Differential instruction approaches appropriate for teaching students with differing ethnic and racial backgrounds are a key to developing effective approaches to multicultural education. Important and frequently discussed approaches include student learning styles, dialect differences among ethnic and racial groups, and bilingual education.…

Reviews research on instructional techniques recognizing the different learning styles, languages, dialects, or cultures of minority students. Concludes that special educational programs for students of other cultures may have both positive and negative outcomes. (JM)

Adult Basic Education instructors need to be introduced to the Black dialect to dispel misconceptions about the abilities of Black English speakers and to develop activities to help Black students in becoming bidialectal. (SK)

Advantages and disadvantages of beginning literacy instruction in the learner's native language are examined. Factors that need to be considered in choosing the language of instruction are presented. (SK)

Urges teachers to deal with one problem at a time in students' papers when attempting to get nonstandard speakers to write standard English. (DD)

Advocates abandoning the classroom suppression of dialects of native Spanish-speaking students in the southwestern states, and recommends using dialect as a foundation for developing native language skills. (JB)

Reprints a classic article originally published in this journal in October 1973, which argues that the problems vernacular-dialect-speaking students suffer in school are not the direct result of so-called dialect interference but rather the result of educators' negative attitudes (based on deficit theory) toward learners who speak vernacular…

Presents an account of the authors' shared explorations and efforts to name some important variables or criteria that bear on the question of whether or not to invite students to write in a home dialect or language. Offers conclusions in the form of a list of 10 variables to consider. (SG)

Compares controversies surrounding actions by school boards in Hawaii and Oakland, California, to promote student fluency in standard English. Public reactions to these actions demonstrated general lack of understanding about languages and nonstandard dialects. Myths and characterizations about Hawaiian Creole English and African American…

Describes the dilemmas involved with teaching Standard American English (SAE) while still accepting and not judging nonstandard dialects. Relates how the teacher used "Pygmalion" by George Bernard Shaw to show students why they needed to learn SAE. (PRA)

Discusses how activities relating to dialect and nonstandard English are integrated into the curriculum in a middle school English class. Describes numerous class activities that result from reading aloud literary works in a wide array of dialects. Asserts the need for respect for linguistic variation in the classroom and in society. (PRA)

This study examined whether African-American children (n=10; ages 4-9) who deleted final consonants marked the presence of those consonants in some fashion. Results indicated that the children produced longer vowels preceding "deleted" voiced final consonants, suggesting that the children had knowledge of the final consonants perceived…

Argues that nonstandard dialect literature deserves more attention than it is currently getting in the classroom, even if this means additional skills on the part of teachers and students. Introduces some issues of multicultural pedagogy based on the author's experience of teaching Alice Walker's "Nineteen Fifty-Five." (TB)

Discusses nonstandard dialects, particularly Black English, in the classroom. (RM)