Multicultural Teaching and
Learning with the Internet
by Paul Gorski
University of Maryland, College Park
gorski@wam.umd.edu
June 1, 2001
Goals
 Develop a deeper understanding of the Digital
Divide its relation to multicultural education
 Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the
Internet as an educational medium
 Develop strategies for locating, assessing, and using
contributive Internet resources
 Locate intersections between the Internet and
multicultural teaching philosophies
Part One:
Introduction(s)
 Who are you?



Name
Institution
Primary interest in educational technology
 Who am I?
 Conceptualizing Multicultural Education
Conceptualizing Multicultural
Education: Working Definition
Multicultural education is a progressive approach for
transforming education that holistically critiques and
addresses its current shortcomings, failings, and
discriminatory practices. It is grounded in ideals of social
justice, education equity, and a dedication to facilitating
educational experiences in which all students reach their full
potential as learners and as socially aware and active beings,
locally, nationally, and globally. Multicultural education
acknowledges that schools are essential to laying the
foundation for the transformation of society and the
elimination of oppression and injustice.
Multicultural Education:
Three Levels of Transformation
 Transformation of self (What am I
contributing to the inequities, consciously or
unconsciously?)
 Transformation of schools and schooling
(Pedagogy, curriculum, classroom climate,
counseling practices, testing, etc.)
 Transformation of society
Part Two:
The Digital Divide
What is the Digital Divide?
 Inequities in access to technology (physical
and pedagogical)
 A divide across race, class, first language,
disability, sex/gender, region, and other
factors
 The newest divide between the have’s and
have-not’s
Digital Divide:
Three Primary Strands
1. Access to the technology


Home access to computers and Internet service
School and classroom access to computers and
Internet service
2. Access to progressive pedagogy
3. Access to cultural capital
Digital Divide:
At Issue
3 Strands of the Divide
1. Access to technology
2. Access to pedagogy
3. Access to cultural
capital
The Big Whoop
The same groups on the
losing end of all three
strands have been and
continue to be
disenfranchised by
education in every other
way.
Digital Divide Data:
Class
While only 39 percent of classrooms in
schools with high concentrations of
poverty (based on 71 percent student
eligibility for free or reduced-price
lunches) had Internet access in 1999, 74
percent of classrooms in schools with
lower concentrations of poverty had
Internet access by that time.
Digital Divide Data:
Region
By January 2000, of the 242 million
Internet users worldwide, 120
million are from the United States
and Canada, while only 2.1 million
are from Africa, 1.9 million from the
Middle East, and 8 million from
South America.
Digital Divide Data:
Education
By 2000, only 4 percent of adults with
only an elementary school education
used the Internet, compared with
74.5 percent of those with at least a
four-year college degree.
Digital Divide Data:
Race
While about 70 percent of teachers in
schools in which racial minorities
comprise less than 20 percent of the
student body report having Internet
access in their classrooms, only 51
percent of teachers whose schools
have 50 percent or more minority
enrollments have that luxury.
Digital Divide Data:
Sex/Gender
Though the disparity in Internet usage
between men and women had largely
disappeared by 2000, women are still
more likely to use it recreationally to
pursue hobbies and personal interests
related to travel, health, and cooking,
while men use it largely for professional or
economic endeavors like on-line investing.
Digital Divide Data:
Disability
By 2000, people with physical
disabilities were less than half as
likely to have computer access at
home as people without physical
disabilities; 23.9 and 51.7 percent,
respectively.
Digital Divide Data:
First Language
By 2000, 49.6 percent of the
worldwide Internet users were firstlanguage speakers of English despite
the fact that they make up only 5.3
percent of the world's total
population.
Digital Divide Data:
References
CommerceNet. (2000). Worldwide internet population [online].
http://www.commerce.net/research/stats/wwwstats.html
Cyber Dialogue. (1999). The American Internet User Survey [online].
http://www.cyberdialogue.com/free_data/index.html
Global Reach. (2000). Global internet statistics (by language) [online].
http://www.glreach.com/globstats/index.php3
Kaye, H.S. (2000). Computer and internet use among people with disabilities. San
Francisco, CA: National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research.
National Center for Educational Statistics (2000a). Internet access in U.S. public schools
and classrooms, 1994-1999. Washington, D.C.: United States Department of
Education.
National Center for Educational Statistics (2000b). Teacher use of computers and the
Internet in schools. Washington, D. C.: United States Department of Education.
National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) (2000). Falling
through the net: Defining the digital divide. Washington, D.C.: NTIA.
Smerdon, B., Cronen, S., Lanahan, L., Anderson, J., Iannottie, N., and Angeles, J.
(2001). Teachers’ tools for the 21st century: A report on teachers’ use of technology.
Washington, D.C.: National Center for Education Statistics.
Digital Divide:
Access to Progressive Pedagogy
Race
During 1999, teachers in
schools with low racial
minority populations were
more likely to use
computers for inquiryfocused or interactive tasks
like creating instructional
materials, communicating
with colleagues, or
instructing students.
Gender
Women are still more
likely to use it
recreationally to pursue
hobbies and personal
interests related to
travel, health, and
cooking, while men use
it largely to further
professional endeavors
like on-line investing.
Digital Divide:
Access to Cultural Capital
Socio-cultural and socio-historical barriers to
building technology infrastructure in Native
American communities:
1. Distrust of new technologies
2. Distrust of federal assistance
3. Federal policy that fails to take the needs of
Native Americans seriously
Digital Divide:
Access to Cultural Capital
The Pew Internet Project found a related
distrust among Black Internet users.
Seventy-two percent of Black people are
very concerned about businesses and other
people obtaining their personal
information, compared with 57 percent of
White Internet users.
Digital Divide:
Solutions?
Group One: Access to computers and the
Internet at home and school.
Group Two: Access to progressive pedagogy.
Group Three: Access to cultural capital
(pushing through the socio-cultural divide).
Digital Divide Solutions:
Some Ideas
 Rethink the implications of the heavy reliance on
computer technology in education
 University/Public School partnerships
 Intensive teacher training
 Put money into training and up-keep instead of
more and more equipment
 Team teachers with technology experts to bridge
some lack of knowledge in both groups
Part Three:
Internet as Educational Medium
Opportunities
 Global compendium
 Expansion of resource base
 Intercultural interaction
 Facilitation of dialogue and social
action
Part Three:
Internet as Educational Medium
Challenges
 Learning curve
 Instability
 Fading educational/commercial lines
 Diminishing face-to-face interaction
 Limited “inclusion”
Part Four:
Multiculturality of the Internet
3 Principles of Multicultural Education
1. Inclusive teaching and learning
2. Interactive teaching and learning
3. Collaborative teaching and learning
Multiculturality of the Internet
Inclusive teaching and learning
 Levels of “inclusion” (rep. versus critical)
 “Other” voices
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Excerpts from Slave Narratives
Native American Documents Project
 Student Voices
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Multicultural Graffiti
Voices of Women
Multiculturality of the Internet:
Interactive teaching and learning
 Redefining “interactive”
 First person sources

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Eye Witness: A North Korean Remembers
Sidney Finkel’s Page
 Interaction with peers
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DiversityWeb Discussion Forums
Multicultural Pavilion Discussion Forums
Multiculturality of the Internet:
Collaborative teaching and learning
 Collaboration among educators
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DiversityWeb Leader’s Guide
PedagoNet
 Collaborative Projects
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Multicultural Song Index
Multicultural Passport
Part Five:
Digging through the Dirt
2 Strategies
1. Engines and indexes that have started digging

About.com

Looksmart
2. Organizations you know

PBS

National Geographic Society
Assessment of My Use of
Educational Web Sites
 Do all of my students have equitable access
to the technology needed to complete the
task?
 Does the resource encourage critical
thinking?
 Will using the Internet contribute to the
learning process in relation to the given
topic?
Part Seven:
Discussion
 Unanswered questions.
 New questions.
 What I can do.
 Tools and resources.