The relationship between teachers’ educational beliefs and their perceptions of multicultural competence

Abstract

The basic aim of this research is to determine teachers’ educational beliefs and their perceptions of multicultural competence. Also, it was investigated whether teachers’ educational beliefs and their perceptions of multicultural competence varied depending on some variables such as gender, department and professional seniority. Research was conducted in relational screening model. Research population was comprised of teachers who work at publich school in Atakum district in 2015-2016 academic year. Data were collected via “Perceptions of Multicultural Competence Scale” which was developed by Başbay and Kağnıcı (2011), “Educational Belief Scale” developed by Yılmaz, Altınkurt and Çokluk (2011) and “Personal Information Form” developed by the researchers. A statistical software package was used for the analysis of the data. The analysis of datas were used to descriptive statistics as mean, standart deviation, frequency, percentage as well as MannWhitney U and Spearman-Brown correlation coefficient. The results of research were revealed a significant correlation between teachers’ educational beliefs and their perceptions of multicultural competence. The obtained results were discussed in the light of literature and given some suggestions.

Keywords: Belief, educational beliefs, multicultural education, multicultural competence, teacher