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With schools having students from all different backgrounds and cultures, it’s important for teachers as well as other students to celebrate the diversity that’s found in the classroom these days. Sometimes, it can be difficult to know how to help students embrace the diversity of other children’s backgrounds, and it’s certainly hard to figure out how to fit such a lesson like that in between multiplication and gym class! These tips provide helpful and easy ways to include multicultural learning and appreciation in your classroom without it being overly forced or out of place.

Use Holidays as a Platform to Teach Multiculturalism
While you can take a break in your summer vacations, taking out some time to study good books would not be something much hard. Some schools are rather conservative about celebrating holidays that are based on specific religions, but if you’re not able to have a celebration for a holiday, perhaps a short time spent explaining the holiday, its significance, and what is done during it would be a good idea. If it’s allowed, a little celebration during a specific holiday is a great way to get the students’ attention, while providing them with a tangible crash course in a different religion or ethnic background. Simple foods, games and other traditions can be utilized on a holiday to help students embrace different cultures.

Show and Tell, Multicultural Style
Show and tell is a game that usually is reserved for younger students, and this version would also work well with them. Instead of simply having kids bring in objects from home, try to get them to bring items that are significant to their cultural background. This can be a great way for students to open up with each other about their backgrounds, as well as a way for them to appreciate each other’s heritage. Of course, you can also provide information to go along with what the students say, or ask questions that lead to more information or discussion from those sharing.

For older students, this game can work as well. In fact, older students may be more able to really identify with and speak about their backgrounds than their younger counterparts. Their parents are also more likely to trust them with important family items or antiques. Just make sure you don’t tell them it’s “show and tell”! Also, as the teacher, you can bring in items that you find that represent different cultures, and plan a short lesson around them.

Find the Culture in School Subjects
Finally, it’s important that teachers today look for opportunities to talk about important social and cultural issues. For certain teachers, like history and social studies teachers, this can be easy. For others, it can be more difficult, but is still possible. Math teachers can discuss the backgrounds of important mathematicians, music class is a great place to explore different cultural sounds, science can easily be a platform to talk about the scientific contributions of many cultures, and so on. This is something tutors can do, as well.

As you can see, if it’s truly a priority to you to talk about many different cultures in your classroom, it’s something that you can do. If you make an effort to include an appreciation of differing cultures as a lesson that is learned in your classroom, your students will be much better for it.