This book focuses on how to meet the challenges of education in a pluralistic society, presenting the Bridging Cultures framework, which is designed for understanding differences and conflicts that arise in situations where school culture is more individualistic than the home value system. Six sections examine: (1) “The Bridging Cultures Framework” (e.g., what culture is, the dynamic nature of culture, individualism and collectivism, and strands of multicultural education); (2) “Parent Involvement: Recommended but Not Always Successful” (e.g., minority parent involvement, parent-school partnerships, and finding common ground); (3) “The Cross-Cultural Parent-Teacher Conference” (e.g., the tradition of parent-teacher conferences, using cultural knowledge to enhance communication, and improving parent-teacher conferences); (4) “Learning What Works” (e.g., understanding parents’ points of view, evaluating the messages schools send, and developing closer personal relationships with families); (5) “Teachers as Researchers” (e.g., action research, inquiry and reflection, and ethnographic inquiry); and (6) “Conclusion: The Challenge of Coming Together” (e.g., the need for cultural knowledge, how Bridging Cultures fits into the big picture of school reform, and what is to be gained). An appendix presents the Bridging Cultures Project in brief. (Contains 191 references.) (SM)
