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9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Too much about race and little coverage of cultures, February 11, 2009
The title of this book is badly mistitled. Although this book is well cited and thoroughly researched, the authors stressed African Americans over all other races. This is a book about multi-cultural education and yet the references were mostly about African Americans. Little research was given to Hispanics, Southeast Asians, Arabs and especially Native Americans. Women and girls are given footnoted references. I do not disagree that racism does not exist in our schools. There are sound examples of racism in this country, and especially in our public schools where tracking, self-fulfilling prophecies, overuse of Special Education and underuse of Gifted Programs for minorities still happen. The authors blame the educators, though, and not the student who may not care to get an education even when offered. Afterall, Asian Americans seem to succeed in the classroom even though they are often face with the same discrimination as African Americans. Yet they are hardly mentioned or used in comparisons of how diversity CAN succeed in public schools. Women and girls in this book are vaguely mentioned as "females" which always bothered me. Since girls make up half of the student body and represent unique issues in the classroom, why not grant them more studies to allow them to succeed more? Although both Nieto and Bode are accomplished educators in high esteem, this book was hard to follow at times and at other times annoying. Many of the points could have been stated in shorter essays in education journals, giving this book somehow an air of "We needed the money so we compiled all these studies into one book!" Don't get me wrong, though, as there were some good points mentioned in this book. Chapter 4, "Racism, Discrimination and Expectations of Students Achievement" was an eye opener. I agree with a previous reviewer who stated that the authors should have used more Hispanic studies in their multicultural education studies. This book is about MULTI cultures and not just the Black race. For areas in the West and Southwest many of the references to African Americans are muted by the majority of Hispanic students in our schools who are still educated primarily by a white teaching staff. This book was required reading for a college course. I plan on selling this book back after this semester.
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23 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Positive indepth look at multicultural education, May 23, 2001
Sonia Nieto has captured the essence of multicultural education because she focuses on real students in real classrooms. She helps teachers and teacher education candidates realize that their goals are the education of all the children in their classrooms and that those most different from the background of the teacher are the ones most in need of multicultural approaches. The goal is student learning, as she points out in her next book, The Light in Their Eyes, Creating Multicultural Learning Communities. I highly recommend this book to any teacher who works with children who speak other first languages than English.
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12 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Ineffective Approach and Little Practical Advice, April 30, 2005
I found this book of little use. The major problems created by using race as the main focus of the book include: * Race as a subject is so overworked that nearly everyone over eight years of age has come to conclusions about race, the most important and most common of which is "I am not racist." However, given how the human brain works (selective attention, generalization, and others) and how humans interact (tribal affiliation, application of generalizations based on visual input, and so on), prejudice and therefore racism are inevitable: We are all racist whether we think so or not. * Again, because the issue of race is overworked, the reaction of many people when race is introduced as a subject is, "Not again!" This could be overcome by a unique or fresh approach. Outside of Chapter 7, "Toward an Understanding of School Achievement", nothing new or fresh is provided. On the positive side, the case studies are well written and well selected. In a different literary context, these case studies could be of immense value. Also, Chapter 7 has value to offer. Yes, I realize that racial discrimination issues are critical, especially given the level of racial discriminiation that exists in the human family. However, focusing on such discrimination as the root issue has stalled civil rights. It has accomplished pretty much all it is going to accomplish. It is time to recognize that predudice is part of the human condition. I invite Ms. Nieto or others to write a text based on the biological and sociological roots of prejudice aimed at helping the reader and, in the context of college classes, the student realize their own propensity for prejudice, recognize how it might show up, and correct the issues of their own prejudice as they emerge.
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