What is the importance of teaching multicultural tolerance?
Holtman, Diane. "Culture in the Classroom." Culture in the Classroom. Southern Poverty Law Center, n.d. Web. 16 Nov. 2015. Everyone always pays attention to education gaps, funding gaps, school readiness gaps, but nobody ever pays attention to multi-culture gaps between students and teachers. This article does a great job at pointing out the importance of understanding multicultural in classrooms. Most people in the education field are white, middle classed, and speak English. Where as many of the students are a variety of different cultures. A lot of times teachers disregard this with a sense of color-blindness. They treat foreigners as they do any other student. That may be
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Each student may have a different struggle, even if they are part of the same culture group. We must break stereo types. Even positive stereo types can be bad, as it leads to assumptions that a person is a culture, rather than an individual. “Culture isn 't just a list of holidays or shared recipes, religious traditions, or language; it is a lived experience unique to each individual.” (Holtam, Para. 3) Elementary school teacher, Diane Holtam, explains how the racist myth that all Asians are good at math can affect Asian students in a harmful way. Teachers tend to help Asian students less at math because they assume they are excellent at math and can get their education on their own without any help. This may not be the case. We need to start realizing this, and treating the students as individuals, because they are their own person. Lyness, Arcy. "Teaching Your Child Tolerance." KidsHealth - the Web 's Most Visited Site about Children 's Health. The Nemours Foundation, 1 Mar. 2014. Web. 16 Nov. 2015.
Today more and more cultures are coming to America. America is known as the great melting pot because of the blend of several cultures. As America is becoming more diverse, this article stresses we must teach our children tolerance. Children will interact with people of all different ethnicities, whether it be in the classroom, or even a future job. Some parents may be open to teaching their children tolerance, other parents may be hesitant to teaching their children tolerance, because they themselves were not exposed to different