thoughtful and less close-minded. Thus, the school should welcome the kind of diversity that lets students grow and learn from one another."
• recognise and value greatly the contributions made to society by other cultural groups.
2.5 Principles of multicultural education
Multicultural education has several principles which it has to embrace in order for it to be effective (Cross, Mkwanazi-Twala and Klein, 1998: 27-28) These principles are as follows:
i) Multicultural education should start with people. In essence this means that education should take into account the socio-cultural background of learners and begin with the experiences they bring into the classroom. In terms of multicultural education this principle means that all people should begin by confronting their own economic, social and cultural background, since the self of a learner can strongly influence how well he does in the classroom. Unless people feel good about their cultural background they can hardly relate positively to people of different cultural settings. This applies not only to learners but also to educators particularly if they are teaching learners of different cultural backgrounds. People must find
some personal relevance to their own lives in the curriculum and school practice.
ii) Multicultural education should be geared to decentre people and thereby depolarise intercultural hostility and conflict. It must promote social mobility wherein members of different groups see themselves existing interdependently, or else individuals may become so preoccupied with issues of cultural identity and their self-interest that they may be misled into believing these issues are ends in themselves. An effective way to decentre a person is by using his cultural background as a cross-cultural bridge, illustrating the parallels between that group's experience and that of other cultural groups. This does not necessarily imply that multicultural education should result in increasing cultural consciousness.
iii) The implementation of multicultural education should be a long-term process with enough flexibility to accommodate eventual shifts and changes in the curriculum and school practices. In some countries, for example, many people took up multicultural education with the idea of implementing it and soon became frustrated by the slow progress achieved despite so much effort. Multicultural education should begin with modest goals and the existing curriculum with small multicultural units. This
enables educators to grow in confidence, develop a long-term commitment to multicultural education and actively pursue their personal growth and development in the field.
iv) Multicultural education should involve intervention not only in curriculum content but also in the teaching practices and social relations of the classroom. Learners are rarely engaged in true dialogue in which they are stimulated to do most of the questioning and analysis and critical evaluation. Classroom interaction constitutes part of the hidden curriculum that transmits powerful subliminal messages to learners and socialises them into patterns of conformity, subservience and passive behaviour that are dysfunctional for participating in a truly democratic society. Intervention in the classroom, utilising the learners' culture and experiences as a basis for learning, can dramatically increase learners- initiated dialogue in the classroom and greatly stimulate critical thinking.
This could in turn lead to a much better understanding of the deeper meaning of democracy, freedom and equality and the potential of learners to exert some control over their destinies.
v) Finally, multicultural education requires special attention to the need for parent or community involvement in school life. In many countries
multicultural educators have utilised multicultural resources in their local communities and involved parents in the education of their children.
Inviting guest speakers from different cultural groups, visiting museums of social history and exploring various aspects of local cultural communities are some of the ways in which educators have utilised multicultural community resources. Such activities stimulate interest, enhance learning and help develop community support for multicultural education programmes. Support that is always necessary to sustain them.
If multicultural education can embrace the above principles it will then be effective.
2.6 Approaches to multicultural education
Sleeter (1992: 4-8) . Outlines five approaches to multicultural education. These approaches are in line with the aims of multicultural education. These approaches are as follows:
i) Teaching the exceptional and culturally different approach
The primary objective of this approach is to assist culturally different learners in acquiring knowledge, skills and attitudes. This approach does not advocate changes to the existing curriculum but it does recognise the need for different techniques to help learners to achieve well at school.
ii) Human relations approach
This approach attempts to eliminate misunderstandings and promote positive interpersonal relationships among learners within diverse groups.
Co-operative learning is used to develop and strengthen learner-learner relationships.
Hi) Single-group studies approach
This approach recognises all cultural groups as equal. It seeks to highlight a particular group by focusing on the history, culture and contributions of that group.
iv) Multicultural approach
Unlike others, this approach advocates major changes with regard to curriculum content, staffing of schools and educational practices such as
teaching methods and medium of instruction. This approach recommend the multiculturalisation of the curriculum.
v) Education that is multicultural and social reconstructionist approach
This alternative strives for equity and justice in the social system. Itbuilds on the other approaches mentioned above. Learners are taught to analyse inequalities in contemporary issues, for example, religious freedom and to take appropriate action such as organising protest.
Similarly Banks (1994: 4-8), another prominent multicultural educator, identifies five so-called dimensions of multicultural education. These dimensions are referred to as the:
a) content integration dimension;
b) knowledge construction dimension;
c) prejudice reduction dimension;
d) equitable pedagogy dimension; and
e) empowering school culture and social structure dimension.
These dimensions advocated by Banks are essentially the same as the approaches suggested by Sleeter (1992) above.