Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine teaching approaches adopted by teachers in ex-Model C English medium secondary schools (former mono-ethnic White Schools) currently in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, after schools became desegregated in 1994 and changed from being mono-ethnic to multi-ethnic. Design/methodology/approach: This study was conducted through a qualitative research approach against the backdrop of a phenomenological design according to the interpretivist paradigm. Data were elicited through in-depth semi-structured interviews with 16 teachers from four ex-Model C English medium secondary schools (former White schools) who had experiences of teaching both pre-1994, when schools were mono-ethnic, and post-1994 when the schools were multi-ethnic. The interviews were transcribed, and the data were analysed and categorised into themes and sub-themes. Findings: The findings indicated that although the teachers were positive towards teaching in multi-ethnic contexts, the majority of them tended to adopt approaches that militated against multicultural education in their classes; such as assimilationist, colour blind and business-as-usual approaches, while a minority incorporated various aspects of multicultural education in their teaching to a limited degree. Originality/value: The study is original in the sense that it focused on the application of Castagno's framework of typologies to teachers' approaches to teaching in multi-ethnic classes. Research of this nature, which explored teachers' approaches to diversity within their multi-ethnic contexts according to Castagno's framework, has not been previously undertaken in South Africa.