Lesson 1: Multicultural and Global Literacy

As schools cater to diverse students in class, be it in terms of gender, color, race,

nationality, religious affiliations, cultural beliefs, ethnic groups, socio-economic status,
etc., teachers need to understand the concept of multicultural literacy to come up with
appropriate approaches in class.

Multicultural Literacy
Multicultural literacy consist of the skills and ability to identify the creators of
knowledge and their interests (Banks, 1996) to reveal the assumptions of knowledge, to
view knowledge from diverse ethnic and cultural perspective, and to use knowledge to
guide action that will create human and just world (Boutte, 2008).
Multicultural literacy then, brings attention to diversity, equity and social justice
to foster cultural awareness by addressing difficult issues like discrimination and
oppression towards other ethnicities (Boutte, 2008).
Accordingly, education for multicultural literacy should help students to develop
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the 21 century skills and attitudes that are needed to become active citizens who will
work toward achieving social justice within communities. Because of the growing racial,
language and ethnic diversity in the country, multicultural literacy needs to be
transformed in substantial ways to prepare students to function effectively in the 21 st
Century (Boutte).
Boutte (2008) reiterated that making small changes within the classrooms can
create big changes globally. As diversity grows, there is a need for the emergence of
multicultural education that is more representative of the students in today’s classrooms.
Banks (20003) asserted that teaching students to be advocates of multiculturalism is also
a matter of sending a message of empathy and tolerance in schools to develop a deeper
understanding of others and appreciation of different cultures. Developing these attitudes
and skills requires basic knowledge prior to teaching students how to question
assumptions about cultural knowledge and how to critique and critically think about these
important cultural issues, which is what essentially makes multicultural literacy a 21 st
Century literacy (Banks, 2003).
Global Literacy
Global literacy aims to address issues of globalization, racism, diversity and
social justice (Guo, 2014). It requires awareness and action, consistent with a broad
understanding of humanity, the planet, and the impact of a human decision on both. It
also aims to empower students with knowledge and take action to make a positive impact
in the world and their local community (Guo, 2014).
According to the Ontario Ministry of Education (2015), a global citizen should
possess the following characteristics: (1) respect for humans regardless of race, gender,
religion or political perspectives; (2) respect for diversity and various perspectives; (3)
promote sustainable patterns of living, consumption, and production; and (4) appreciate
the natural world and demonstrate respect on the rights of all living things.
Interconnecting multicultural and global literacy. Every classroom contains
students of different races, religions and cultural groups. Guo (2014) averred that students
embrace diverse behaviors, cultural values, patterns of practice, and communication, yet
they all share one commonality, which is their educational opportunity.
Therefore, teachers should teach their students that other cultures exist and that
these deserve to be acknowledge and respected. Integrating a variety of cultural context
into lessons and activities teaches students to view the world from many angles, creates
respect for diversity and enables students to learn exciting information. As classrooms
become increasingly more diverse, it is important for educators to analyze and address
diversity issues and integrate multiculturalism information into the classroom curriculum
(Guo, 2014).

The OECD Global Competence Framework

Source: https://www.oecd.org/pisa/innovation/global-competence/
The framework depicts the four dimensions of global competence encompassing
the development of knowledge, values, attitude and skills that flow along parameters of
attaining such competency.
Global Competence
The desire to participate in interconnected, complex and diverse societies has
become a pressing need. Recognizing the roles of schools in preparing the youth to
participate in the world, the OECD’s Program for International Student Assessment
(PISA) developed a framework to explain, foster and assess students global competence.
This design serves as a tool for policymakers, leaders and teachers in fostering global
competence among students worldwide.
Global competence is a multidimensional capacity. Therefore, globally competent
individuals can analyze and rationalize local, global, and intercultural issues, understand
and appreciate different perspectives and worldviews, interact successfully and
respectfully with others, and take responsible action toward sustainability and collective
well-being (OECD publication).
Global competence refers to skills, values and behaviors that prepare young
people to thrive in a diverse, interconnected and rapidly changing world. It is the ability
to become engaged citizens and collaborative problem solvers who are ready for the
workforce.
Promoting global competence in schools. Schools play a crucial role in helping
young people to develop global competence. They can provide opportunities to critically
examine global developments that are significant to both the world and to their own lives.
They can teach students how to critically, effectively and responsibly use digital
information and social media platforms.
Schools can encourage intercultural sensitivity and respect by allowing students to
engage in experiences that foster and appreciation for diverse peoples, languages and
cultures (Bennett, 1993; Sinicrope, Norris and Watanabe, 2007). Schools are also
positioned to enhance students’ ability to understand their place in the community and the
world and improve such ability to make judgments and take action (Hanvey, 1975 in
PISA, 2018).
The Need for Global Competence
The following are the reasons why global competence is necessary.
1. To live harmoniously in multicultural communities. Education for global
competence can promote cultural awareness and purposeful interactions in increasingly
diverse societies (Brubacker and Laitin, 1998; Kymlicka, 1995; Sen, 2007). People with
diverse cultures are able to live peacefully, respect differences, find common solutions,
resolve conflicts and learn to live together as global citizens (Delors, e. al., 1996;
UNESCO, 2014). Thus, education can teach students the need to address cultural biases
and stereotypes.
2. To thrive in a changing labor market. Education for global competence can
boost employability through effective communication and appropriate behavior within
diverse teams using technology in accessing and connecting to the world (British
Council, 2013).
3. To use media platforms effectively and responsibly. Radical transformations in
digital technologies have shaped young people’s outlook on the world, their interaction
with others and their perception of themselves. Online networks, social media and
interactive technologies give rise to new concepts of learning, wherein young people
exercise to take their freedom on what and how they learn (Zuckerman, 2014).
4. To support the sustainable development goals. Education for global
competence can help form new generations who care about global issues and engage in
social, political, economic and environmental discussions.

Dimensions of Global Competence: Implications to Education

Education for global competence is founded on the ideas of different models of

global education, such as intercultural education, global citizenship education and
education for democratic citizenship (UNESCO, 2014a; Council of Europe, 2016a).

Despite differences in focus and scope, these models share a common goal of
promoting students’ understanding of the world and empower them to express their views
and participate in the society. PISA proposes a new perspective on the definition and
assessment of global competence that will help policy makers and school leaders create
learning resources and curricula that integrate global competence as a multifaceted
cognitive, socio-emotional and civic learning goal (Boix Mansilla, 2016).

This definition outlines four dimensions of global competence that people need to
apply in their everyday life just like students from different cultural backgrounds are
working together on school projects.

Dimension 1: Examine issues of local, global and cultural significance.

This dimension refers to globally competent people’s practices of effectively
utilizing knowledge about the world and critical reasoning in forming their own opinion
about a global issue. People, who acquire a mature level of development in this
dimension, use higher-order thinking skills, such as selecting and weighing appropriate
evidence to support arguments about global developments. Most likely, globally
competent students can draw on and combine the disciplinary knowledge and thinking
styles learned in schools to ask questions, analyze data and propositions, explain
phenomena, and develop a position concerning a local, global or cultural issue. Hence,
globally competent people effectively use and create both traditional and digital media
(Boix Mansilla and Jackson, 2011).

Dimension 2: Understand and appreciate the perspectives and world views

of others.
This dimension highlights that globally competent people are willing and capable
of considering other people’s perspectives and behaviors from multiple viewpoints to
examine their own assumptions. This in turn, implies a profound respect for and interest
in others with their concept of reality and emotions. Individuals with this competence
also consider and appreciate the connections that enable them to bridge in differences and
create common ground. They retain their cultural identity while becoming aware of the
cultural values and beliefs of people around them (Fennes and Hapgood, 1997).
Dimension 3: Engage in open, appropriate and effective interactions
across cultures.
This dimension describes what globally competent individuals can do when they
interact with people from different cultures. They understand the cultural norms,
interactive styles and degrees of formality of intercultural contexts, and they can flexibly
adapt their behavior and communication manner through respectful dialog even with
marginalized groups. Therefore, it emphasizes individuals capacity to interact with others
across differences in ways that are open, appropriate and effective (Barrett, et. al., 2014).
Dimension 4: Take action for collective well-being and sustainable
development.
This dimension focuses on young people’s role as active and responsible
members of society and refers to individual’s readiness to respond
to a given local, global or intercultural issue or situation. It
recognizes that young people have multiple realms of influence
ranging from personal and local to digital and global. Globally
competent people create opportunities to get engaged to improve
living conditions in their communities and build a just, peaceful,
inclusive and an environmentally sustainable world.
The assessment strategy for global competence
The PISA 2018 assessment of global competence contributes development, while
considering challenges and limitations. It has two components: 1) a cognitive test
exclusively focused on the construct of “global understanding”; 2) a set of questionnaire
items collecting self-reported information on students’ awareness on global issues and
cultures, skills (both cognitive and social) and attitudes, as well as information from
schools and teachers on activities that promote global competence (OECD, 2018).
Curriculum for global competence: Knowledge, skills, attitudes and values
Schools can provide opportunities for students to explore complex global issues
that they encounter through media and their own experiences. The curriculum should
focus on four knowledge domains: (1) culture and intercultural relations; (2) socio-
economic development and interdependence; (3) environmental sustainability; and (4)
global institutions, conflicts and human rights. Teaching these four domains should stress
on difference should stress on differences in perspectives, questioning concepts, and
arguments. Students can acquire knowledge in this domain by reflecting on their own
cultural identity and that of their peers by analyzing common stereotypes toward people
in their community or by analyzing related cases of cultural conflict. Acquiring
knowledge in this aspect is important in developing values, such as peace, respect. Non-
discrimination, equality, fairness, acceptance, justice, non-violence and tolerance (OECD,
2018).
Skills to understand the world and to take action
Global competence builds on specific cognitive, communication and socio-
emotional skills. Effective education for global competence gives students the
opportunity to mobilize and use their knowledge, attitudes, skills and values together
while sharing ideas on global issues in and outside of school or interacting with people
from different cultural backgrounds.
A school community that desires to nurture global competence should focus on
clear, controllable and realizable learning goals. This means engaging all educators to
reflect on teaching topics that are globally significant, the types of skills that foster
deeper understanding of the world and facilitate respectful interactions in multicultural
contexts, and the attitudes and values that drive autonomous learning and inspire
responsible action (OECD, 2018).
Knowledge about the world and other cultures
Global competence is supported by the knowledge of global issues that affect
lives locally and around the globe, as well as intercultural knowledge, or knowledge
about the similarities, difference and relations among cultures. This knowledge helps
people to challenge misinformation and stereotypes about other countries and people, and
thus, results in intolerance and oversimplified representations of the world.
This can be done through the following strategies (OECD, 2018):
Perspective-taking refers to the cognitive and social skills of understanding how
other people think and feel.
Adaptability refers to the ability to adapt systems thinking and behaviors to the
prevailing cultural environment, or to situations and contexts that can present new
demands or challenges.
Openness, respect for diversity and global-mindedness
 Globally competent behavior requires an attitude of openness towards people
from other cultural backgrounds, an attitude of respect for cultural differences and an
attitude of global-mindedness. Such attitudes can be fostered explicitly through
participatory and learner-centered teaching, as well as through a curriculum characterized
by fair practices and an accommodating school climate for all students.
Openness toward people from other cultural backgrounds involves sensitivity
towards curiosity about and willingness to engage with other people and other
perspectives on the world (Byram, 2008; Council of Europe, 2016a).
Respect consists of a positive regard for someone based on judgment of intrinsic
worth. It assumes the dignity of all human beings and their inalienable right to choose
their own affiliations, beliefs, opinions or practices (Council of Europe, 2016a).
Global-mindedness is defined as defined as a worldview, in which one sees
him/herself connected to the community and feels a sense of responsibility for its
members (Hansen, 2010).
Valuing human dignity and diversity
Valuing human dignity and valuing cultural diversity contribute to global
competence because they constitute critical filters through which individuals process
information about other cultures and decide how to engage with others and the world.
Hence, people, who cultivate these values, become more aware of themselves and their
surroundings, and are strongly motivated to fight against exclusion, ignorance, violence,
oppression and war.
Clapham (2006) introduced the four aspects of valuing equality of core rights and
dignity. To wit: (1) the prohibition of all types of inhuman treatment, humiliation or
degradation by one person over another; (2) the assurance of the possibility for individual
choice and the conditions for each individual’s self-fulfillment, autonomy or self-
realization; (3) the recognition that protection of group identity and culture may be
essential for that of personal dignity; and (4) the creation of necessary conditions to have
the essential needs satisfied.
Global understanding
Understanding is the ability to use knowledge to find meaning and connection
between different pieces of information and perspectives.
The framework distinguishes four interrelated cognitive processes that globally
competent students need to use to understand fully global or intercultural issues and
situations (OECD, 2018).
1. The capacity to evaluate information, formulate arguments and explain
complex situations and problems by using and connecting evidence, identifying biases
and gaps in information and managing conflicting arguments.
 2. The capacity to analyze multiple perspectives and worldviews, positioning and
connecting their own and other’s perspectives on the world.
3. The capacity to understand differences in communication, recognizing the
importance of socially appropriate communication and adapting it to the demands of
diverse cultural contexts.
4. The capacity to evaluate actions and consequence by identifying and comparing
different courses of action and weighing actions on the basis of consequences
Thus, globally competent students should be able to perform a wide variety of
tasks utilizing different cognitive processes, such as: reasoning with evidence about an
issue or situation of local, global and intercultural significance; searching effectively for
useful sources of information; evaluating information on the basis of its relevance and
reliability; synthesizing information to describe the main ideas in an argumentative text
or the salient passages of a conversation; and combining their background knowledge,
new information and critical reasoning to build multi-causal explanations of global or
intercultural issues (OECD, 2018).
Integrating Global and Intercultural Issues in the Curriculum
For global education to translate abstraction into action, there is a need to
integrate global issues and topics into existing subjects (Klein, 2013; UNESCO, 2014). In
practice, content knowledge related to global competence is integrated in the curriculum
and taught in specific courses. Therefore, students can understand those issues across
ages, starting in early childhood when presenting them in developmentally appropriate
ways (Boix Mansilla and Jackson, 2011; UNESCO, 2015).
Therefore, Gaudelli (2006) affirmed that teachers must have clear ideas on global
and intercultural issues that students may reflect on. They also need to collaboratively
research topics and carefully design the curriculum while giving students multiple
opportunities to learn those issues. Teachers may also engage in professional learning
communities and facilitate peer learning.
More so, teaching about minority cultures in different subject areas entails
accurate content information about ethnically and racially diverse groups and
experiences. Curricula should promote the integration of knowledge of other people,
places and perspectives in the classroom throughout the year (UNESCO, 2014a), rather
than using a “tourist approach”, or giving students a superficial glimpse of life in
different countries now and then.
Textbooks and other instructional materials can also distort cultural and ethnic
differences (Gay, 2015). Teachers and their students should critically examine textbooks
and other teaching resources and supplement information when necessary.
Connecting global and intercultural topics to the reality, contexts and needs of the
learning group is an effective methodological approach to make them relevant to
adolescents (North-South Centre of the Council of Europe, 2012). People learn better and
become more engaged when they get connected with the content and when they see its
relevance to their lives and their immediate environment (Suarez-Orozco and Todorova,
2008).
Pedagogies for promoting global competence. Various student-centered
pedagogies can help students develop critical thinking along global issues, respectful
communication, conflict, management skills, perspective taking and adaptability.
Group-based cooperative project work can improve reasoning and collaborative
skills. It involves topic- or theme-based tasks suitable for various levels and ages, in
which goals and content are negotiated and learners can create their own learning
materials that they present and evaluate together. Learners, participating in cooperative
tasks, soon would realize that to be efficient, they need to be respectful, attentive, honest
and empathic (Barrett, et. al., 2014).
Class discussion is an interactive approach that encourages proactive listening and
responding to ideas expressed by peers. By exchanging views in the classroom, students
learn that there is no single right answer to a problem, understand the reasons why others
hold different views and reflect on the origins of their own beliefs (Ritchhart, et. al.,
2011).
Service learning is another tool that can help students develop multiple global
skills through real-world experience. This requires learners to participate in organized
activities that are based on what has been learned in the classroom and that benefit their
communities. After the activities, learners reflect critically on their service experience to
gain further understanding of course content, and enhance their sense of role in society
with regard to civic, social, economic and political issues (Bringle and Clayton, 2012).
Through service learning, students not only “serve to learn,” which is applied learning,
but also “learn to serve” (Bringle, et. al., 2016).
The Story Circle Approach intends students to practice key intercultural skills,
including respect, cultural self-awareness and empathy (Deardorff, n.d.). The students, in
groups of 5-6, take turns sharing a 3-minute story from their own experience based on
specific prompts, such as “Tell us about your first experience when you encountered
someone who was different from you in some ways.” After all students in the group have
shared their personal stories, students then, share the most memorable point from each
story in “flash back” activity.
Other types of intercultural engagements involve simulations, interviews, role
plays and online games.
Attitudes and values integration toward global competence. Allocating
teaching time to a specific subject that deals with human right issues and non-
discrimination is an important initial step in cultivating values for global competence.
 Values and attitudes are partly communicated through the formal curriculum and
also through ways, in which teachers and students interact, how discipline is encouraged
and the types of opinions and behavior that are validated in the classroom. Therefore,
recognizing the school and classroom environments’ influence on developing students’
values would help teachers become more aware of the impact of their teaching on
students (Gay, 2015).