Tolerans, jämlikhet och social rättvisa, vilken roll spelar det interkulturella lärandet? : En studie om hur samhällskunskapslärare i gymnasiet uppfattar interkulturellt lärande.

Sammanfattning: Intercultural learning is an aspect in all matters of teaching, including civics. Although it is not specified “how” intercultural learning should be included or defined in civics. In the curriculum LGR 11 for the elementary school the concept of intercultural learning is explicitly included but in GY 11 for the upper secondary school its excluded, at least explicitly. Furthermore, there is ambiguities about the definition of intercultural teaching. Although tolerance, equality, and social justice are aspects that intercultural teaching strives to develop. In relation to the report ICCS 2016 attributes such as tolerance, values and understanding norms in other cultures indicated to be somewhat lacking in students, attributes that intercultural learning is supposed to develop. The purpose of this master thesis is to interview upper secondary school teachers in civics about their perception of intercultural learning, in what ways intercultural learning occurs in teaching and how the teachers perceive support for intercultural learning in GY 11. To study this, I have used semi-structured interviews. Their answers were later analysed through three theoretical aspects based on Lahdenperäs (2004) definition of intercultural learning. These are student-active and experience-based teaching, culture contrastive perspective and emotionally process one’s own ethnocentrism. The result show that intercultural learning is unusual when the interviewed teachers reflect upon their teaching planning. The teachers did not or only barely understood the concept of intercultural learning. After the interviews were analysed, it showed a mixed result about how teachers reflect and understand intercultural learning and how they include it in their teaching. Sometimes the teachers mentioned aspects that indicate the use of intercultural learning and at other times responses indicated otherwise, even aspects that intercultural learning is supposed to oppose. Perceived support about intercultural teaching in the curriculum GY 11 deemed to be somewhat lacking and could be improved upon. Although the teachers mentioned that it might be difficult to include more aspects in the curriculum due to the overload in work it might cause. The results also showed that intercultural teaching might be an area to study further upon because of the interesting reflections by the teachers, that might aid the understanding of how intercultural teaching could be included in teaching.