Teaching intercultural understanding in Australian International Baccalaureate (IB) primary schools

In response to the Melbourne Declaration's call for educators to prepare young Australians for "the century of dealing with multi-cultural backgrounds," and the new Alice Springs (Mbangtway) Education Declaration's commitment to fostering a culturally supportive learning environment, the Australian Curriculum has included "Intercultural Understanding (IU)" as one of the seven general capabilities. The International Baccalaureate (IB) also places a strong emphasis on IU, aiming to develop inquiring, knowledgeable, and caring young people through IU and respect. However, there is a need to understand how teachers teach IU through the International Baccalaureate Primary Years Programme (IBPYP).
To explore the implementation and challenges for teachers teaching IU through IBPYP, a convergent mixed method approach was used to investigate the IBPYP curriculum and its daily implementation in IBPYP schools with respect to teaching IU. This study involved a content analysis of key IB documents (n=8), a PYP school guide (n=1), teachers' lesson plans (n=6), a Qualtrics questionnaire in IBPYP schools worldwide (n=226), and a case study in an Australian IBPYP school with teacher interviews (n=6) to provide a comprehensive analysis.
The findings of this study are relevant for informing the practice of in-service teachers, pre-service teachers, initial teacher education, as well as school leaders and curriculum and policy developers. The theoretical understanding of teaching IU provides the foundation for teachers to gain insight into teaching practice and develop students' IU