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Should high school history curricula reflect multicultural perspectives

Last reviewed: November 13, 2011 ~4 min read

¶ … tells topic selected topic important. • Should high-school history classes social-studies curriculum changed reflect diversity multicultural perspectives? • Should U.

The masses are typically accustomed to having history and social studies classes focused on the dominant segment of their community, with minorities present in the respective community having to adapt. In most cases, minorities simply need to accept that the authorities consider that it is very difficult to provide each student with preferential curricula and that the general purpose of going to school is for them to be assimilated by society. In spite of the fact that the U.S. holds a great deal of ethnic groups, educational institutes normally teach history and social studies curricula that only relate to European-American people. Especially given that white individuals have actually become minorities in some states, the U.S. needs to accept the fact that it is a multicultural society and that it is essential for it to create classes that address students on account of their backgrounds.

State authorities in particular areas from the U.S. have attempted to provide students with teachings in their native languages with the purpose of making it easier for them to understand what they were taught in school. In some cases, these techniques have had limited effectiveness because schools were unable to successfully address the needs of each child or because children found it difficult to start from the beginning as a result of the fact that the primary language had changed. Even with the fact that bilingual classes taught both English and a native language, they did not teach history and social studies dealing with the respective native language.

Considering that some ethnic groups are determined to maintain cultural values, it is difficult for children in schools to be presented with a whole new approach considering culture. While they initially considered culture to be primarily connected with their ethnic traditions, schools teach them history from a different perspective and make it problematic for them to identify with a particular cultural identity. These children come to be multicultural individuals that identify with a wide range of traditions but that are unable to claim that they belong to a single culture. The U.S. has a great deal of spanglish people in territories containing a great deal of Hispanic individuals. From a certain point-of-view, it's perfectly normal for schools to want to provide multicultural students with teachings regarding English traditions, given that this helps them integrate society easier. However, denying these children the chance to learn important things regarding their ethnicity practically prevents them from identifying with their background, their families, and their traditions. "In California, Proposition 54 forbids the government from classifying people on the basis of race, ethnicity, color or national origin in public employment, contracting, education and numerous other situations" (The Color Blind Society: Whiteness as the Default Standard). Although it experienced significant progress in the recent years, society did not manage to acknowledge the fact that a multicultural environment needs multicultural teaching. Being multicultural does not necessarily mean that a person is advantaged, as he or she fails to associate his or her thinking to certain cultural values and largely feels that he or she does not belong.

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PaperDue. (2011). Should high school history curricula reflect multicultural perspectives. PaperDue. https://paperdue.com/essay/tells-topic-selected-topic-important-8226-52856

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