Cultural literacy of preschool teachers teaching children from different cultures

ABSTRACT

This research was carried out to examine the cultural literacy of preschool teachers who have students from different cultures in their classrooms. In the present study, a qualitative research method was used to examine teachers' cultural literacy in detail. The participants of the study are preschool teachers who work with children from different cultures. A semi-structured interview form for teachers was used as a data collection tool. Research findings show that preschool teachers have insufficient knowledge about the culture of their students from different cultures and they have prejudices against the culture. As a result, teachers' getting to know different cultures and not interacting with families from these cultures affected their creation of a culture-sensitive educational environment in their classrooms. Similarly, it is observed that teachers keep their educational expectations and goals regarding children from different cultures low on the basis of their prejudices.

KEYWORDS:

• Pre-school teachers
• cultural lıteracy, early chıldhood educatıon
• multicultural education

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mustafa Kale

Mustafa Kale is the assistant professor in the Child Development Department at Cag University. His research interests are family and child in the context of culture in early childhood, child development and education in ecocultural context, child body image, child well-being, inclusive education and feminist pedagogy, ethnographic research.

Ebru Deretarla Gül

Ebru Deretarla Gül is the associate professor in the Early Childhood Education Department at Cukurova University. Her research interests are emotional development in early childhood, child literature, in early childhood and teacher training.

Merve Tohma

Merve Tohma is a lecturer at Cag University. Her research interests are language development in early childhood, multıcultural early childhood and multıcultural teacher training.