Attitude towards intercultural education: Approach to teachers in schools in Guayaquil

Abstract

The cultural diversity of students in the classrooms is a current challenge for schoolteachers; many of them face interactions with culturally diverse groups without knowing the competences necessary for an effective intercultural communication. This research analyzes a group of 293 educators from state elementary schools in the city of Guayaquil through the scale for teachers' attitude towards intercultural education. The reliability of the questionnaire was 0.8 and the exploratory factor analysis yielded 5 communalities. The general results show that there is a favorable attitude toward intercultural education. However, in some cases there were divergences between: (1) students' high performance in multicultural classrooms and, (2) stress situations generated to the teachers.