East meets west : Australian pre-service teachers' experiences of cultural exchange with implications for mathematics/science learning

The University of Western Sydney (UWS) is unique in the extent of the cultural diversity among the students and staff, with students originating from around 170 different national backgrounds (Ingleson, 2009). Nearly half of the Australian students are from non-English speaking backgrounds. The university reflects the composition of Australian school classrooms which are multicultural and thus broad cultural understanding and knowledge are important to pre-service teachers' knowledge base (Clarke, Shimizu, Ulep, Gallos, Adler, & Vithal, 2006). One of the goals of UWS policy is to "maximise the number of UWS students who have an international experience during their program of study" (Ingleson, 2009, p.3).