Multicultural Education of Children and Adolescents



Summary

The Arab students are often made to face a literature and curriculum which is biased. Due to the media and stereotyping, with its negativity the perceptions regarding the Arab Americans, that are held by the Americans is very harmful to their (Arabs) image. It is up to the school administration that the Arab students must be represented equally and should be allowed to participate in the school activities, as much as the others. Schools can do a lot for eradicating the prejudice and discrimination. They can provide the necessary training to the teaching staff and engage the students in various activities that relate to team work, involving the Arab and the American students to work together. The training can be helpful in providing a valuable insight about the cultural factors of the Arab students. This way the teaching staff can make the necessary adjustments. The diversity of the Arab Americans is overlooked. Arabs in the USA are there with different objectives and interests. According to a very recent survey, there are about 2-3.5 million Arabs in America. Those Arab Americans, who are Christians, have no issues in mixing with the main stream Americans, and adopting the American way of life.

Multicultural Education of Children and Adolescents

Introduction

Multicultural education consists of various materials and strategies in the American education system, developed mainly for assisting the teachers responding to the issues that are surfaced due to the ever changing rapid demographics of the students. It is useful in providing students with the knowledge regarding cultures and histories of the various diverse groups. It assumes that the future of the American society is very pluralistic, (Banks, 1993). Teachers in the urban universities, colleges and schools have to deal with students who hail from various ethnic backgrounds, (Baruth, 1992).

Acculturation, on the other hand explains the psychological and cultural change processes which are resulted when cultures clash. The effects of this can be observed at different levels in all the cultures that interact.

The Arab students are often made to face a literature and curriculum which is biased. Due to the media and stereotyping, with its negativity the perceptions regarding the Arab Americans, that are held by the Americans is very harmful to their (Arabs) image. It is up to the school administration that the Arab students must be represented equally and should be allowed to participate in the school activities, as much as the others, (Baruth, 1992). Schools can do a lot for eradicating the prejudice and discrimination. The training can be helpful in providing a valuable insight about the cultural factors of the Arab students, (Aboud, 2000). This way the teaching staff can make the necessary adjustments.

The paper will be discussing a chapter pertaining to multicultural education from the book; 'Multicultural Education of Children and Adolescents', by Manning, Baruth, and L.G. Our discussion will focus on the Arab American students who reside in the United States of America.

Discussion

Promotion of positive cultural identities

It is believed that a ...