Republic of the Philippines

Tarlac State University

COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
CENTER OF DEVELOPMENT
Lucinda Campus, Tarlac City
Tel. No. (045) 493-0182; Fax No. (045) 982-0110
Re-Accredited Level IV by the Accrediting Agency of Chartered Colleges and Universities of the
Philippines (AACCUP), Inc.
______________________________________________________________________________

TITLE Chapter II: Globalization and Cultural and Multicultural

Literacies. (Issues in Teaching and Learning Multicultural
Literacy in the Philippines.)

I. RATIONALE Our topic is about Issues in Teaching and Learning

Multicultural Literacy in the Philippines. In this topic,
we’ll be talking about the definitions of Multicultural
Literacy and Multicultural Education and their differences,
Challenges of Multicultural education, as well as the
Current Issues in the Multicultural Classroom.

This module provides awareness about the different

cultures, as well as to prevent conflicts that future
educators might be encountered.
II. PRETEST 1. It is the ability of understanding, learning, and
communicating in different forms of language and culture.
A. Multicultural literacy
B. Cultural literacy
C. Literacy
D. Global literacy

2. It is the ability to take different perspectives to gain a

more humane perspective.
A. Multicultural literacy
B. Cultural literacy
C. Literacy
D. Global literacy

3. Any form of education or teaching that incorporates the

histories, texts, values, beliefs, and perspectives of people
from different cultural backgrounds. What is it called?
A. Multicultural Literacy
B. Multicultural Education
C. Intercultural Literacy
D. Intercultural Education

4-8. What is your idea about Multicultural Literacy?

INSTRUCTION TO THE USERS This module discusses the Issues in Teaching and Learning
Multicultural Literacy in the Philippines.

Work through the sections of this module in the order

presented in the graphic below.

1 2 3 4 5

1. Preparatory Activities
2. Developmental Activities
3. Closure Activities
4. Synthesis
5. Evaluation

III. LEARNING OBJECTIVES At the end of the discussion, the students will be able to;
a) Discuss the terms multicultural literacy and
multicultural education
b) Differentiate multicultural literacy and multicultural
education
c) List down the major challenges of multicultural
education
d) Enumerate the current issues in the multicultural
classroom
IV. CONTENT click the link below.
A. PREPARATORY
ACTIVITIES https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDlapusAJHA

What are your thoughts about the video?

B. DEVELOPMENTAL What is Multicultural literacy? But first, we need to know
ACTIVITIES what is the definition of the word literacy. Literacy is the
ability to read and write. However, the definition has been
expanded to the ability of understanding, learning, and
communicating in different forms of language and culture.
Multicultural Literacy refers to the skills involved when
uncovering bias in regards to culture, as well as the ability
to take different perspectives to gain a more humane
perspective.
Multicultural education refers to any form of education
or teaching that incorporates the histories, texts, values,
beliefs, and perspectives of people from different cultural
backgrounds.
Every person not connected with schooling may think that
there is nothing difficult in teacher’s job. This thought is a
huge mistake as the number of challenges teachers face
every new lesson is incredibly big and this happens in the
classrooms where teachers and students speak the same
language and understand each other perfectly.
There are Major Challenges of Multicultural Education;
1) Language barrier
The main thing that differs multicultural classrooms from
ordinary ones is a language barrier. Coming from different
countries and even city districts children can speak the
same language but never understand each other. This might
be the influence of parents, environment, dialects etc.
However, the situations when students do not know the
language of studying happen even more often. Young
people get into the environment where a teacher speaks a
foreign language they do not understand at all and their
task is not only to understand what a teacher says but also
gain new knowledge – twice harder than in customary
classrooms.
2) Domination of different learning styles
Despite the fact that students may differ in race, religion or
family background, these young people can also absorb
information in a variety of ways. They can be accustomed
to other teaching approaches, methods, ways of material
presenting so it will take time to get used to everything
new.
A teacher should offer his students all the learning styles
(auditory, visual, tactile etc.) for learners to grasp
information better. Moreover, it is necessary to consider
cognitive styles of particular concern like field-dependent
and field-independent cognition, reflectivity and
impulsivity, tolerance and intolerance for ambiguity.
3) The cultural difference can also be noticed in
the poorly formed speaker-listener relationships and
diverse patterns of cooperation and competition
As a result, students might not know how to behave when a
teacher is speaking, have no idea of group or pair work,
will not understand the rules of games introduced.
One more important aspect is a prevalence of visual
learning materials. As students can hardly understand the
language, images can be more effective in acquiring new
knowledge.
4) Non-verbal behavior
Sometimes it is much easier to understand a foreign
language than a body language of another ethnic group. If a
teacher is not aware of the non-verbal behaviors
characteristic of the society where his students are from,
that might bring about a variety of troubles and difficulty
of right interpretation. Such customary non-verbal
behaviors as raised hands, eye contact, head nods can have
a completely different meaning in another country let alone
any other body signs.
5) Presenting one topic from different perspectives
You may say that every teacher should present a topic from
different prospective independent on the pupils’ nationality
in the classroom. Of course, it would be great but a
restricted number of school lessons does not always
provide this opportunity.
In multicultural classes the situation is different. It
especially concerns history lessons as some events can be
defined by different populations as opposite ones. For
example, some movements should be called not only an
expansion of one country but also the displacement of
another nation.
A teacher should be very careful in his formulations and
expressions not to offend feelings of some students.
Moreover, he should not try to persuade in the
unquestioned truth of his words and views as it may result
in a struggle or disappointment among students.
History should be presented as accurately as possible.
There is no need to downplay any negative aspects but a
task of the teacher is to avoid stereotypes and offer
evidence from the primary sources to sound objective.
6) Diversity of extracurricular activities
As children from other cultures have appeared in the
classroom that differs from theirs it means that they should
also get accustomed to new traditions, a way of life,
relationships in this new society. In most cases, it is
teacher’s job to show and tell about that. It is usually done
in different extracurricular activities. Whether it is a
holiday or some important date children should learn about
it.
7) Teaching communication skills
Apart from difficulties in using a foreign language students
may feel shy or unable to express their viewpoint because
of the horror not to be understood. In some Muslim
countries, boys will avoid socializing with girls while in
the new environment it is an absolutely normal experience.
Teachers should encourage students to discuss different
issues, speak up their mind on a variety of topics and
promote a pleasant atmosphere in the classroom.
8) Constant work with parents
Every teacher should understand how a student feels in an
absolutely new environment and communication with his
parents can be helpful in that. It is important to understand
how a child has been raised from the childhood, what
traditions influenced his view of the world or what is
absolutely inadmissible for him. This knowledge will help
teachers to build their lessons more effectively and help
students to find their place in the classroom.

There are several studies that explain the issues in the

multicultural classroom.

Low Academic Achievements are an obvious issue.

Witsel (2003) noted that teaching and learning are not easy
work, even if students and teachers are of the same
societal, economic, and cultural background. Therefore,
they may face some difficulties in the classroom when they
deal with students and teachers who are from a different
cultural background. This negatively affects the academic
levels of students. Thus, teachers should be provided with
professional development opportunities that assist them in
learning how to assess, train, teach, and be motivated to use
multicultural teaching. This study also suggests that
teachers should be trained to use several approaches in the
multicultural classroom before they start teaching (Witsel,
2003). Some studies reported that because the education
system of students' cultures are different from the culture
of their new classroom, the academic achievement of
students may be low or bad. This study also gives an
example of some cultures that use and prefer indirect
relations over directness, open expression, or frankness.

Adjustment to A New Cultural Environment

 Some studies indicate that the new cultural character of the
classroom is one of the issues for international student in
western education. This research reported that East Asian
students are reluctant to participate in activities or speaking
in the multicultural classroom because they are learning in
a new environment that is unfamiliar to them. This same
study shown that some activities in the multicultural
classroom, such as group study, lectures, individual
learning, or cooperative learning, which require interaction
and communication, may not be familiar to all international
students.

Problems with Self as Well as the New Culture

Trust problems with self as well as the new culture are
issues in the intercultural classroom. Another study found
that an emotional relationship, especially confidence
between teachers and their students in the intercultural
classroom, is important in establishing trust between
students and the teacher. This study also suggested that the
teaching material and approaches of teachers should be
modified to recognize the students' cultures and to gain
students' trust. Therefore, students will feel respected and
safe with their teachers and classmates.

C. CLOSURE ACTIVITIES Before we end our discussion for today, give at least two
challenges that you have encountered during a
multicultural education.

V. SYNTHESIS / Literacy - is the ability of understanding, learning, and

GENERALIZATION communicating in different forms of language and culture.
Multicultural Literacy refers to the skills involved when
uncovering bias in regards to culture, as well as the ability
to take different perspectives to gain a more humane
perspective.
Multicultural education refers to any form of education
or teaching that incorporates the histories, texts, values,
beliefs, and perspectives of people from different cultural
backgrounds.

VI. EVALUATION 1. It is the ability of understanding, learning, and

communicating in different forms of language and culture.
A. Multicultural literacy
B. Cultural literacy
C. Literacy
D. Global literacy

2. It is the ability to take different perspectives to gain a

more humane perspective.
 A. Multicultural literacy
B. Cultural literacy
C. Literacy
D. Global Literacy

3. Any form of education or teaching that incorporates the

histories, texts, values, beliefs, and perspectives of people
from different cultural backgrounds. What is it called?
A. Multicultural Literacy
B. Multicultural Education
C. Intercultural Literacy
D. Intercultural Education

4. Coming from different countries and even city districts

children can speak the same language but never understand
each other.
A. Cultural difference
B. Languange barrier
C. Non-verbal behavior
D. Domination of different learning styles

5. Despite the fact that students may differ in race, religion

or family background, these young people can also absorb
information in a variety of ways.
A. Cultural difference
B. Languange barrier
C. Non-verbal behavior
D. Domination of different learning styles

6-10. What are the multicultural education challenges you

might encounter in the future as an educator? List five (5)
challenges and elaborate.
Make an essay about how you can handle when you
ASSIGNMENT / AGREEMENT experience the conflicts or issues in a multicultural
classroom.

REFERENCES https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZhSD1FKAgU

https://www.edglossary.org/multicultural-education/
#:~:text=Multicultural%20education%20refers%20to
%20any,people%20from%20different%20cultural
%20backgrounds.

https://sites.google.com/site/
teaching21stcenturyliteracies/multicultural-literacy

https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1081654.pdf
https://blog.noplag.com/challenges-of-multicultural-
education/