ore equal classroom.
In Con Respeto, the author's premise is clear. She believes that other cultural perspectives have value and that attempting to impose mainstream values, or intrude mainstream values into immigrant families shows a lack of respect, and is likely to fail anyway. She also clearly believes that there is room in mainstream culture for difference, and that there is value in this difference, even though schools try to stamp it out and define success in one specific way. One might also surmise that she is not totally convinced that the American idea of success is really the ideal concept of success. Perhaps allowing for multiple perspectives might change and refine that concept to one that is more supportive of a just, harmonious community.
Sonia Nieto's premise is clearly stated in her last chapter. As she put it, the main idea of her book is that both student learning and teacher transformation must be at the center of any kind of multicultural education. This is not entirely clear, though, and she develops her premise by elucidating four principal themes that she felt had emerged from the selections in the book. For example, her first theme was that learning was a complex process not explained by culture, language, or even changes in pedagogy or curriculum. Another theme is that the nature of the teacher student relationship is central to student learning, very like the nature of the relationship between therapist and client is central to the client's healing no matter what the theory or methodology of the therapist. Essentially, she concludes that systemic school reform is necessary in order to promote student learning, and that this must occur within a multicultural foundation.
In looking for examples of Valdes' perspective, it is obvious that she has done a great deal of work in exploring the culture that Mexican immigrants bring with them. She noted that that culture is significantly different f...