Abstract
This study focuses on how the Greek language teachers manage the students’ linguistic and cultural diversity in the Multi-cultural/ Cross-cultural Senior High Schools. The teachers’ attitudes towards their students with a different linguistic and ethnic background as well as the practices they use when teaching Modern Greek Language are investigated in this work. Despite the fact that a lot of students with a different level of knowledge of the Greek language and a diverse cultural background attend classes in the Cross-cultural Schools, the same curricula and syllabuses, the same teaching material and methodology with the other types of Senior High Schools of Greece are used to teach them Modern Greek Language. For this reason the focus of the study is the teachers, that take on the responsibility of teaching Modern Greek Language classes in which Greek language speakers and foreign language speakers coexist.The data for the study were selected through three instruments:11questionnair ...
This study focuses on how the Greek language teachers manage the students’ linguistic and cultural diversity in the Multi-cultural/ Cross-cultural Senior High Schools. The teachers’ attitudes towards their students with a different linguistic and ethnic background as well as the practices they use when teaching Modern Greek Language are investigated in this work. Despite the fact that a lot of students with a different level of knowledge of the Greek language and a diverse cultural background attend classes in the Cross-cultural Schools, the same curricula and syllabuses, the same teaching material and methodology with the other types of Senior High Schools of Greece are used to teach them Modern Greek Language. For this reason the focus of the study is the teachers, that take on the responsibility of teaching Modern Greek Language classes in which Greek language speakers and foreign language speakers coexist.The data for the study were selected through three instruments:11questionnaires, interviews and observations. The technique of triangulation was applied with a view to gather both quantitative and qualitative data and to increase the credibility and validity of the results through cross verification.More specifically, during the investigation Questionnaires were used which were answered by the inquired staff. Also Semi- Structured Interviews, for which samples of two stages were used in many phases and finally the method of Non Participant Observation, with sampling of two stages in many phases, the data of which were used as a tool to check the findings of the other two methods. After the gathering and the electronic recording of data, the classification, the coding, the analysis, the treatment and the interpretation of the findings, that correspond to the theoretical affairs of the research, followed thoroughly.According to the results of the research, it has been confirmed that the attitudes and the practices acquired by the Greek Language teachers make the teaching process be organized in a traditional manner that results in the creation of a monolingual – oriented education system as far as the curricula and the teaching material are concerned. Undoubtedly there are many cases in which innovative and pioneering teaching methods are chosen aiming at the effective result of the course and the improvement of the students’ language level and school performance. Teachers point out the lack of infrastructure and the deficit of the institutional framework and doubt the cross-cultural dimension of the educational processes inside the cross-cultural school. However teachers themselves often try hard to create in their multicultural class an environment of mutual acceptance and collaboration among the students, in which the common values can progressively be built and the various cultures may coexist and interact.The findings of the survey seem to confirm the central research hypothesis, since the teachers, who work in a mono-lingual and mono cultural education system, present contradictions, differentiations, regressions between the traditional and the innovative. Besides, having constituted a solidified body of educational experiences and personal mentalities and perceptions, they attempt to discover new ways of managing the multilingual and multicultural composition of their classes and to create a more “cross-cultural” vision of the educational process
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