Multiculturalism in Teaching Physical Education : A Review of U . S . Based Literature

The purpose of this paper was to review extant literature on multicultural education in the context of teaching physical education. More specifically, the article was designed to review the literature on physical education teachers’ knowledge and skills related to teaching culturally diverse students. The findings revealed teachers' knowledge and skills in multicultural education to embrace cultural competency, cultural sensitivity, culturally responsive pedagogy, and racial identity, and indicated multicultural education coursework and field experiences in teacher education programs to be important avenues for the development of positive attitudes toward cultural diversity. Other findings from this review point to limited previous research studies that focused on multiculturalism in physical education, and further that physical education teachers have varying degrees of knowledge and understanding of multicultural education. The outcomes of these studies underscore the important role physical education teacher education has in preparing pre-service teachers for diversity in schools.