Student Diversity

Abstract

For many years, student diversity has caused many conflicts in the educational system, especially for immigrant children and children of color. As the student population in American schools becomes increasingly diverse, educators must respond with school reform efforts that meet the needs of these students. Because of this, U.S. immigration laws, has helped the student population to become increasingly more diverse in regards to race, ethnicity, and language. In order for this to take place, school officials must be able to develop culturally sensitive curriculums that accommodate multicultural viewpoints and histories. As of today, many people believes that student diversity has come along way from where it was coming from before, but there are also some issues that still need to be taken in concern about student diversity. This paper goes a little more in debt about how student diversity has come along way, from languages to the question Are U.S. teachers prepared for diversity? The paper identifies each issue on student diversity in categories, locates the main problem, and how the United States are trying to cope with it.

In today society, Educators are faced with an overwhelming challenge to prepare students of diverse cultural backgrounds to live in a society in which you have to change in order to be accepted in a world were some groups have grater societal benefits than others because of race, ethnicity, gender, class, language, religion, ability, or age. In the next twenty-five years, the school system will become increasingly diverse. Researchers have reported that by 2020, students of color will represent nearly half of the elementary and secondary population.

Throughout the 20th century, schools have stressed the importance of learning a non-English language, preferably Spanish. Due to the variety of immigrant languages, the teaching of English in the U.S. public schools is complicated. In 1990, U.S. Bureau of the Census showed us the language spoken at home (Table 4-7).

Table 4-7. Top 15 Languages Other Than English Spoken at Home, 1990 and 1980 (numbers in thousands)

Language 1990 1980 Percent Change, 1980-1990

Spanish 17,345 11,116 56%

French 1,930 1,609 20

German 1,548 1,587 -2

Chinese 1,319 631 109

Italian 1,309 1,618 -19

Tagalog (Filipino) 843 452 87

Polish 723 821 -12

Korean 626 266 135

Vietnamese 507 195 161

Portuguese 431 352 22

Japanese 428 336 27

Greek 388 401 -3

Arabic 355 217 63

Hindi (Urdu) 331 130 155

Russian 242 173 40

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census, “We Asked …You Told Us Language Spoken at Home,”

http://www.census.gov/.

Based on the evidence shown in Table 4-7, it is apparent that Spanish is nine times more frequently spoken in the home rather than French and other European languages. The table does not only shows that Spanish is the leading language spoken, but rather indicates the changing language patterns in the United States. As can be notice, most of the European languages are starting to diminish and languages such as Spanish and Asian are starting to escalate.

Due to the language growth, it is making it difficult for teachers to teach. See, it is important for teachers to recognize that students who are new to a language may not always be able to make appropriate word selections or to comprehend the meaning of particular dialects or slang. See language is used to socialize children into their linguistic and cultural communities. It also helps them to understand culture itself. Each language provides them with means to perceive the world and how to interpret experiences. One major problem in the schools today, is finding