Creating culturally responsive classrooms in a Chinese context: A study of teacher and school attitudes to multicultural teaching competence in Hong Kong schools

Hong Kong is a multicultural society without any multicultural policy support. Schools have a predominantly Chinese student population but some 1.94% of our students are ethnic minorities. (School Education Statistic Section, EDB, 2012). These students remained invisible in the school system until the 2008 Racial Discrimination Ordinance and the implementation of inclusive education policy in 2002 (EDB, 2010, 2011). Without a broad multicultural environment supporting our schools, how do teachers better support the learning of ethnic minority students, make them feel included and address the issues of diversity involved? It can be argued that teachers’ lack of knowledge of ethnic minority students’ backgrounds and cultures impedes effective teaching and learning and the promotion of inclusion. Hence the broad aim of this proposed study is to address the issue of Hong Kong’s teachers’ multicultural competence in supporting the learning of ethnic minority students at the various levels of classroom, school and teacher professional development, as identified in our prior research projects (Hue, 2008: Hue &' Kennedy, 2012; Kennedy & Hue, 2011: Kennedy, 2008). Specifically the study will explore teachers’ views of culturally responsive teaching and how such teaching can support the learning of these students in public schools. These students are among our lowest academic achievers, come from low socio-economic backgrounds, face problems of social adjustment and experience learning difficulties in the foreign languages of Chinese and English.

Funding Source: RGC - General Research Fund (GRF)