Despite many alarming clues, the most urgent need for the European society is mixing diversity and different cultures into a renewed idea of “host” society: a system of resources for individuals, groups, Institutions. The variety of cultures and languages in Europe is often underestimated, stressing the threats linked to the daily life coexistence of many cultures, and not pointing out the potential of such diversity. Solid quantitative evidences supported the above considerations. Eurostat (2015) reports the presence of 33.5 million people born outside of the EU-28 living in a EU-28 Member State on 1 January 2014, while there were 17.9 million persons who had been born in a different EU-28 Member State from their country of residence. As a result, EU is increasingly becoming a stable multicultural society, importing challenges in how socializing institutions cope with diversity. In addition to this EU schools embrace more and more pupils with different cultural or ethnic backgrounds, becoming increasingly culturally composite. Language troubles, cultural misunderstandings, etc. come out of diversity, and of different cultural and origin affiliation (i.e. family membership). Some problematic areas have emerged with the integration of children at school, concerning both language and educational aspects. Moreover, it is important to deal with teachers; they are the strategic actors in the educational institution, bringing into the process of socialization their ideas about education, society and the future for the new generations. They are actors (and directors) of daily-life realization of integration of foreign students. In particular, in educational environments with high multiculturalism, teachers play an important role in opposition (and spreading) to prejudices, stereotypes, racist discourse between students, families, civil society. The paper presents the results of the first phase of the Erasmus+ Project concerning the analysis of the teacher needs in multicultural classes. Using mixed methods the action-research aim at examine in depth challenges and problems with cultural integration of foreign origin children. Results will be shown in comparison with the European partners (Italy, Poland, Belgium, Greece, and Spain), focusing on similarities and differences of educational systems as well as strategies and methods for teaching/learning in multiethnic and multilingual settings. Some key examples of best practices will be also analysed.

The Underestimated Treasure: Teachers Facing Diversity at School

Daher L. M.
Primo
Conceptualization
;
Gamuzza A.
Secondo
Conceptualization
;
Leonora A. M.
Ultimo
Conceptualization
2019-01-01

Abstract

Despite many alarming clues, the most urgent need for the European society is mixing diversity and different cultures into a renewed idea of “host” society: a system of resources for individuals, groups, Institutions. The variety of cultures and languages in Europe is often underestimated, stressing the threats linked to the daily life coexistence of many cultures, and not pointing out the potential of such diversity. Solid quantitative evidences supported the above considerations. Eurostat (2015) reports the presence of 33.5 million people born outside of the EU-28 living in a EU-28 Member State on 1 January 2014, while there were 17.9 million persons who had been born in a different EU-28 Member State from their country of residence. As a result, EU is increasingly becoming a stable multicultural society, importing challenges in how socializing institutions cope with diversity. In addition to this EU schools embrace more and more pupils with different cultural or ethnic backgrounds, becoming increasingly culturally composite. Language troubles, cultural misunderstandings, etc. come out of diversity, and of different cultural and origin affiliation (i.e. family membership). Some problematic areas have emerged with the integration of children at school, concerning both language and educational aspects. Moreover, it is important to deal with teachers; they are the strategic actors in the educational institution, bringing into the process of socialization their ideas about education, society and the future for the new generations. They are actors (and directors) of daily-life realization of integration of foreign students. In particular, in educational environments with high multiculturalism, teachers play an important role in opposition (and spreading) to prejudices, stereotypes, racist discourse between students, families, civil society. The paper presents the results of the first phase of the Erasmus+ Project concerning the analysis of the teacher needs in multicultural classes. Using mixed methods the action-research aim at examine in depth challenges and problems with cultural integration of foreign origin children. Results will be shown in comparison with the European partners (Italy, Poland, Belgium, Greece, and Spain), focusing on similarities and differences of educational systems as well as strategies and methods for teaching/learning in multiethnic and multilingual settings. Some key examples of best practices will be also analysed.
2019
9781527544581
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11769/373922
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