Introduction
Nowadays students’ diversity in the classroom is typical for many educational institutions in different countries. All the students have equal rights with regards to learning and development. Educators now have to be able to deal with the diversity and to ensure that every student receives attention and is provided with the best possibility to learn. The problem has become very important as it appears that dealing with the diverse classroom is a more complicated issue than it may seem to be. Sometimes teachers even are not able to cope with the quarrels between the representatives of different races or sexual orientation. Language is also an issue of diversity and sometimes causes problems. Teachers need to be more informed and trained in dealing with the diverse students in order to ensure smooth learning process and positive psychological atmosphere in their classrooms.
Recently there have been many studies regarding the importance of student diversity issues, researchers are trying to find solutions for the problems arising from it and provide teachers with the recommendations. However, most of such recommendations are complicated to be implemented and they require many special conditions. The problem is emerging and teachers need to know how to behave. This literature review is devoted to the identification of the issues that arise due to the student diversity and finding practices for the teachers that may be used to deal with the diverse classroom.
Meaning of the Diversity
Not all people have the same definition for diversity. Some people can think first about it in relation to one’s skin color or language, gender, background, ethnicity, race or sexuality. For teachers, it is the experience continuum that a student takes to a school as a person that has to be supported and nurtured. In case there is a difference between school and home experiences of a child, diversity usually becomes something that should be ignored or obliterated. This makes impact not just upon academic success opportunity, self-esteem, and belonging sense, but it may also rather quickly decrease the student’s motivation to learn (Reis, 2009, p. 12). Connecting with and knowing of the students that enter the classroom is absolutely necessary for the modern teachers (Reis, 2009, p. 13).
Educating in multicultural and multilingual contexts is a complicated problem and involves not only just including more teachers from similar to students backgrounds to cope with the problem (Faez, 2012, p. 79).
The cultural gap between teachers and school children is growing and large. For example, in the U.S. the enrollment in public secondary and elementary schools in 1996 was 17% Black, 64% White, 4% Asian/ Pacific Islander, 14% Hispanic, and 1% Alaskan Native / American Indian children. At the same time, in 1994 the force of teaching was 7% Black, 87% non-Hispanic White, 1% Asian/Pacific Islander, 4% Hispanic, and 1% Alaskan Native / American Indian. 39% of educators had limited English proficiency students in their classrooms; however, just 25% of those educators had been trained for dealing with them.
In many color communities, as well as in numerous communities of poor White education is in a crisis state. Children are becoming disengaged, learning far too little, and dropping out at large quantities. Very small number of students is attending college (Sleeter, 2001, p. 94).
Cultural Diversity
The learners are diverse in their ethnicity and cultures, their learning styles, their experiences, and other aspects. Such aspects determine how they learn and who they are. Professional educators understand this problem and utilize different methods of teaching to assist studying.
Promoting a classroom that is color-blind may not be a good resolution for the situation. Attempting to do this privileges inevitably a certain perspective (often the one of the educator) and does not provide a possibility to recognize the needs and experiences of the students. The author recommends utilizing strategies that capitalize and recognize the diversity.
It is important to appreciate each student’s individuality. Every child has unique perspectives, values, needs and experiences. Teacher can inform children early in the course that he or she is willing to meet all students’ needs and that the teacher is open to discussions regarding the ways of assisting them with learning ("Teaching in a Diverse Classroom", 2016, p. 43). Children should be sure that that the teacher will understand and help them with all their problems and concerns related to learning.
In addition, teachers need to recognize their own styles of learning and cultural background; as such factors make impact on their way of teaching and expectations from the children. Recognition of these factors makes possible for teachers to create the style of teaching that is more appropriate for the diverse students.
Professionals also recommend preparing different examples to support the material. It is good when such examples refer to various experiences, cultures, genders, sexual orientations, etc., to assist all children in studying process. It is necessary to help students understand differences between specific experiences, abstract, concrete and theoretical knowledge, to enhance learning of everyone. It is better to use different methods of teaching (small groups, lectures, collaborative learning, and discussions) to meet the learning needs’ variety ("Teaching in a Diverse Classroom", 2016, p. 44).
Diversity influences culture. Uniqueness of the individual is identified by the inherent in a person’s life diversity, received through either one’s associations or the DNA. Diversity determines people, both as a nation and as individuals.
Cultural differences are manifested generally in the way people communicate, approach learning, complete tasks, deal with conflicts, reveal information regarding themselves to others, and make decisions (Balogun, 2010, p. v).
Interculture means cultures interactions, where every group of individuals esteems the contributions, perspectives, and traditions of the others. The interculturalism’s goals are to reduce marginalization, improve mutual understanding, and create inclusion.
As institutions of education are society’s microcosms, the role of culture is very important in schools nowadays. The teachers, therefore, need to be able to appropriately and effectively communicate in various contexts of culture; and apply such skills to different contexts of education, like the school, classroom, provincial and district school educational system, etc.
In general, intercultural skills are acquired over time with the help of reflection, observation, practice and learning. Using tools and skills designed specifically for the intercultural environment and learning improves equity (Balogun, 2010, p. vi).
Diverse Classroom’s Learning Styles
Generally, there are three major styles of learning:
Auditory learners are used to receive information and ideas by hearing it. Such children can experience difficulties with writing and reading, but be very successful at remembering spoken words. These students usually benefit from classes that are based on discussion and the possibility of oral presentations’ preparing.
Visual learners are used to get information by viewing it. Usually such learners are concentrated on details. These children rarely talk in class in comparison with the others, and usually use few words while speaking. Graphs, outlines, pictures and maps are helpful for these children.
Kinesthetic-Tactile learners prefer to receive information by means of touch and movement. Such children are usually called as hyperactive as they like to constantly move around. As they prefer movement, these students may learn and take many notes best once they have a possibility to experience and explore their environment ("Teaching in a Diverse Classroom", 2016, p. 42).
Disability and Health Problems
Disability and problems with health sometimes become significant obstacles while learning. The teacher should take this into account and assist such students with achieving the best possible academic results. Professionals recommend considering the following while working with students with special needs:
Even when two students have the same disability, their accommodation needs may not coincide. It is necessary to teach every child individually;
It is required to remember that disabilities may sometimes be invisible to other people. The teacher does not need to estimate a health of the student, but the teacher has to be aware of authorized documentation regarding the needs of individual student;
Utilizing different modes (video/slide, verbal, written, etc.) to show information is among the methods of assisting some special needs’ learners to study successfully ("Teaching in a Diverse Classroom", 2016, p. 43).
In order to facilitate the process of learning of students of different needs and backgrounds, the teachers should take into consideration the following factors: treat every child as an individual with his or her needs, weaknesses and strengths, and not as a typical representatives of some ethnic, cultural groups, or races; use different styles of teaching to respond to the diverse learners’ needs; contribute to the open classroom that highly esteems the perspectives and experiences of all learners ("Teaching in a Diverse Classroom", 2016, p. 41).
In order to be good teachers, students of education should appreciate and understand the diversity of humans. Emphasis has to be put on a broad liberal arts education in the multicultural education initial course, multiculturalism infusion throughout the curriculum of education, and cultural competency assessment of every individual.
In many societies the classroom includes people of various genders, social classes, abilities, ages, sexuality, racial, ethnic, or religious backgrounds, as well as of various personal characteristics. A number of these differences can be noticed in the learning styles multiplicity of students. Diversity instruction is mainly concentrated on the sequential abstract learning. Teachers usually emphasize the analytical skills’ development and devote most classes to conceptual and theoretical issues; they often put accent on perfectionism; teachers prefer to use more lectures than discussions in group (Du Plessis & Bisschoff, 2007, p. 245).
Differences in Sexual Orientations and Gender
Differences in gender. Many professionals notice that males and females have certain differences in studying context, this relates particularly to mathematics and science. There is also data that in some cases teachers treat male and female learners differently, such as interrupt female students more frequently in comparison with the male students or suggest female students to critically think less often than male students.
The situation of students with different sexual orientations also causes numerous problems in the classroom. Thus, a lesbian woman and gay man have to make a decision regarding being honest to the peers and each option causes different problems: in case they tell the truth it may be dangerous, so they have to pretend to be similar to others (Geer, 1997).
Management of the Diverse Classroom
There are three main trends that exist in the literature related to the management of the diverse classroom:
the constructs and terms used to study, elucidate, and conceptualize management of the diversity in the classroom vary;
the ethnic and racial students identities (the populations) researched in the studies extend beyond White and Black to include a racially and culturally diverse students range; and
the studies’ locations (the contexts) in the literature vary regarding management of diverse classroom (Milner & Tenore, 2010, p. 561).
Among the most important actions targeting to improve climate in the campus with regards to the diversity is to grow the quantity of individuals of color there (Hurtado, Milem, Clayton-Pedersen & Allen, 1998).
Use of Modern Technology
Different resources of technology that many schools have now may also be utilized to improve the diverse students teaching. Word processors and simple graphics software, the same as tools and resources available on the Internet, provide teachers and learners with numerous ways to work with information, search content, check knowledge, and improve understanding. However, this easily accessible technology power may not be recognized by all educators and other professionals who make decisions regarding professional development, technology allocating, and perform other related tasks. They can sometimes know numerous low-tech devices for learning improvement, for example, highlighting, books on tape, writing templates and worksheets, and making tables, charts, or diagrams, but they may not be familiar with the possibilities of such strategies’ improvement with the existing digital technology use (Wahl & Duffield, 2005, p. 2). In fact these technological innovations may be very helpful in the learning process.
Conclusions
As it can be seen from the above literature review, the problem of students’ diversity is complex and wide-spread. Modern teachers face it in almost every classroom and need to have knowledge and skills in order to be able to deal with it. Students may be diverse in their cultural and ethnical backgrounds, genders, sexual orientation, health problems, disability, and etc. The problem is that there is no single recipe to deal with them all. Each child requires much attention and individual approach. However, there are some advices that are applicable to all the students in the conditions of a diverse classroom. They include treating everyone as a unique personality, having respect to everyone, adjusting teacher’s own cultural worldview to the conditions of the diverse audience, using technology in the process of education, and other.
References
Balogun, G. (2010). Teaching in the Intercultural Classroom. Edmonton, AB: The Alberta Teachers’ Association.
Berry, R. (2006). Teachers’ assessment practices for classroom diversity. Hong Kong Institute Of Education, 7. Retrieved from http://www.iaea.info/documents/paper_1162a1ffcd.pdf
Du Plessis, P., & Bisschoff, T. (2007). Diversity and complexity in the classroom: valuing racial and cultural diversity. Educational Research And Review, 2(9), 245. Retrieved from http://www.academicjournals.org/journal/ERR/article-full-text-pdf/89639A33699
Faez, F. (2012). Diverse Teachers for Diverse Students: Internationally Educated and Canadian-born Teachers’ Preparedness to Teach English Language Learners. CANADIAN JOURNAL OF EDUCATION, 35(3), 79. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ995610.pdf
Geer, A. (1997). Diversity in the College Classroom (p. 83). Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina. Center for Teaching and Learning.
Helping Faculty Teach Diverse Students and Diverse Topics Effectively Principles and Guidelines. (2008). San Diego State University, 1-8. Retrieved from http://wikieducator.org/images/b/bb/Diversity_and_complexity_in_the_classroom.pdf
Hurtado, S., Milem, J., Clayton-Pedersen, A., & Allen, W. (1998). Enhancing Campus Climates for Racial/Ethnic Diversity: Educational Policy and Practice. The Review Of Higher Education, 21(3), 279-302. Retrieved from https://castl.duq.edu/Conferences/Library03/FOV1-00014858/FOV1-00014A87/Hurtado_S.pdf
Milner, H., & Tenore, F. (2010). Classroom Management in Diverse Classrooms. Urban Education, 45(5), 561-291. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0042085910377290
Packard, J. (2013). The Impact of Racial Diversity in the Classroom: Activating the Sociological Imagination. American Sociological Association.Teaching Sociology, 41(2), 144. doi:10.1177/0092055X12451716
Reis, N. (2009). Diversity in the Classroom. Principal, 12-13. Retrieved from https://www.naesp.org/resources/1/Pdfs/Principal-ND09-Diversity-in-the-Classroom.pdf
Richards, H., Brown, A., & Forde, T. (2006). Addressing Diversity in Schools: Culturally Responsive Pedagogy. National Center For Culturally Responsive Educational Systems. Arizona State University, 4-11. Retrieved from http://www.nccrest.org/Briefs/Diversity_Brief.pdf
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Wahl, L., & Duffield, J. (2005). Using Flexible Technology to Meet the Needs of Diverse Learners: What Teachers Can Do. Wested, 2. Retrieved from https://www.wested.org/online_pubs/kn-05-01.pdf
