceptions oftruth; (b) genuine empathy for the experiences, issues, andperspectives of other ethnic groups; (c) advocating for theredistribution of power and privilege among ethnic groups; and(d) investing resources and energies in the actual process of change.
Bell, Washington, Weinstein, and Love (1997) proposed eightother elements of self-knowledge as prerequisites to teaching forsocial justice. These are awareness of one's own social identities;confronting self-biases and prejudices; resolving anxieties aboutdealing with prejudices toward diversity expressed by students;overcoming doubts about personal competency and fears of
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antagonizing ethnically diverse students; dealing with emotionalintensity and concerns about losing classroom control; disclosure ofpersonal beliefs, values, and experiences; negotiating power andauthority issues; and attending to institutional risks and resistance.These elements of self-knowledge apply as well to multiculturalteaching in general. Social justice in schools and society is both anintended outcome and a descriptive characteristic of multiculturaleducation.
Cultural, racial, and ethnic knowledge about self and othersshould be developed through courses designed in collaboration withprofessors of education, but taught in various social science unitsacross university campuses. These might include culturalanthropology, sociolinguistics, social psychology, and ethnic andwomen's studies. The competencies they engender should berequirements for admission to colleges of education. The magnitudeof these requirements might range from a multicultural core clusterof three or four courses to a full-fledge minor in cultural diversity.
Developing Multicultural Pedagogical Knowledge and SkillsAfter a sufficient knowledge background about ethnic and
cultural diversity has been acquired, the next step in preparation formulticultural teaching is learning how to translate multiculturalknowledge into pedagogical practices. This training should centeraround six major areas of competence. These are (a) multiculturalclassroom communications; (b) multicultural foundations ofeducation; (c) multicultural pedagogical knowledge and skills;(d) multicultural performance appraisal; (e) public relations skillsfor culturally diverse families, groups, and communities; and(f) multicultural change agency. We examine four of the six brieflyto give a sample of how they should be operationalized in teachereducation.
Multicultural CommunicationsSkills in multicultural classroom communications are necessary
for two obvious reasons. First, effective communication is the heartof teaching. Second, communication is strongly influenced byculture. Students from different ethnic groups and culturalbackgrounds talk, write, think, and listen in ways that are differentfrom school patterns and expectations. More specifically, thesedifferences can be seen in relationships between speakers andlisteners, problem-solving processes, task engagement, organization of
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ideas, self-presentation, how individuals gain entry intoconversations, and how speakers relate to the content ofconversations.
Two quick examples are provided here to illustrate some of thesecommunicative differences (see Gay, 2000 for a more detaileddiscussion of them). One is the lingering controversy and confusionover African American Ebonics. Many people still think that Ebonicsis only grammatically incorrect Mainstream Standard English. Othersrestrict it to linguistic structure. In fact, the most vital dimensions ofAfrican American communication are its discourse features (e.g., howideas are organized, words are used, and significance signaled), andcultural nuances (e.g., rhythmic patterns, values, and self-positioning) embedded within them. Without understanding these,teachers will not be able to cull from African American students allthat they know about what is being taught. Nor can they teachstudents as well as they should how to shift communicative styles toserve diverse purposes, such as taking tests and engaging in "schooltalk" to improve academic performance.
The other example has to do with how students from differentethnic groups organize their thoughts in written and verbal forms.Two major patterns are usually identified: topic-centered and topic-chaining (Au, 1993). The first one is the preference of EuropeanAmericans and schools, while the second is the preference of groupsof color. Briefly, topic-centered "talk" is linear, reportorial,descriptive, and dispassionate. By comparison topic-chaining talk iscircular, passionate, elaborate, episodic, advocating, and story telling.Without understanding the details of these communicating styles,teachers will not be able to "hear" their students who use them or"talk" in ways that their students can understand. Nor can they teachtopic-chaining students skills in topic-centered speaking and writingso that they can improve their performance in conventional schoolsettings.
Multicultural Foundations of EducationAwareness of the foundational principles and ideology of
multicultural teaching is another essential skill. These principlesinclude historical, philosophical, sociological, psychological, political,cultural, and economic analyses and explanations of whatmulticultural education is and why it is needed. These explorationswill introduce teacher education students to the scholarship in thefield and defuse some of the hysteria, misconceptions, and distortions
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surrounding multicultural education by dispelling some of the faultynotions that surround it. These include the belief that no consensusexists among leaders on critical components of multiculturaleducation; that multicultural education can be defined by anyone forhis or her own purposes without considering the thinking of majorscholars in the field; that there is no real basis for multiculturaleducation because the issues and conditions that contributed to itsorigins have been resolved; and that multicultural education andgood quality education goals (e.g., academic excellence, nationalunity, and democracy) are incompatible. In order to dispel thesenotions and be better informed advocates for multiculturaleducation, preservice teachers must study its foundations.
Specific content components of foundations of multiculturaleducation might include analysis of issues such as:
• how funding patterns and legislative policies (e.g., anti-affirmativeaction and bilingual education, and the English only movement)affect the educational opportunities of different ethnic groups.
• the effects on students of social and educational treatment ofdifferent ethnic groups in popular culture and mass media.
• disaggregated and qualitative interpretations of different types ofachievement data, both within and across ethnic groups, and theimplications of these for instructional reform.
• appropriateness of conventional developmental psychologyprinciples, learning theories, and research protocols for use withethnically diverse students.
• relationships among culture, language, and learning.• legal precedents for multicultural education.• historical antecedents (individuals, programs, and ideologies) of
multicultural education.• social justice for ethnically and culturally diverse groups within
educational contexts.
Multicultural Pedagogical SkillsTeachers need to develop multicultural pedagogical knowledge
and skills. Two types of pedagogical competencies are necessary:general and content-specific. There are powerful ideas about whatconstitutes multicultural teaching, but too many teachers do notknow what these are, what they mean, or how to accomplish themin classroom instruction. They are even more puzzled about howto do multicultural teaching within the various content areas
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routinely taught in schools. Developing skills in these two levels ofmulticultural pedagogy makes sense, because they are consistent withthe logical sequence of how pedagogical mastery is accomplished.
General multicultural pedagogy skills that teachers should learndeal with the domain of multicultural education itself. They includeusing multiple ethnic perspectives; alternative instructionaltechniques to achieve common learning outcomes; comparativeanalyses across diverse ethnic groups; matching teaching styles to thelearning styles of diverse ethnic groups; empowering marginalizedethnic groups within the instructional process; cooperative learningamong ethnically diverse students; creating climates andcommunities conducive to learning for diverse groups; culturallyresponsive teaching; recognizing, mobilizing, and engendering the"voices" of different ethnic groups and experiences; and teaching forsocial change and social justice.
Learning how to place these techniques within specific subjectareas is the next level of multicultural content pedagogical skillsdevelopment. Some examples are how to use multiple ethnicperspectives in teaching social studies issues and concepts (e.g.,protest, power, politics, change, and the struggle for social justice);how to use cooperative learning and engender multiple ethnic voicesin teaching computations and problem solving in math and science;or how to include multiculturally relevant and authentic materialswhen teaching reading and writing skills in language arts courses.Both types of multicultural pedagogical skills are imperative; the firstis a prerequisite for the second, and the second is essential to thefeasibility of multicultural education implementation in K-12classrooms. Teachers are more likely to do multicultural educationwhen they know how to link it systematically and routinely to theother subjects and skills they teach.
Of equal importance to integrating multicultural education intoother subjects taught in schools is learning how to teach studentsfrom ethnically diverse groups. This is an extension of the ideaintroduced earlier of matching teaching styles with different ethniclearning styles. If, indeed, ethnicity, culture, and prior experiencesinfluence how students learn (as we firmly believe), then teachersmust know how to teach differently students from these variousbackgrounds. Take, for example, recent immigrants from Vietnam,the Philippines, Ethiopia, and Panama. Their socializations abouthow to do schooling are radically different from the expectationscustomarily practiced by U.S. teachers. Many native-born students of
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color also learn values and rules of behaviors in their home culturesthat are inconsistent with school norms. In order to teach thesediverse students (and others) effectively, teachers need to knowexplicitly how their particular cultural values and beliefs aremanifested in learning behaviors, what teaching techniques are mostsuitable for them, and how to adapt instructional strategies,relationships, and other classroom elements to better accommodatetheir "sociocultural frameworks and cognitive schémas." The closerthese match, the better students will perform on all aspects of schoolachievement.
Multicultural Performance AssessmentA similar kind of skills extension is required for teachers to learn
how to do multicultural performance assessment. Just as learningstyles and cultural orientations are critical criteria for teaching, theyare equally valuable for designing equitable, culturally appropriate,and authentic achievement measures for diverse students. It is unfairand unethical to depend entirely on written, individuallycompetitive, standardized tests to determine the achievement ofstudents whose cultural socialization gives priority to oral expression,cooperative group efforts, and performance demonstrations ofmastery. The "one method for all" that is so much the emphasis ofcurrent "standards testing" (and even alternative assessment in theform of written portfolios) is not very amenable to multiculturalassessment.
Teachers need to use multiple, multiculturally responsiveassessment techniques with ethnically different students. In otherwords, measures and procedures used to determine achievementshould be matched to the performance and learning styles of studentsfrom different ethnic groups. Instead of relying exclusively on penciland paper assessment techniques, teachers need to learn how to useother means such as dramatizations, role-playing, interviews,observations, peer feedback, audio and visual journals, andconversions of learning from one form or genre to another (e.g., fromwords to pictures, essays to poetry, writing to speaking). Wherestandardized testing is unavoidable, teachers should learn to teachstudents how to study across learning styles and shift performancemodes to accommodate the testing formats.
How Can We Do What We MustIdeally, all of the multicultural competencies discussed earlier will
he prominent in all aspects of the entire teacher education program,
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from course work to practicum, exit requirements, certification, andemployment. Unfortunately, this may not happen for some timebecause there is still strong resistance to multicultural educationand a lack of implementation skills among professors of teachereducation. They have many of the same attitudes, concerns, andassumptions about the need for and ways to accomplish multiculturaleducation as teacher education students. Consequently, manyprofessors of education need to go through multicultural educationtraining similar to that which we have proposed for their students.
Can they teach what they do not know or value? Can colleges ofeducation afford to continue graduating students who areinadequately prepared in multicultural education? Will K—12ethnically diverse students ever have a fair chance of receivingeducational equity and academic excellence under the tutelage ofteachers who do not know how to care about and teach them mosteffectively? We think the answer to all of these questions is aresounding "NO." Therefore, teacher education faculties must beheld as accountable for implementing quality multicultural educationas they should expect their students to be in K-12 classrooms.Certainly multicultural issues in teaching and learning are as criticalas issues of sexual harassment, and increasingly universities aremandating training and accountability of faculties on these. Issues ofcultural and ethnic diversity in education deserve comparable statusand treatment.
But, we cannot wait until all members of college of educationfaculties are sufficiently skilled (relative to attitudes, knowledge, andteaching techniques regarding infusion) to proceed aggressively withpreparation for multicultural teaching. For the foreseeable futureseparate multicultural education courses within teacher preparationprograms are imperative. They should be academically robust,present across the duration of the program, and parallel thecompetency areas we discussed earlier. Without this kind ofcomprehensive training too many teachers will continue to bethreatened by cultural diversity and unsure about their abilities toeffectively teach ethnically diverse students. K-12 students willcontinue to suffer from the negative effects of these teachers' fearsand uncertainties, and educational disparities among ethnic groupswill prevail. We must break this vicious cycle by ensuring that allcollege of education students are thoroughly prepared to do highquality multicultural teaching, regardless of where and whom theyteach. This is the teacher education mandate for the 21st century.
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References
Allen, J. E. (1998, May 6). Children see minorities stereotyped on TV.Seattle Times, p. A8.
Au, K. H. (1993). Literacy instruction in multicultural settings. New York:Harcourt Brace.
Bartolome, L I., & Macedo, D. P. (1997). Dancing with bigotry: Thepoisoning of racial and ethnic identities. Harvard Educational Review, 67(2),222-246.
Bell, L. A., Washington, S., Weinstein, G., & Love, B. (1997). Knowingourselves as instructors. In M. Adams, L. A. Bell, & P. Griffin (Eds.), Teachingfor diversity and social justice: A sourcebook (pp. 299-310). New York: Routledge.
Bowers, C. A., & Flinders, D. J. (1990). Responsive teaching: An ecologicalapproach to classroom patterns of language, culture, and thought. New York:Teachers College Press.
Cortés, C. E. (1995). Knowledge construction and popular culture: Themedia as multicultural educator. In J. A. Banks & C. A. M. Banks (Eds.),Handbook of research on multicultural education (pp. 169-183). New York:Macmillan.
Cortés, C. E. (2000). The children are watching: How the media teachabout diversity. New York: Teachers College Press.
Dates, J. L., & Barlow, W. (1990). Split image: African Americans in themass media. Washington, DC: Howard University Press.
Gay, G. (1997). Educational equality for students of color. In J. A. Banks& C. A. M. Banks (Eds.), Multicultural education: Issues and perspectives (3rd ed.,pp. 195-228). Boston: Allyn and Bacon.
Gay, G. (2000). Culturally responsive teaching: Theory, practice, and research.New York: Teachers College Press.
Howard, G. R. (1999). We can't teach what we don't know: White teachers,multiracial schools. New York: Teachers College Press.
Kang, K. C. (2000, March 2). Report: Asian Americans still treated as"aliens" in U.S. Seattle Times, A7.
Spindler, G., & Spindler, L. (1993). The process of culture and person:Cultural therapy and culturally diverse schools. In P. Phelan & A. L. Davidson(Eds.), Renegotiating cultural diversity in American schools (pp. 21-51). NewYork: Teachers College.
Spring, J. (1992). Images of American life: A history of ideologicalmanagement in schools, movies, radio, and television. Albany: State University ofNew York Press.
U.S. Department of Education. (1999a). Digest of education statistics, 1998.Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
U.S. Department of Education. (1999b). The condition of education, 1999.Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
Walsh, D. (1988). Critical thinking to reduce prejudice. Social Education,4, 280-282.
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