Examining multicultural awareness of primary school teachers in Addis Ababa

In culturally and linguistically diverse societies, teachers’ multicultural awareness is essential for creating inclusive and equitable learning environments. In Ethiopia, particularly in urban centers such as Addis Ababa, primary schools serve students from varied sociocultural backgrounds; however, empirical evidence on teachers’ multicultural awareness remains limited. This study aimed to examine the level of multicultural awareness among primary school teachers in Addis Ababa. An explanatory sequential embedded mixed-methods design was employed. Quantitative data were collected from 342 primary school teachers using a structured survey, followed by qualitative data from in-depth interviews with six purposively selected teachers to further explain the quantitative results. The findings revealed that teachers’ overall level of multicultural awareness was moderate. Qualitative results showed that only two of the six interviewed teachers could clearly define multicultural education and its key dimensions, indicating gaps in conceptual understanding. Inferential statistical analysis demonstrated that participation in multicultural training had a statistically significant positive effect on teachers’ multicultural awareness. Additionally, teachers who spoke two or more languages exhibited higher levels of multicultural awareness than monolingual teachers did. In contrast, age, gender, and teaching experience showed no significant relationship with multicultural awareness. This study contributes to the limited research on multicultural education in the Ethiopian primary school context. It highlights the importance of multicultural professional development and multilingual competencies in enhancing teachers’ responsiveness to student diversity and underscores the need for targeted teacher training programs to strengthen cultural competence in diverse classroom settings.