Used concept maps and surveys to assess the effects of a multicultural education course on preservice teachers' cognitions. Found that Group B students' conceptualizations of effective teaching increased after the course, but other indicators showed that they did not actively reorganize their reconceptualization. Group A students exhibited the…

Analyzes obstacles facing multicultural/bilingual teacher education reform in the context of California's Crosscultural Language and Academic Development (CLAD) or Bilingual Crosscultural Language and Academic Development (BCLAD) programs, which try to translate theoretical frameworks concerned with cultural difference into credentialing policy.…

Discusses white American ethnic consciousness in the community college classroom. Describes the Racial/Cultural Identity Development model's five stages of white identity development, through which individuals proceed from stages of cultural unawareness to enlightenment: conformity, dissonance, resistance, introspection, and integrative awareness.…

Suggests that teachers can work with children's families to study likenesses and differences in their respective cultures. Details a class project for 7- to 8-year-olds whereby children start with self-portraits and construct masks of their faces. Provides sample mask project timeline and steps for making masks out of paper molds and a…

Native Americans have oral traditions that are distinct from the European literacy consciousness, having different modes of discourse, different kinds of metaphorical thinking, and different conceptions of teaching as storytelling. Storytelling is important in children's education, but to be effective and respectful of Native culture, school…

Argues that identity and language issues are a powerful influence on education politics and policies in Switzerland. Uses the introduction of second language instruction as a case study to illustrate why and how education policy reflects Switzerland's cultural, linguistic diversity, and the strong local and regional identities of its citizens.…

Examines connections between diversity and disability in special education, noting increasing tendencies to locate special education under the umbrella of diversity. The paper maintains that the assumptions underlying disability are dramatically different from those supporting diversity and suggests that special educators transform their…

Describes the responses of white, affluent, ethnically-encapsulated first graders to four books that featured African-Americans as the central characters. Finds that students' responses showed a sensitivity for the feelings and actions of people they seldom interact with or even think about. Notes that the students frequently addressed issues of…

Fitchburg (Massachusetts) State College, surrounded by rapidly expanding African American, Asian, and Hispanic populations, was awarded a 1990 federal Student Literacy Corps grant to initiate a Literacy Corps Program. The program created and fostered literacy opportunities for area children, adolescents, and adults and helped participants develop…

In a lecture at Navajo Community College in fall 1995, Russell Means discussed freedom and responsibility in our present-day world. He talked about the true nature of education, the difference between knowledge and wisdom, and why Indian peoples must think critically about the educational and government structures constraining them. (Author/TD)

Describes an action research project which began by asking how English teachers could improve the writing of their African American students, and gradually came to ask how the teachers' own cultural assumptions might be blocking their teaching relationships. Identifies and discusses eight principles of their approach, and discusses changes in…

Educators are challenged to develop specialized programs to serve the varied cultural norms, beliefs, and values espoused by different Native American tribes. To counter bureaucratic pressures toward uniformity, individual schools must foster development of shared school-community culture. To assist at-risk students, schools and communities must…

A modified version of the Societal, Attitudinal, Familial, and Environmental Acculturative Stress Scale (SAFE) was administered to 71 Latino and Euramerican children aged 8-10 from southern California. Despite being U.S.-born, Latino children experienced significantly more acculturative stress than their Euramerican peers, thereby helping to…

Thirty-five staff members' views on developmental assessment in a multicultural early childhood setting are described and used to initiate a critique of current practice in assessment of young children. Staff expressed a range of opinions from endorsement to frank rejection of the utility, validity, and ethics of developmental assessment.…

Examined how risky peer group behaviors at school impacted junior high students' experience of victimization, extending findings from an earlier study of elementary students. Surveys of Arab and Jewish Israeli junior high students indicated that risky peer behaviors in school were one of the strongest predictors of victimization in both elementary…