Education, Diversity and Social Cohesion Conference (University of London, 2018). Paper entitled: Teachers' Perceptions of Cultural Differences.
Sociology of Education Conference (University of London). ‘Education, Diversity and Social Cohesion’ September. 2018.
Damian Spiteri, Ph.D.
Earlier this month, I had attended for a conference hosted at the University College, London (Institute of Education). This was an international conference called ‘Education, Diversity and Social Cohesion’. It was set up by the European Sociological Association ESA ‘Sociology of Education’ Research Network.
Focused on applying sociological thinking to current realities, the conference was organised in a very pragmatic way. The first day was dedicated to defining the problems associated with bringing about healthy social cohesion through the medium of education. The second day was dedicated to exploring potential solutions when schools and education systems experienced challenges in bringing about social cohesion in an optimal way.
The conference was opened by the Director of ‘Llakes’, Dr. Andy Green. He was followed on by Dr Germ Janmaat. They both emphasized that societies need to be more welcoming to ‘the other’ in times of rapid global change.
This need for societies to be more welcoming to ‘the other’ was also acknowledged in the two key-note presentations. The first keynote speaker of the conference was Associate Professor Per Mourritsen, of Aarhus University, Denmark who contrasted between how migrants were approached in Denmark to how they were approached in Sweden. He explained how they were more likely to be naturalized as citizens in Sweden than in Demark. This is due to the different policies that both countries have in place. The second keynote speaker was Dr. Francesca Borgonovi, a Senior Policy Analyst with the OECD (Paris). Her presentation was on ‘Immigrant-native gaps in the social outcomes of education.’ She explained how the OECD analyses how education systems contribute to the academic and socio-emotional well-being of immigrant students; including those from asylum-seeking backgrounds. She contrasted between the levels of academic standards (as measured by the PISA benchmark tests); social engagement, emotional security, and personal motivation that were attained in different countries, noting how all of these factors could all have a bearing on a child’s or young person’s performance at school.
The presenters at the conference came from universities in Europe including Italy, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Wales, Belgium, Ireland, and England; and farther afield, including South Africa. I presented a paper representing the Malta College of Arts, Science and Technology. I am currently based in Malta but have also worked in the United Kingdom having lectured in social work at the University of Strathclyde and more recently at the University of York.
My presentation was on teacher’s perceptions of cultural difference and their implication for learners’ education. My material was clearly aligned to that of the other participants; since over the two days, many of their presentations focused on the association between cohesion and intercultural competence/showing solidarity for others. A common factor that seemed to me to feature in all the presentations at the conference was a reference to the importance of the fostering of friendships (bonds) between people from different parts of the world if a meaningful and long-lasting social solidarity was to be effectively co-created between people of different cultures.
Teacher’s perceptions of cultural difference and their implication for learners’ education.
My presentation on this subject was based on a theorical model that I had conceptualised. My belief is that, in diverse classrooms, it is essential that teachers and students (learners) share a common vision. The vision needs to be rooted in knowledge (savoir) and skills (savoir faire). However, particularly in multicultural settings, it is not enough for people to be good at their jobs and adequately task-savvy; and, likewise, in a school setting it is not enough for students to cross their ‘t’s and put a dot on their ‘I’s. A core feature of my model is an acknowledgement that students also need to know how to relate to one another. This sense of being (savoir être) is what can instigate people to gel together. Ultimately, being able to forge satisfying interpersonal relationships with one’s peers is one of the main factors that can make learning at school fun, particularly when children and young people are at an age when peers are important to them (and serve also as central agents of socialization in their lives).
Previous research that I have conducted has established that structural constraints may not have such a deterministic influence on a person’s career destinations and life course development on people from minority groups if they feel less ‘left out.’ In virtue of this, it is important that schools do not only provide knowledge about cultures to their students but rather embed that knowledge by (i) encouraging them to form both formal and informal groups at school which are comprised of people from different cultures; and (ii) by engaging their students in reflecting on cultural differences between them and how greater mutual understanding can be fostered.
Teaching Approach Model: Copyright: Damian Spiteri
I dedicated part of my presentation to apply my Teaching Approach Model to elaborate on the work of J.A. Banks (see https://www.teachingforchange.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Banks_James.pdf) on social cohesion.
Banks presents a ‘levels of integration’ model. Banks’ model consists of four developmental levels of which social action is the apex. The first level is the contribution approach. Using this approach, teachers refer to ethnic content. However, this content is limited to special days, weeks, and months related to ethnic events and celebrations. This approach offers little insight about the ethnic group other than to know something about days that the group considers significant for some reason. The second level is the additive approach. This approach, as its name suggests, simply means that the teacher fills in missing details about ethnic groups (where the teacher believes that they do not feature in the curriculum) but does little else. This implies that while cultural groups are given (some form of) mention, the additive approach does not enable students to consolidate or change their ideas or frames of reference about these groups. Consequently, the additive approach is little more effective than the contribution approach. The third level is the transformation approach. For Banks, the transformation approach is a step up from the contribution and additive approaches. This is because it calls on teachers to change the curriculum in such a way that students can understand reality from the perspectives of diverse ethnic and cultural groups. It thereby contributes to building up a greater intercultural sensitivity through enabling students to actively empathise with people of different cultures. However, it is still very teacher centred and is subject to the teacher’s ability and time availability to give different cultures the importance they merit. The fourth level is the social action approach. The social action approach includes all the elements of the transformation approach but requires that students make decisions and/or take actions that enable them to build greater intercultural competency and political efficacy. When employing the social action approach, students are active and not passive.
My Teaching Approach Model relates savior and savior faire to savoir être. Using Banks work as a case in point, the contribution, additive and transformative approaches can do little to ‘educate’ students, other than provide them knowledge and skills. However, as Matthew Lipman, who founded Philosophy for Children says, when describing caring thinking which he sees as an essentially interpersonal type of thinking; ‘education’ in the true sense of the word can only come about when students actively use these three approaches, when relating to others. (see: https:// www.ojs.unisa.edu.au/index.php/jps/article/view/989).
If one of the central goals of education is to enable people to relate to one another, as Dr. Andy Green had pointed out in this conference, one cannot argue against the notion that, in today’s globalised world, it is necessary for students the world over to be able to relate to people of different cultures. This need for people to be able to relate is where savoir être enters the picture. Through processes of embedded learning, children and young people at school would actively interact with peers from different cultures. Any knowledge elicited through the contribution approach, additive approach and transformation approach will be assigned personal meaning. With the help of the input of teachers, this knowledge would become the basis for the more accurately targeted social action approach.
At the end of the conference. A closing plenary session was held. This closing session was entitled ‘Education and Diversity, the way forward’ was conducted by a panel constituted of two people from universities in Ireland; Dr. Daniel Faas, (Trinity College, Dublin), and Dr. Bernadette Brereton, (Dundalk Institute of Technology) and another from a university in Spain; Dr. Adriana Aubert-Simon, (University of Barcelona). The closing session focused on the some of the more pressing current needs including making concluding observations about how schools can respond to the challenges presented by native students and migrant students (including asylum-seekers) in a holistic way.
Damian Spiteri Ph.D. is the author of Multiculturism, Higher Education and Intercultural Education (Published by Palgrave Macmillan) https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781137513663 He is currently in an advanced stage of his second book which is on the education of children and young people who have been displaced from their homelands in mainstream schools. Dr. Spiteri has been the invited keynote speaker at several international conferences and has also been a visiting research affiliate at the University of London (IOE). On a different note, he is a singer-songwriter, and his first single, Shine at Christmas was an instant ‘hit’ attracting almost 50,000 YouTube views https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3I6aiN_SV6c
The author would like to thank Eric Formosa for producing the slides reproduced above.