Teaching in culturally diverse contexts: what knowledge about ‘self’ and ‘others’ do teachers need?

This article draws on data from a small‐scale qualitative study conducted in Australia that explored how pre‐service teachers engaged with students from culturally diverse backgrounds during practicum and how they understood their own ethnic identities. The findings of the study suggest that pre‐service teachers have simplistic understandings of their students' cultures and limited understandings of how their own identities are constituted through, and by, ethnicity. Such limited knowledge about the ‘ethnic self’ and the ‘ethnic other’ has implications for the development of multicultural pedagogies. The article raises concerns for teacher education including the need to provide opportunities for pre‐service teachers to understand the ‘ethnic self’ in relation to the ‘ethnic other’ through ongoing critical reflection.