Semester

Summer

Date of Graduation

2003

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MA

College

Eberly College of Arts and Sciences

Department

World Languages, Literatures and Linguistics

Committee Chair

Frank W. Medley, Jr.

Committee Co-Chair

Sharon Wilkinson

Committee Member

Dara G. Shaw

Abstract

There have been research studies done in the area of cross-cultural analysis that discuss the necessity of culture-oriented examiners or assessors as well as "culture-free testing" when assessing students from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds. Despite evidence that "culture-bias" is present in oral examinations, few of the studies found directly approach the instructors' reactions to students' different cultural and backgrounds in classroom interaction. Therefore the purpose of this exploratory study was to investigate teachers' perspectives on teaching in a multicultural classroom. The findings of this study conducted in an American language institute with non-native ESL teachers reveal a mismatch between what teachers think they do and what they actually do (between their conscious and subconscious) with regard to different cultural groups in the classroom.

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