‘I treat them all the same’ teacher‐pupil talk in multiethnic classrooms

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The underachievement of ethnic minority children continues to be an issue for educators in many parts of the world. Attempts to explain and remedy this underachievement have been many and varied. Recent discussions, however, have focused increasingly on the notion of institutional racism and a number of commentators have tried to identify the ways in which the assumptions and practices of the dominant group work to the detriment of minority children in the classroom. The present paper is offered as a contribution to this ongoing debate. It examines the interactions of some five different teachers working with multi‐ethnic classes of five‐six year olds in the UK. Teachers were found to interact less frequently with Black children than with White; they have fewer exchanges lasting more than thirty seconds with Black children; they also spent less time with them discussing the particular task which had been set. Qualitative data from classroom observation which throws light on these findings is also considered. It is suggested that there is an urgent need for teachers and teacher educators to look more critically at the ways in which stereotypes are mediated through language.

This publication has 4 references indexed in Scilit: