Comprehensive Multicultural Education: Theory and Practice (5th Edition)

This text provides preservice teachers the historical background, basic terminology, and social science concepts of multicultural education to assist them as they enter the field.

Comprehensive Multicultural Education provides a curriculum model with six goals and numerous lesson plans illustrating how each goal can be implemented in the classroom. The text includes conceptual frameworks from the social sciences and historical backgrounds. Both theory and practice in the text present interdisciplinary content through primary source material and vignettes of actual teachers and students, and encourage interactions between students' cultural and individual differences.

Bennett aims to foster the idea that understanding and valuing students' individual differences allows teachers to encourage each student to reach his or her fullest potential.

Christine Bennett aims to help prepare teachers who are informed and caring advocates for students from all cultural, racial, socioeconomic, linguistic, and national backgrounds. Comprehensive Multicultural Education provides a curriculum model with six goals and numerous lesson plans illustrating how each goal can be implemented in the classroom. It emphasizes diversity within and across ethnic groups to help teachers understand students’ cultural and individual differences. Incorporating research from current sociology, history, and ethnogeography, the author makes key issues like immigration accessible for today’s teachers.

New to This Edition

• Revision and expansion of Part II, “Roots of Ethnic Diversity in the United States: The Conflicting Themes of Assimilation and Pluralism,” from two to four chapters.
• New coverage of contemporary immigration issues in schools (Ch. 8 & 9)
• New case study research by ethnogeographers provides representative examples of the immigrant experiences in the heartland, West Coast, and Southwest.
• Additions to the section on American Indians.
• New Chapter 10, “Teaching and Learning in Linguistically Diverse classrooms.”
• Expansion of and greater emphasis on subjects such as the Achievement Gap, Poverty, and the needs of LGBT youth in Chapter 9, and White Privilege, difficulties with the U.S. Census racial categories, Multiracial Identities, and how race and culture are conceptually different in Chapter 2. 
• Substantial updates to Resources for Further Study.
• New MyEducationLab site provides online assignments as extensions of text concepts.

What reviewers are saying:

"The examples and cases are students' favorites. The quality of the information presented [in this text] is excellent."

- Henry M. Codjoe, Dalton State College

“I like the emphasis placed on ethnic and national groups covered in Part II. Other texts don't cover this topic to the extent that this text does. I particularly like her treatment of immigration and how it has impacted our nation and our schools."

-Richard Orem, Northern Illinois University

“More areas of diversity were covered than are found in most texts of this nature. Overall, the writing style is great. It is easy to read, has a narrative feel."

-Anita Jones Thomas, Loyola University - Chicago