Challenges and Perspectives of Multicultural Education for Young Children in the Context of Greek Nurseries: Educators' Views
Authors: Sotiropoulou, Eleni 
Stroungis - Venetas, Georgios 
Giannakou, Vasiliki 
Bercovits, Anastasia 
Publisher: Macrothink Institute
Issue Date: 1-Jan-2022
Journal: International Journal of Education 
Volume: 14
Issue: 3
Keywords: Educator, Greek ECEC, Multicultural education, Practices of multicultural approach, Young children
Abstract: 
In recent years, Greece has received very high numbers of migrants and refugees from the Middle East, North Africa and Ukraine, including children of all ages. This new and evolving socio-cultural environment has an impact on education, since the application of multicultural principles in education is considered necessary for the development of multicultural respect. To achieve that level of mutual respect, the role of educators is particularly important. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to investigate the views of 196 educators working in Greek nurseries on the difficulties they face in implementing multicultural education in young children (children under the age of 3) and the perspectives of that method. Furthermore, the research investigates the goals set by educators, the practices they choose and how competent they consider themselves in implementing multicultural education. A questionnaire with closed-ended questions was used to collect the data. The results of the survey show that educators mainly choose fairy tales/books for managing and highlighting cultural diversity, while cooperation with parents is practiced to a very small extent. As for the difficulties that the educators face during that process, these are mainly attributed to the xenophobic attitudes of native parents. Finally, they feel that their knowledge on multicultural education is inadequate, and they express the need for appropriate training. In summary, the survey can provide useful information for educators on multicultural education in the nursery and can be used as a guide for their future training on that field.
ISSN: 1948-5476
DOI: 10.5296/ije.v14i3.20171
URI: https://uniwacris.uniwa.gr/handle/3000/1192
Type: Article
Department: Department of Early Childhood Education and Care 
School: School of Administrative, Economics and Social Sciences 
Affiliation: University of West Attica (UNIWA) 
Appears in Collections:Articles / Άρθρα

CORE Recommender
Show full item record

Page view(s)

33
checked on Nov 5, 2024

Google ScholarTM

Check

Altmetric

Altmetric


Items in DSpace are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.