The pressure on students to deal with the complex connections of racism is a major issue. Research is being done on teens to explore their understanding on cultural harmony in school and their world outside the school.
An introduction of the multicultural class room is the best way to teach students to get along with different cultures and races. There are various ways to make students learn about different culture and races, some of them are listed below:
• The course books and the library of the school should have ample books on multicultural characters.
• The emphasis should be on developing a daily regime which includes literature from different cultural units.
• Discussion on multi-culture should be encouraged.
• Schools should avoid doing short term sessions on multi-culture since these will shift the focus from long term solutions.
• Even if the class is a homogeneous mix of students, multi-cultural issues should still be discussed. The primary reason being that these students will meet students of other cultures in other areas such as sports or social gathering. They should be better equipped at that time.
• The walls of the school are also an important medium of spreading information. There can be posters indicating multicultural information.
• Including an international pen pal for a group of students or for a class is also a very good practice.
• The class should discuss the differences and similarities in different cultures. More importance should be on similarities of cultures so that students understand what they have in common with each other.
• The teacher should read multi-cultural books to the students.
• Discuss different holidays in different cultures. This divulges more on the history of different culture.
• Make sure that the “multicultural units” are not being created in the school. Focus should remain on including multicultural literature. Then the discussion of the teachable moments should be discussed with the larger group of students. The differences and similarities should be conversed openly with all the students.
