INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION: ANALYSIS OF THE PRIMARY SCHOOL TEXTBOOKS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA

Abstract

The intercultural education is most explicitly accomplished through textbook contents which encourage interaction, exchange, desegregation, interdependency and solidarity among people belonging to different cultural groups living in the same territory. The main goal of the research was to determine the quantity and quality of content that point to intercultural education in the textbooks used in elementary schools in the Republic of Macedonia, where the medium of teaching is in Macedonian. The analysis includes 44 textbooks. The research involved both quantitative and qualitative research methods, the late involved using deductive defining of categories. Nine categories, important for intercultural education were distinguished: identity, cooperation and friendship, respect, tolerance, cultural relativism, stereotype, prejudice, oppression and labeling. The results showed that the highest percent of contents promoting intercultural is found in textbooks for Civic education and History, while the lowest one in Nature and Geography. From the analyzed categories, identity is highly present, followed by cooperation, friendship and respect of the other. Themes regarding the categories such as: stereotype, prejudice, labeling and oppression are least represented and are not even mentioned as negative examples of behaviors which are not to be practiced. As a conclusion, we can say that it is very positive that depreciation and discrimination of other cultures, ethnicities or religious groups are not present. However, there is demand and need to enrichtextbooks and syllabuses with large number of contents concerning above mentioned positive categories, in order to promote one set of values which are essential to build an intercultural society.