Multicultural Education

9 Pages 2168 Words

n melting pot because it denies the right to cultural pluralism. By believing that an area should assimilate or “melt” together people are deprived of their right to believe in and celebrate the traditions of their culture.
As the importance of schooling grew after the industrial revolution, students of all ethnic backgrounds were taught to assimilate into the American culture. “Schools increasingly became the institution to enculturate the young to be Americans and to socialize future workers” (La Belle 1994 p. 10). The curriculum consisted of Anglo/Protestant view and values that were not honored by all students and their families. The “public schools became an instrument for the dominant group to enculturate and socialize subordinate groups” (La Belle 1994 p. 12). Some ethnic groups created their own schools, but most immigrants were submissive and attended public schools. These schools caused children to lose their cultural identity and created tension with their parents. The new sets of values forced on the children were usually different than immigrant parent’s, causing a major gap between the generations. The conception of multicultural education has been developing in schools since the 1940s and 1950s, but “the 1960s and 1970s brought rapid change to intergroup relations and their relationship with education” (La Belle, 1994 p. 17 & 21). This era brought about a change in education from teaching intergroup relationships—the concept that every student should be taught how to be a part of the integrated society—to the inclusion of concepts of other ethnic groups into the curriculum; this was the start of multiethnic education. “By the late 1970s gender and religion were added to…education,” thus creating multicultural education, which in the last couple of decades, has become a daily part of curriculum in many schools (La Belle, 1994 p. 22).
A goal of multicultural education is to “provide ...