Cultural Continuities: An Australian Perspective

This paper discusses findings of a research project which investigated the views of 101 immigrant families to Australia from Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia, The People's Republic of China and the Philippines in relation to aspects of their pre-school children's education. In addition, views were sought from 100 early childhood teachers working with the children of the families in the sample. The findings showed statistically different views between parents and teachers on three questions relating to cultural maintenance: How important is it for the ethnic minority child to maintain the family culture? How important is it for an ethnic minority child to maintain his/her first language? How important is it for parents to share their views about child rearing with the early childhood teacher?