Doctoral dissertation: Estonian teachers tend to be culturally blind
Culture is more than national cuisine and traditions – it also influences, for example, how we transmit and receive information, in other words, how we acquire an education. Maiki Vanahans, a PhD student at the Department of Educational Sciences of Tallinn University, studied how teachers consider children’s cultural backgrounds when planning lessons.
Estonia's current education system faces challenges from recent immigration and cultural diversity. The cultural diversity of learners has led to changes in the learning environment. This inevitably impacts teachers, as culture influences the transmission and reception of information. "Recognising and responding to different cultures in teaching is important, and the development of teachers’ intercultural competence is necessary for enriching the overall learning experience and achieving a culturally inclusive preschool or school where both children and teachers recognise and use diversity as a resource," explains Maiki Vanahans, who studied the teachers’ intercultural competence in her doctoral dissertation.
Vanahans acknowledged that to work successfully with students from various cultures, teachers need knowledge and skills on how to engage children from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds in terms of behaviour, cognition and emotion: "Although culturally responsive teaching and interculturality are not new concepts in Estonia, practitioners, teachers and leaders are not familiar with them. In addition, the core subjects covered by culturally responsive teaching do not form part of the teacher competence framework.”
In interviewing teachers and school leaders for her doctoral thesis, Vanahans found that behind their open-minded attitudes that valued diversity was cultural blindness, which emphasised equal treatment for all. "While teachers do not differentiate children by ethnicity or culture, they also do not consider the cultural background of children when preparing learning activities," Vanahans admitted, pointing out how important it is in a multicultural environment for teachers to develop intercultural competence through knowledge and experience. "However, the participants found that experience gives better preparation," Vanahans acknowledged, stressing that the challenges of teaching in multicultural settings should be addressed proactively. School leadership should prioritise the development of teachers' knowledge and skills through further training.
Teachers still consider language barriers the biggest problem when teaching in a multicultural environment. To overcome language barriers, Vanahans recommends focusing on the organisation of the Estonian language education of newly arrived migrant students on the one hand, and on the other hand, increasing teachers' knowledge and skills on how to support children with low Estonian language skills in their learning activities. "This is necessary because, even after 20 years of teaching newly arrived migrant students, teachers rely primarily on their own experience and that of their colleagues," Vanahans stresses.
Maiki Vanahans, PhD student at the Institute of Education of Tallinn University, defended her PhD thesis "Intercultural Competence for Teaching Newly Arrived Migrant Students from the Perspective of Preschool and Primary School Teachers and Leaders" on 3 September. The supervisors of the thesis were Inge Timoštšuk, Professor at Tallinn University and Krista Uibu, Professor at the University of Tartu. The opponents were Terese Elisabet Bondas, Professor Emeritus at the University of Stavanger, and Kara Diane Brown, Professor at the University of South Carolina.