A Content Analysis of Elementary social studies Textbooks based on Philosophy for Children program with the orientation of multicultural education

The current study aims to analyze the content of elementary school social studies books in terms of the amount of attention to philosophy for children program with the orientation of multicultural education. The descriptive research was of the quantitative content analysis type using the Shannon entropy method. The research tool was the researcher's checklist made of the criteria of philosophical thinking (exploratory, argumentative, and interactive) and the components of multicultural education (15 components) whose validity was approved by a specialized jury, and its reliability was measured by Scott’s method with an overall agreement of 0.87. The entire statistical population was selected as a sample, including 4 volumes of social studies books for the third to sixth grades. The units of analysis included text, images, and book activities. Finally, 48 components were identified, and the results show the highest level of attention to the concept of "materials, tools and educational environment", followed by the concepts of nation/language, teaching methods and cultural communication. The components of "justice", "equality and anti-discrimination", "dignity and human rights", "gender", "valuation", "respect for different opinions" and "peaceful life" also lacked reflection, which shows an unbalanced distribution. It is the components. Therefore, this program has been neglected in the social studies curriculum of elementary school and considering the pluralistic society of Iran, it is suggested to revise the textbooks
 
Keywords: philosophy for children program, multicultural education, social studies, Shannon Entropy
Introduction
A conceptual orientation toward multicultural education should be selected or created in order to use it as a suitable guide and strategy and as a criterion to determine progress (Sadeghi, 2011). Supporters of critical multiculturalism policy believe that issues of equality and superiority cannot appear effectively, without posing and creating difficult but necessary and vital questions (Jenks, Lee, and Kanpole, 2001). Therefore, this approach, while challenging the conservative multiculturalism that demands the assimilation of minorities with the norms and dominant culture, also challenges the liberal multiculturalism that claims that all groups in the society have access to equal opportunities and is difficult. - Hard work and meritocracy are the only basis for success in society, they challenge (Abd Elkader, 2015) and inspired by Freire and criticize the one-way communication in the educational system; This approach makes learners slaves to knowledge and will not bring anything except the accumulated memory (Eghbali, Salehi, Ghaedi and Mahmoudnia, 2021) and with Freire, who considers dialogue as the basis of democratic and liberating education. You know, they are aligned.
One of the dialogue-oriented programs that have been welcomed due to its primary goal, which is to transform students into critical thinkers (2021, Hurtubise), is the "philosophy for children" teaching program. The goal of teaching philosophy to children is not to turn students into little philosophers, but the ultimate goal is to help students think better than they think now (Zulkifli & Hashim, 2020). In other words, it can be said: the goal of this program is to create a radical change in education, which is achieved by activating the child's thinking through the dialogue and guidance of the teacher, centered on the child.
Despite conducting numerous types of research inside and outside the country to identify the components of the philosophy curriculum for children and multicultural education, there is no research on the commonality of these two fields. Therefore, considering the alignment of the theoretical foundations of the program of teaching philosophy to children and the approach of multicultural education, where critical thinking and dialogue are the two main elements, the role of connecting the two approaches, the importance of analyzing textbooks in terms of the amount of attention to The criteria of teaching philosophy to children with the orientation of multicultural education is more necessary than ever, so that by knowing the current situation of the content of the books, its strengths and weaknesses are identified and trying to provide a content that fits the needs of the learners in the elementary school as a course. This is the best time for the formation of students' knowledge and attitude. Therefore, considering the background of the research and the expectation that multicultural education components will appear and reflect the most in social studies books, this research tries to answer the question, to what extent in the elementary school social studies books, the criteria of the program Is the teaching of philosophy to children with the orientation of multicultural education considered?
 
Method
The descriptive research was of the quantitative content analysis type using the Shannon entropy method. The research tool was the researcher's checklist made of the criteria of philosophical thinking (exploratory, argumentative, and interactive) and the components of multicultural education (15 components) whose validity was approved by a specialized jury, and its reliability was measured by Scott’s method with an overall agreement of 0.87. Given the nature of the research and the limitedness of the statistical population, we have put aside selective sampling and taken the entire population, which included 4 volumes of social studies books for the third to sixth grades in the academic year of 2022-2023. The units of analysis included text, images, and book activities.
 
findings
The findings indicate that social studies textbooks pay more attention to the concept of materials, tools and educational environment with an importance coefficient of 0.199. In second place are three concepts of nation/language, teaching methods and cultural and human communication with an importance coefficient of 0.191. The next ranks include goals/content, religion/religion, and acceptance of differences, respectively. Even though the concept of disability/inability has been reflected in textbooks once, but in Shannon's entropy analysis, such as the concepts of justice, equality and anti-discrimination, dignity and human rights, gender, evaluation, respect for different opinions and peaceful life, which They do not have any reflection in social studies books of elementary school, it has a zero importance coefficient.
Results
Part of the findings of the current research, which indicates the weak reflection or abnormal distribution of multicultural concepts based on the criteria of the program of teaching philosophy to children in social studies books of the elementary school, with the results of Khakbaz research, 2019; Garshasbi, Fathi-Vajargah and Arefi, 2019; Ahmadresh and Mostafazadeh, 2018; Kahan, 2017; Hamidizadeh, Fathi Vajargah and others, 2017; Vafai and Sobhani-Najad, 2014; Zainal-Taj, Dehghani and Pak-Mehr, 2013, who showed that the amount of attention to multicultural education in textbooks is small or unbalanced and scattered, is consistent. Also, the unstable distribution of the desired components is completely consistent with the results of the research by Mohammadi, Kharazi and others (2015), which indicates that textbooks pay more attention to a specific ethnic group, group, gender, or culture in general.
On the other hand, the little attention paid to philosophical skills in the present study is consistent with the results of Yousefian, Ranjdoost, and Azimi (2019), which indicates an unbalanced and uncoordinated amount of attention to philosophical thinking skills, and also with the results of Mirzaei's research. Eslami and Afani (2015) who showed that the sixth-grade book of thinking and research paid the least attention to teaching thinking to children, which is consistent.
Many researchers admit that the curriculum planners' ignorance of multiculturalism and the common misconceptions about it cause incomplete, weak, or neglect of its teaching in textbooks. While opposing the threatening view of multiculturalism, Winter believes that ethnic diversity cannot be an obstacle to strengthening national identity and strong solidarity. On the one hand, diversity is a blessing, because it actually represents the diversity of the wealth of cultural treasures, and on the other hand, diversity is also a great potential for the increasing spread of conflicts, especially if such diversity cannot be well implemented and used (Arifin & Hermino, 2019).
Replacing teacher-centered and lecture- and memory-based educational approaches with active and student-centered educational programs, such as teaching philosophy to children and studying the content of textbooks and design based on the cultural demands of societies, more than ever. It is essential. Because P4C and multiculturalism are trying to transform the educational system by emphasizing communication between people through dialogue in order to reduce problems and tensions in societies.
In view of this importance and based on the findings of the current research, it is an absolute necessity to revise the curriculum of social studies in elementary school, to pay more attention to the program of teaching philosophy to children with the orientation of multicultural education.