Pre-service Teacher Reflections on the Dilemmas, Challenges and Opportunities They Encountered in Implementing Culturally Inclusive Practices in Their Final Placement

Despite Australia’s culturally and linguistically diverse population, the teacher workforce remains predominantly Anglo-Australian, and curriculum and pedagogy continue to be epistemologically centred from a white hegemonic lens. The consequence of this is that culturally and linguistically diverse learners experience barriers to educational success and are alienated and marginalised during their school experience. Preparing pre-service teachers to be culturally inclusive is a social justice issue and needs to be a priority of Initial Teacher Education (ITE) programs. This chapter draws together qualitative data from a doctoral exegesis conducted in Australia in which seven pre-service teachers were asked to reflect on how their cultural knowledge and positioning shaped their pedagogy and prepared them to teach in a culturally responsive way. The findings highlight the dilemmas, challenges and opportunities encountered by the pre-service teachers in implementing culturally responsive practices during their final six-week placement. A major recommendation of this chapter is for ITE courses to create safe spaces for pre-service teachers to engage in reflective discussions around cultural diversity, identity, inclusion and racism as well as to critique their own cultural biases.