Immigrant Students’ Experiences of Teaching Methods and the Education Process at Three Different Universities in Iceland

Abstract

The paper emphasizes the importance of implementing culturally responsive teaching methods which can improve the quality of education in universities with diverse student populations. It is based on the first, extensive, qualitative study on immigrant students’ experiences of university education in Iceland. The theoretical framework of the research includes multicultural education theory (Banks & Banks, 2010) and critical multicultural studies (Parekh, 2005), which focus on analysing the position of minority groups in societies with special attention to their access to education. The paper presents findings concerning the participants’ experiences of the education process and their perspectives on culturally responsive teaching methods (Gay, 2000), as well as highlighting the importance of creating an atmosphere of trust and power sharing in the classroom. The findings are relevant for educational institutions that emphasize the importance of multicultural education and that pay special attention to providing equal rights to education to everyone regardless of their origin.

Keywords

• immigrants
• higher education
• multicultural education
• culturally responsive teaching
• qualitative research