Structuring Multicultural Art Education to Encourage Positive Cultural Identity: Recommendations for Secondary Art Teachers

Abstract

More educators are recognizing the importance of multicultural art education, but due to a gap in pedagogy, students often aren’t provided the guidance and instruction necessary to take away lifelong skills in cultural appreciation, interpersonal communication, critical thinking and thoughtful expression. Providing students with these skills should be at the forefront of initiatives in secondary art education. While quality multicultural art education can result in interpersonal conflict between students in response to issues surrounding cultural identity, the environment of an arts classroom is the perfect space to confront and deconstruct such issues as they arise through the incorporation of conflict resolution strategies (CRS). These strategies, in tandem with quality multicultural art instruction, cultivate a strong classroom community and provide students lifelong skills.