Some key issues in intercultural bilingual education teacher training programmes - As seen from a teacher training programme in the Peruvian Amazon Basin

Abstract

This article presents a critical reflection of the author's 14 years of experience in the Teacher Training Programme for Intercultural Bilingual Education in the Amazon Basin, developed by the indigenous confederation AIDESEP and the Loreto state teacher training college in Peru. The first part of the article offers an overall view of the particular approach towards intercultural bilingual education adopted by the AIDESEP/ISPL Programme and presents a critical outlook on some of the conceptual challenges the Programme has faced during its development and their relation with ongoing theoretical debates and with the demands of the indigenous movement. The second part of the article is centred on a discussion of the ethical, political and pedagogical challenges that intercultural education raises regarding curriculum decision-making and practice. The author bases her reflection on an analysis of the way in which the Peruvian Ministry of Education and different intercultural bilingual teacher training programmes have dealt with this issue during the last two decades.