What is there to learn from the British multicultural primary school classroom?

Abstract

Although the problems for teachers posed by the changing South Africa have been more or less defined, in practice many teachers are being confronted by situations which leave them feeling helpless and ineffective. There are, however, parallels to be found in the British children in the classroom, irrespective of cultural, academic and linguistic differences—this was the need that became more and more pressing in the inner-city schools of Britain. A similar need is making itself felt in some South African schools as DET-trained pupils move into schools until recently the preserve of other groupings. This paper looks at a British primary classroom “at work” (a model is constructed) and examines the sorts of tasks and teacher strategies that can generate linguistic development for all the pupils, despite the variety of abilities and cultures in the classroom.