Strengthening intercultural education through a national intercultural bilingual education system

According to the objective four of the National Plan for Good Living, the Ecuadorian state must "strengthen the capacities and potentialities of inhabitants"; achieving this through integral formation processes which “allow us to make the leap from an economy of finite resources (materials) to the economy of infinite resource: knowledge. This should focus efforts to guarantee everyone the right to education under conditions of quality and equity, centering on human beings and the territory ".

One of the actions implemented in Ecuador through the Ministry of Education has been the application of the Intercultural Bilingual Education System Model (Moseib).This system takes into account the cultural and linguistic diversity of Ecuadorian peoples. The globalization processes, the expansion of democratic conceptions and the increasing acceptance of social diversity have made the members of Ecuadorian peoples and nationalities take increasingly clear initiatives towards a qualitative leap in their style and quality of life, maintaining at the same time their cultural roots. However, this entails serious difficulties and the challenge is precisely to achieve a vital balance between insertion in modernity and the preservation of the ancestral culture.

This strategic action has had to be complemented by some parameters such as: i) experiential assessment of the model in relation to the current educational reality; ii) participation of educational process actors of all nationalities; iii) taking into account proposals from external experts and specialists; iv) experience systematization of twenty years of Intercultural Bilingual Education (EIB) and; v) prioritization of pedagogical strategies for an adequate cultural and linguistic development of peoples and nationalities.

Among the main results achieved through this experience are:

• Intercultural  Bilingual  Education  System  Model  interpreted  in  14  languages  of  the indigenous nationalities of Ecuador, supported by curricular adaptations;
• Full implementation of the Community Educational Experiential Calendar that guides the pedagogical  action  in  harmony  with  the  socio-cultural  reality  and  its  application  in schools.
• Use of the nationality’s language as the main language for the pedagogical process and Spanish as intercultural relation language (methodologies for teaching languages);
• Technical pedagogical teams trained in the application of Moseib.