Examining Early Childhood Teachers' Beliefs and Practice About Multicultural Education

OpenAlex İngilizce

Multiculturalism has become a crucial part of education in most countries and Türkiye since global migrations are constantly increasing. However, multicultural education is still being discovered by teachers and educators. Therefore, this study examined early childhood teachers’ beliefs and practices through multicultural education in Türkiye. The study was designed as a qualitative study in which multiple case studies design was utilized for investigation. All six participants were selected by purposive sampling and working with 5-6-year-old children from different countries. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews, and inductive content analysis was utilized to analyze the collected data. The findings indicated that teachers are not aware of the meaning of multiculturalism and multicultural education. Teachers were not prepared to teach culturally diverse children. In addition, they believe that instead of preparing the classroom for children with different funds of knowledge and adapting the curriculum for them multicultural children should adapt to the current educational system. Finally, teachers claimed the language barrier is the biggest issue they had to cope with, and they use online translators, older siblings going to the same school as interpreters, and body language to solve this problem.