Culturally, ethnically, nationally and linguistically heterogeneous classrooms, often to be found in urban centers, are intercultural spaces of tension calling for adequate educational responses. In recent years there has been an increasing interest in intercultural, cross-cultural or multicultural competence as an indispensable element in the repertoire of pedagogic competencies of teachers. What is it like for teachers, who are predominantly socialized and trained in monocultural school settings, to teach in the transcultural setup of today’s urban classrooms? How do teachers experience and deal with the tensions of cultural diversity in the physical and social space of schools? How do they know what is the right thing to do? How do they assess, judge and act as situations of intercultural tension surface in everyday classroom practice? While teacher education for intercultural competence is often focused on culture specific knowledge, skills and attitudes, in this paper we set out to explore the experience of teaching in heterogeneous classrooms by drawing on the constructs of practical reasoning, judgment and pedagogical tact.

Practical reasoning refers to a teacher’s capacity to discern particulars and make wise judgments about how to act in pedagogical situations. According to Greene (1973: 220), teachers are inevitably caught up in ‘the pursuit of the worthwhile’. While they can refer to curricula, didactic, and theories of learning, teachers cannot take recourse to some authority to tell them how they must act at any given moment in the classroom. That is, teachers cannot abandon their responsibility to make judgments, and they must locate that responsibility in specific actions and concrete decisions. ‘Entering the practical means entering a realm of legitimate uncertainty, ambiguity, and disagreement’ (Phelan 2001: 42). Rooted in the particular, the practical realm invites a wisdom and ethic of its own, what Aristotle (1962) called phronesis or practical wisdom. 

Pedagogical tact refers to a teacher’s situational alertness, sensitivity, flexibility, thoughtfulness and intuitiveness in interacting with learners in everyday educational settings. Johann Friedrich Herbart, who in 1802 introduced the concept into educational discourse, describes pedagogical tact as a mediator between educational theory and practice, the instantaneous assessment and decision-making of the educator to meet the necessities of the situation and the individual case at hand. Such pedagogical tact is developed in the educational practice, has to do with the mind-set and the disposition of the educator, and is a result of thoughtfulness, genuine interest and moral commitment, which in turn leads to successful pedagogical practice and endeavor (Asmus, 1982; Benner & Schmied-Kowarzik, 1986; Blaß, 1972; Herbart, 1802; Metz, 1992, 1995; Müßerer, 1983, 1991, Muth, 1962; Prondczynsky, 1993).

Drawing on the language of practical reasoning and pedagogical tact we explore teachers' recollections of ‘culturally charged’ situations, which call upon the teacher’s immediate and often on the spot assessment, judgment and action, and we ask what is the ethical claim of intercultural encounter on a teacher.  

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