Intercultural pedagogy is sometimes limited to intercultural knowledge, leaving aside the important question of how difficult it is for some people to develop fluency in the world’s growing diversity. Hence the importance of focusing on intercultural skills and less on intercultural knowledge.
What’s more, the accumulation of intercultural knowledge doesn’t help people who are struggling with diversity, and even consumes their time available to go out and meet people.
There’s no need for prior knowledge, at least not of this level of detail and depth, to develop ease with diversity, as demonstrated by the child. It’s afterwards that intercultural knowledge becomes particularly useful for respect, consideration and sharing, at school, in professional relationships and in life. Some intercultural knowledge is acquired through school and extracurricular activities, others through books and guidebooks, still others through visits and travels. However, the most sensitive is learned through encounters, experientially.