Drawing on Diversity in the Arts Education Classroom: Educating Our New Teachers

Abstract In this article, the authors discuss their attempts to make antiracist multiculturalism a reality in their students’ future classrooms. They note that the literature is replete with examples of what not to do in trivializing curriculum, and they attempt here to take theory into praxis/practice by exposing and describing their strategies for engaging their students in antiracist multicultural understandings and activities. Multiple diverse narratives in the classrooms of Canadian schools provide countless opportunities for arts educators to bring community into the classroom. However, research continues to show that new teachers still come predominantly from the dominant culture and will likely continue dominant traditions unless interventions occur that cause them to reflect on what and how they teach (Beynon, Veblen, & Bradford, in review). Realities of schooling and the crosscurrents of race, gender, and class compel educators to rethink culturally responsive curriculum. In this paper we describe the strategies that each of us used with prospective arts teachers in our university classrooms to educate them about issues of diversity and the necessity for inclusion. The purpose of this paper, then, is to explore means of bringing pedagogical