A Multicultural Early Childhood Education Model among Thai and Migrant Students from Myanmar in Phangnga Province

Abstract

The research objectives were 1) to conduct the situational analysis of current situation and existing educational model among Thai and migrant student at early childhood institution in Phangnga Province, and 2) to develop a Multicultural Early Childhood Education Model among Thai and migrant students in Phangnga Province. The research methodology was Research and Development (R & D). The research comprised 2 steps, firstly a situational analysis used a qualitative method and secondly the model development and experimental process used both quantitative and qualitative methods.

The findings from the first research step were; all 4 targeted schools were open to migrant students to enroll. After the enrollment, 3 out of 4 schools managed by the inclusive classroom which taken care by Thai kindergarten teacher while 1 out of 4 schools managed differently. This school separates to migrant and Thai student classroom, the Thai classroom was taken care by Thai kindergarten teacher while the Burmese instructor was taken care the migrant classroom. All 4 schools use the Ministry of Education curriculum for Early Childhood Education B.E 2002 as a core curricular. The existing model for all 4 schools is under the assimilation ideology, not considerably Multicultural Education.

The result of model development and experiment in 2 steps are concluded as following. The model comprised 7 components namely; school policy, a multicultural perspective curriculum, school personnel, learning management, school environment and atmosphere, parents and community. The result after the experiment showed that; 10 Early Childhood students were fully participated in the research. Out of these, 3 are Thai, 6 are Mon and 1 is Burmese. Pre and Posttest mean indicated that after the experiment the knowledge of student was significantly improved at p-value 0.05 while the actual result on behavior was also elaborated that all 10 students had strongly increased their practices on multicultural behavior at p-value 0.05 as well. These are 7 multicultural behaviors which most students had practiced; greeting in other languages, spell out numeric in other languages, introduce one own language to others, interest to learn other cultures, helping friend from other ethnics, play with friend from other ethnics and have interaction with friends parents from other ethnics.

The factors which lead to knowledge, attitude and behavior change were compliment to each other’s. For examples; the school director had a clear policy and provided appropriate support to multicultural education. The curriculum was designed based on cultural perspective while kindergarten teachers gained multicultural knowledge which leads to attitude change and capable to practice in classroom. Learning management were designed based on the diversity of students, classroom and school environment as well as atmosphere were adapted according to multicultural education concept. In addition, practical participation of parents and community were promoted and also contributed the success. The supportive factors contributed to model result were actually led by the ownership and full action school director and kindergarten teacher. The researcher took role as catalyst in some model components such policy and multicultural curriculum development.