BALANCING BETWEEN THEORY AND PRACTICE IN INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION; THE CASE OF INTERCULTURAL PRIMARY SCHOOLS IN GREECE

This paper explores teachers’ and head teachers’ perceptions of the nature of intercultural education within the thirteen intercultural primary schools in Greece. The research methodology adopted is a mixed-method approach which has been employed in order to achieve a better understanding of the issue examined. The research methods used include questionnaires administered and interviews undertaken with teachers and head teachers. The results indicate that although teachers may be aware of the main principles of the theoretical background of intercultural education, most of them agree that they are not implemented in the classroom, especially as regards the principle that foreign pupils’ mother tongue should be taken into account in the curriculum and they provide a number of reasons for that. The contribution of this study to the topic examined is significant since there has been no previous research conducted in all 13 intercultural primary schools in Greece.