Multicultural Education: Raj’s Story Using a Curricular Conceptual Lens of the Particular

Authors

Vicki Ross, Northern Arizona UniversityFollow
Elaine Chan, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

2008

Citation

Teaching and Teacher Education 24 (2008), pp. 1705–1716.

doi: 10.1016/j.tate.2008.03.003

Comments

Copyright © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. Used by permission.

Abstract

In this study, we employ a curricular conceptual lens of the particular to explore the experience of multicultural education from the perspective of an immigrant student, Raj. Using a school-based narrative inquiry approach, we learn about Raj’s experiences at the intersections of immigration and settlement, adaptation and assimilation, English-language acquisition, unemployment, poverty, family violence, and family relocation. We employ Dewey’s [(1938). Experience and education. New York: Simon & Schuster] theory of experience, Connelly and Clandinin’s [(1988). Teachers as curriculum planners: Narratives of experience. New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia] understanding of curriculum as experience, and Schwab’s [(1969). The practical: A language for curriculum. School Review, 78, 1–23] theory of the particular as theoretical frameworks upon which to examine and analyze interactions and events.