EFL Teachers' Attitudes towards Language Learners: A Case of Multicultural Classrooms

The purpose of this quantitative and qualitative mixed research is to describe the impact of English teachers' attitude on the learning outcomes of multicultural students in six Islamic secondary schools. The obstacles faced in teaching these students were also investigated. About 30 respondents that comprised 20 female teachers and 10 male teachers filled out questionnaires. From these teachers, 12 English teachers were further selected for interviews and classroom observations. The findings of the study revealed that 90% of the teachers had positive attitudes towards multicultural students and gave positive impacts to the students' good learning outcomes. Meanwhile, 10% of the teachers had a negative attitude towards multicultural students, and this gave negative impacts on the students' low learning outcomes. Moreover, the obstacles faced by English teachers in the learning process with these students come from the content of English teaching materials, from within the students themselves, and from the environmental responses to the different linguistic, social, and cultural conditions of these students. To overcome these obstacles, some teachers used various learning strategies that could accept and appreciate the multicultural conditions of students. Some of the strategies that these teachers use are further discussed in the paper.