Investigation of preschool teachers' opinions on multicultural education

In our world of diversity and diversity, it is almost impossible to talk about a monocultural society. Cultural diversity makes its presence felt in schools, as in every environment. Pre-school institutions, where children leave their home environment and are included in the educational environment for the first time, are place where each child brings the cultural diversity of himself and his family, and where peer interaction first occurs and develops. For these reasons, it is important to determine the views and practices of preschool teachers about multiculturalism and its applications. In this study, interviews were conducted with 23 preschool teachers working in official independent kindergartens in the city center of Diyarbakır, and a phenomenological research model, one of the qualitative research methods, was used. Data were collected through interviews with teachers, and content analysis was used in the analysis of the data. According to the results of the research; it has been determined that the number of teachers who make arrangements in terms of multiculturalism in their classrooms is quite low, and the teachers who do not make arrangements for this, justify that the children in their classes are from Diyarbakır province or its surroundings, and ignore the cultural diversity of the province they work in. It was determined that all of the participants included the issues of respect for differences in their plans, and due to the pandemic, the diversity of teachers' activities for multiculturalism and respect for differences decreased. It was determined that they focused on different themes and subjects due to the limitation of the education period during the pandemic process. All the teachers participating in the study emphasized that it is more effective to deal with cultural issues in face-to-face education, but it was determined that they could not associate some of their practices with multiculturalism and respect for differences.