The effect of multicultural education based instructional principles and methods course on multicultural teacher competencies, universality-diversity orientation and attitude towards the profession

The aim of this research is to redesign the "Instructional Principles and Methods (IPM)" curriculum in accordance with the multicultural education approach and to examine the effect of this course on multicultural teacher competencies, universality-difference orientation and attitude towards teaching. The Multicultural Education Based Instructional Principles and Methods (MIPM) curriculum, which was designed based on the findings obtained from the views of the teacher educators (n=8) and teacher candidates (n=17) during the needs assessment phase of this multi-phase mixed methods research, was pilot-tested, put into the 13-week actual implementation period and its effectiveness was investigated through pretest-posttest quasi experimental design. Participants of the experimental process consisted of 59 pre-service teachers. Data collection tools consisted of Miville-Guzman Universality-Diversity Orientation (UDO) Scale, Attitude Towards Teaching Profession Scale, Multicultural Teacher Competencies Scale developed by the researcher, and learning products along with the opinions of the participants. Based on the quantitative and qualitative findings of the research, it was determined that the MIPM curriculum had a positive effect on pre-service teachers' multicultural teacher competencies, UDO and attitudes towards the profession. In conclusion, it was determined that the Instructional Principles and Methods course can be redesigned to improve multicultural teacher competencies, and such a design is functional in preparing teacher candidates for cultural diversity.