In a multi-cultural society, students need to understand visual arts in relation to culture and history in order to interpretate artwork better and have opportunities to learn about their changed surroundings for survival. Through multi-cultural art education, students can be encouraged to understand art from many cultures. The students' own cultural experience in art might give them a chance to prepare their future where different values, social-cultural beliefs, purposes, and traditions might exist. The purpose of the study was 1) to examine the cultural aspects in art education including Korean traditional culture in art and artworks, and 2) to present the multi-cultural art programs for Kindergarten, elementary, middle and high school levels in order to develop competitive power in an globalized society through strengthening the understanding of multi-culture in art education. The study included 1) investigation of art education for strengthening the understanding of multi-culture; the direction of contemporary art education in a multi-cultural era, art education and Korean traditional art culture, and, the relationship of art education and multi-cultural art education: and 2) theoretical studies on multi-cultural art education presented in the national art curriculums and art textbooks including the 7th Korean National Art Curriculum and art textbooks for grade 3, 4 and 7, and national art curriculums of USA, UK, and Japan. In chapter IV, the model of the multi-cultural art programs were presented with summary, purpose, contents, instructional teaching methods, assessment, organization of the programs, and the results of consultation by art specialists. Based on the findings of the studies and results for developing the model, twenty art programs were developed: five art programs were developed respectively in four categories, such as, kindergarten to second grade of elementary levels, third to sixth grade of elementary levels, middle school levels, and the first year of high school level; and, five different art areas including painting(paintings in general and Buddhist paintings), sculpture(sculpture in general and buddhist sculpture), crafts/ceramics(crafts/ceramics in general and buddhist ceramics), patterns and architecture(architecture in general and Buddhist architecture) were included. The recommendations for the study were follows: 1) multi-cultural approaches to art education should be considered; 2) exemplary art practices and programs in the teaching of multi-cultural aspects in the grades K-10 should be promoted; and 3) support to develop instructional strategies to help students keep alert to cultural diversity through artworks made in an different era and culture would be provided.