How do I overcome my own stereotypes and misconceptions?

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Matthew Vetter

Teachers are not just professionals but also human beings with their own
experiences and histories through which they may have acquired prejudices and
stereotypes about other cultures and peoples just like any other human being. We
are not always conscious of these feelings and how we express them, but a brief
remark in the classroom is often remembered by learners for many years
afterwards.
These remarks may be negative or positive. Some teachers are positively
prejudiced about the countries where their target language is spoken and wish to
pass this enthusiasm on to their learners. This might seen to be the role of the
teacher but it is debatable whether teachers should try to influence attitudes or
not. So this is one of the first issues teachers need to think about. The response to
this problem may be different in different countries according to their education
traditions. In some countries teachers believe that they should not attempt to
influence attitudes towards other countries and in fact should be careful only to
deal the cognitive dimension of learning. Teachers in other countries may feel
that it is part of their pedagogical responsibility to influence attitudes. Neither of
these positions excludes the development of savoir être because this is not a
question of developing particular positive (or indeed negative) attitudes towards
a country or people but rather of creating curiosity and a sense of openness.
Although in Question 9 it was suggested that teachers should attempt to break
down learners’ stereotypes and prejudices, there may be a need to include
stereotypes in the materials so that the apparent usefulness of stereotypes can be
addressed. Stereotypes operate on a different level to other kinds of knowledge:
they simplify and they allow people to act quickly. People can make judgements
and act upon them quickly if they use stereotypes whatever the context, not just
in connection with other countries. This makes them attractive but deceptive.
Knowledge of a more differentiated and accurate kind depends on recognising
the variation in people, but this requires more effort and is easily avoided.
This is by no means to say that we can do without any stereotypes at all in foreign
language teaching – after all identities are often defined in stereotypes, even by
people defining themselves! The way one nation sees another is at least partly
dependent on how it thinks about itself. Stereotypes are there to be challenged,
for this is the only way to develop an individual who is ready to discover the
essence of “others” in members of other cultures and understand the complexity
they embody.
On the other hand, it is inevitable and proper that learners have views on other
cultures and the values, beliefs and behaviours they embody. The question for
teachers is how they respond to learners’ views. Do they take a neutral position?
Do they take a clear and explicit position in favour of the values in other cultures
which their learners may reject? Do they allow learners’ views to go
unchallenged?
The concept of savoir s’engager suggests that teachers should first challenge
learners to make explicit the basis on which they make judgements about others,
and to encourage them to be aware of the culturally-determined nature of their
basis for making judgements. This not the same as challenging and criticising
learners’ beliefs and basis for judgement about other cultures. It is simply an
encouragement to them to see how others might consider their position, whether
it is religious, secular, ethical, philosophical or pragmatic.
The consequence for teachers is that they need to be aware of and decide
consciously about the issues raised by their own feelings about their languages
and associated cultures. Do they wish to influence their learners’ attitudes? Do
they wish to take a neutral position? Do they challenge their learners to make
their own position explicit and if so how?
Teachers cannot be neutral on cultural issues since they respond to
other cultures as human beings and not just as language teachers. They
need therefore to consider how their own stereotypes and prejudices
may influence their teaching subconsciously, and what the effects of
this may be on learners. They also need to reflect upon how they
respond to and challenge their learners’ prejudices not only as teachers
but also as human beings subconsciously influenced by their
experience of otherness.

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Do I need specific training?

Posted on January 23, 2012 by Matthew Vetter

The importance of the intercultural dimension is that it is a vision of language
teaching and learning which is goes beyond the concept of language learning as
just acquiring skills in a language, accompanied by some knowledge about a
country where the language is spoken. Intercultural competence is different from
factual knowledge about another country. So along with the linguistic
competence teachers should be able to develop in their learners the intercultural
competence which enables them to interact with people of different cultural
backgrounds, multiple identities and a specific individuality.
This has a lot of implications for the priorities in teacher training. . However,
even if the curriculum for initial teacher education institutions is revised (which
will certainly take time), many parents, learners, teachers, and other professionals
feel the need to change the ways of teaching/learning now. The question teachers
ask themselves is: “How can a conscientious teacher keep a sense of direction
and survive in a situation when you have to do both – teaching and learning?”
The issues which need to be given priority are not the acquisition of more
knowledge about a country or countries, but how to organise the classroom and
classroom processes to enable learners to develop new attitudes (savoir être),
new skills (savoir apprendre/faire and savoir comprendre) and new critical
awareness (savoir s’engager).

Priority 1
Developing skills of group communication and group work in the classroom:
this includes knowing how to set procedural ground-rules and determine ways in
which learners can make personal responses – not just acquire skills and
information (see Question 8 above). In some countries this is familiar territory for
teachers of social studies/citizenship education and similar subjects, and language
teachers can learn from them. In other countries, there has been a lack of this
kind of pedagogy throughout the last 70-80 years, and there is a need for
innovation and experimentation which will not always be easily accepted,
although experiments which have been carried out show that young people are
very open to this kind of pedagogy.
Teachers will need to seek new kinds of materials which allow learners to
explore and analyse them rather than learn the information in them. Sources
include the internet where it is available. Where it is not, a challenging way of
obtaining materials is to have an exchange by post with a school in another
country, where for example learners choose a topic and put real objects which
they think will explain the topic – accompanied by comments written carefully to
suit the language level of the recipients. The class can be in a country other than
a target language country, provided the learners are learning the same foreign
language. 34
Thus even if teachers’ own knowledge might be limited, their proper role is not
to impart facts, but help learners to attain the skills that are necessary to make
sense out of the facts they themselves discover in their study of the target culture.
Classroom procedures of team-building and project work are some of the
important features of teacher education, for the objectives that are to be achieved
in intercultural understanding involve processes rather than facts.

Priority 2
Since the focus is on processes and some of these involve the learners in taking
risks by talking about their attitudes and views, teachers may need more
opportunities to discuss psychological self-awareness and awareness of others.
Teaching for intercultural competence involves dealing with learners’ attitudes,
emotions, beliefs and values. This does not imply that foreign language teachers
should aim at becoming psychologists, but they should try to acquire the basic
principles of teaching when emotions and risk-taking are involved. This may
be a new area to language teachers who traditionally focus on cognitive
knowledge and skills but in some countries there are other teachers who are more
accustomed to this. Co-operation with such teachers or group discussions among
language teachers themselves can be very helpful. It is not question of taking a
course in psychology.

Priority 3
Taking part in international projects, professional associations, governmental
initiatives, exchanges will promote all the aspects of intercultural dimension in
language teaching. Such experience involves teachers in being intercultural
learners themselves, in taking risks, analysing and reflecting on their own
experience and learning – and drawing consequences from this for their work as
teachers.
International projects are sponsored by the Council of Europe, in workshops in
the European Centre for Modern Languages, and by other national and
international institutions, including the European Union. The value of being
involved in professional networks of this kind is as much in the experience of
working with people of other professional, cultural and national identities as in
the products and information acquired. Teacher should see this work as
significant in their professional development.
What language teachers need for the intercultural dimension is not more
knowledge of other countries and cultures, but skills in promoting an
atmosphere in the classroom which allows learners to take risks in their
thinking and feeling. Such skills are best developed in practice and in
reflection on experience. They may find common ground in this with
teachers of other subjects and/or in taking part themselves in learning
experiences which involve risk and reflection.

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How do I assess intercultural competence?

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Matthew Vetter

There are many kinds of assessment of which testing is just one. Tests too are of
many kinds and serve many functions – diagnosis, placement on courses,
achievement, proficiency for example – but are often associated with
examinations and certification. Examinations and certification are highly
sensitive issues to which politicians, parents and learners pay much attention. As
a consequence, the examination of learners’ competence has to be very careful
and as ‘objective’ – meaning valid and reliable – as possible.
It seems not difficult to assess learners’ acquisition of information. There can
be simple tests of facts, but the difficulty comes in deciding which facts are
important. Shall they, for example, learn ‘facts’ about social etiquette and
politeness in a particular country? But then whose social etiquette, that of the
dominant social class, or that of the social class or ethnic group or gender group
to which they belong? Shall they learn historical ‘facts’, but whose version of
history?
It is also possible to assess learners’ knowledge and understanding. In the
teaching of history for example, rather than testing recall of historical ‘facts’,
historical understanding and sensitivity is assessed in essays where learners
discuss events. A similar approach is familiar to many language teachers who
have also been learners or teachers of literature, where the testing of recall of
literary history or plots of novels has largely given way to assessment of critical
understanding of and sensitivity towards literary texts.
The problem lies however in the fact that knowledge and understanding are only
part of intercultural competence (savoirs and savoir comprendre). Assessing
knowledge is thus only a small part of what is involved. What we need is to
assess ability to make the strange familiar and the familiar strange (savoir
être), to step outside their taken for granted perspectives, and to act on a the
basis of new perspectives (savoir s’engager).
Most difficult of all is to assess whether learners have changed their attitudes,
become more tolerant of difference and the unfamiliar. This is affective and
moral development and it can be argued that even if we can test it, we should not
be trying to quantify tolerance. But quantification is only one kind of assessment.
If however, assessment is not in terms of tests and traditional examinations,
but rather in terms of producing a record of learners’ competences, then a
portfolio approach is possible and in fact desirable.
The Council of Europe has developed a European Language Portfolio.
It has three parts:
· the Passport section provides an overview of the individual’s
proficiency in different languages at a given point in time; the overview
is defined in terms of skills and the common reference levels in the
Common European Framework.
· The Language Biography facilitates the learner’s involvement in
planning, reflecting upon and assessing his or her learning process and
progress; it encourages the learner to state what he/she can do in each
language and to include information on linguistic and cultural
experiences gained in and outside formal educational contexts; it is
organised to promote plurilingualism i.e. the development of
competencies in a number of languages.
· The Dossier offers the learner the opportunity to select materials to
document and illustrate achievements or experiences recorded in the
Language Biography or Passport.
So the portfolio introduces the notion of self-assessment which is considered
significant both as a means of recording what has been experienced and learnt,
and as a means of making learners become more conscious of their learning and
of the abilities they already have.
The language biography can therefore include self assessment of intercultural
competence. Here are two examples of proformas for self-assessment for older
learners. Versions for younger learners would need a different formulation but
could follow the same principles i.e. to formulate the different aspects of
intercultural competence in the learners’ ways of thinking and talking about their
learning experiences:
A record of my Intercultural Experience
- in language: (learner inserts language)
- place, period of time, age:
A. Feelings
Ways in which my curiosity and interest were aroused:
(examples from ordinary daily life, especially when they made me re-consider
my own culture)
Periods when I felt uncomfortable/homesick
(what made me feel like this, with particular examples if possible)
Periods when I felt at home and comfortable
(what made me feel like this, with particular examples if possible)
B. Knowledge
The most important things I learnt about family life and/or life at school
The most important things I have learnt about the country, the nation, the state
where I stayed – in the present and in its past
What I have learnt about customs and conventions of talking with people
(topics which interest them, topics to avoid, how to greet people and take leave
from them)
C. Actions
Incidents or problems which I resolved by explaining different cultures to
people, helping them see the points of view of different cultures and how
misunderstandings can happen.
Examples of times when I have had to ask questions and work out my own
answers (from ‘asking the way’ to understanding cultural customs and beliefs)
A self-assessment of my Intercultural Experience
A. Interest in other people’s way of life
I am interested in other people’s experience of daily life, particularly those
things not usually presented to outsiders through the media.
Example:
I am also interested in the daily experience of a variety of social groups within
a society and not only the dominant culture.
Example:
B. Ability to change perspective
I have realised that I can understand other cultures by seeing things from a
different point of view and by looking at my culture from their perspective.
Example:
C. Ability to cope with living in a different culture
I am able to cope with a range of reactions I have to living in a different
culture (euphoria, homesickness, physical and mental discomfort etc)
Example:
D. Knowledge about another country and culture
I know some important facts about living in the other culture and about the
country, state and people.
Example:
I know how to engage in conversation with people of the other culture and
maintain a conversation
Example
E. Knowledge about intercultural communication
I know how to resolve misunderstandings which arise from people’s lack of
awareness of the view point of another culture
Example:
I know how to discover new information and new aspects of the other
culture for myself
Example:
The role of assessment is therefore to encourage learners’ awareness of
their own abilities in intercultural competence, and to help them realise
that these abilities are acquired in many different circumstances inside
and outside the classroom.

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How do I deal with learners stereotypes and prejudices?

Posted on January 12, 2012 by Matthew Vetter

Research suggests that overcoming prejudice is a top priority for language
teachers.
Stereotyping involves labelling or categorising particular groups of people,
usually in a negative way, according to preconceived ideas or broad
generalisations about them – and then assuming that all members of that group
will think and behave identically. Stereotypes can undermine our sense of who
we are by suggesting that how we look or speak determines how we act.
Prejudice occurs when someone pre-judges a particular group or individual
based on their own stereotypical assumptions or ignorance.
Since stereotypes and prejudices are based on feelings rather than reason, it is
important to have opportunities to explore feelings as well as thoughts. This
implies careful classroom management to ensure conflicts of views are
productive and not destructive. In particular it is important to challenge ideas,
not the people who express the ideas.
Material in text books or, indeed, examinations may contain stereotypes of
ethnic minorities, for example. One response lies in the development of skills of
critical discourse analysis and critical cultural awareness.
Critical discourse analysis (CDA) studies the way text and talk may reproduce
or resist racism, abuse of social power, dominance and inequality. It looks at
texts and talk in the social and political context. CDA can provide a set of
guidelines for interrogating an authentic text, so that learners engage with
the content critically at the same time as they attempt to understand other more
superficial aspects of the text. For instance, learners may confront texts of a
possibly xenophobic nature to explore the discourse mechanisms of racism.
As an example, learners of Spanish studied newspaper articles on the theme of
immigration. They were asked to closely examine the texts looking for certain
discourse features such as the following:
• Sources, perspectives, arguments.
Are they institutional? From the majority group? Do minority perspectives find
expression? Are the sources of evidence made explicit?
Vocabulary, connotations, names
Different words for ‘immigrants’. Different descriptors.
Implications and presuppositions
e.g. ‘the best antidote against immigration is…’ implies that immigration is a
social illness against which society has to fight. 28
Extrapolation of statistics
e.g. ‘by 2010 there will be…’
Active and passive constructions
e.g. ’32 immigrants deported to Africa’ – no mention of who was responsible.
Rhetorical expressions
Metaphors and similes: ‘Fortress Europe’; ‘an avalanche of immigrants’.
Us versus them
our democracy, our jobs, their religion, their culture.
Having made this critical analysis of the linguistic and stylistic features of the
press coverage of immigration, learners felt confident to discuss the issue and to
make comparisons with coverage in their own national and local press. They then
wrote an account of their findings and their feelings about them.
Learners can acquire the skills of critical analysis of stereotypes and
prejudice in texts and images they read or see. Their own prejudices and
stereotypes are based on feelings rather than thoughts and need to be
challenged, but teachers need to ensure that the ideas are challenged
not the person, if the effect is to be positive.

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How does it affect teaching and learning styles?

Posted on January 3, 2012 by Matthew Vetter

Promoting the intercultural dimension requires a framework of accepted
classroom procedures that allows for the expression of and recognition of
cultural difference. These procedures should be based on human rights –
equal dignity and equal rights. They should be explicit and discussed with and
agreed by the group.
Procedural ground rules need to be established and adopted for discussion and
debate in class. Whether the context is pair work, group work or whole class
discussions, agreements such as the following apply:
• Participants are expected to listen to each other and take turns.
• Where a discussion is chaired, the authority of the chair is respected.
• Even heated debates must be conducted in polite language.
• Discriminatory remarks, particularly racist, sexist and homophobic discourse
and expressions are totally unacceptable at any time.
• Participants show respect when commenting on and describing people
portrayed in visuals or texts.
• All involved have the responsibility to challenge stereotypes.
• A respectful tone is required at all times.
It goes without saying that, teachers are party to these agreements and will not
use sarcasm, irony and disparaging judgements.
Learners and teachers will expect to examine and challenge generalisations or
stereotypes, and suggest or present other viewpoints. This is an essential part of
developing intercultural competence.
In oral work, learners can expect to discuss in pairs and small groups, as well as
in plenary. They should have opportunities for making a personal response to
images, stories, case-studies and other materials.
Tasks set should be carefully formulated and include explorations of opinion
gaps as well as information gaps. Learners bring considerable knowledge of their
familiar culture and some knowledge of cultures being studied. However, they do
not necessarily share the same knowledge, the same values or the same opinions.
Language learning to promote an intercultural dimension encourages a sharing
of knowledge and a discussion of values and opinions. Many intercultural and
antiracist educational programmes, such as the Council of Europe’s All Different,
All Equal campaign, are based on the principle of peer education. That means
that learners learn from each other as much as from the teacher or text-book. 26
An intercultural dimension involves learners in sharing their knowledge
with each other and discussing their opinions. There need to be agreed
rules for such discussions based on an understanding of human rights
and respect for others. Learners thus learn as much from each other as
from the teacher, comparing their own cultural context with the
unfamiliar contexts to which language learning introduces them.

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What materials do I need to promote the intercultural dimension?

Posted on December 25, 2011 by Matthew Vetter

Textbooks can be written in an intercultural and critical perspective or in a
way that suggests that the materials are authoritative. If there is a choice of textbook, one with this critical perspective is preferable.
For instance, the introduction to a textbook on British Cultural Studies produced
in Romania describes the expectations of the authors for the learner:
“This book is less concerned about making you learn information by
heart than with encouraging you to process the information contained
here. For example, in the class on Scotland you are asked to compare
what a Scottish person says about Scotland and what a compilation from
reference books says about Scotland. You do not have to learn one or the
other, but you do have to learn the process of comparison. The same
process of comparison of different kinds of information takes place in
many classes. In others, you are asked to apply concepts such as ‘gender’
or ‘nation as imagined community’ in your analyses of society. In short,
what we want is to provide you with the skills to argue …not learn by
heart” (Chichirdan et al., 1998:10).
Sources of information used in this approach are authentic texts, including audio
recordings and a variety of written documents and visuals such as maps,
photographs, diagrams and cartoons. The activities involve understanding,
discussing and writing in the target language. The approach to the materials is
always critical. There is every reason for applying such principles to all topics
studied in the target language. It is a question of challenging the reader by
bringing together texts and visual materials which present contrasting views.
Learners need to acquire concepts for analysing texts more than factual
information.
However, if a textbook presents a single perspective, then teachers can suggest
that other perspectives are also possible and legitimate. One way of doing this is
to find or encourage learners to find additional authentic materials which present
a different view. The Internet is a rich source for this. For instance learners can
find newspapers with different political or cultural perspectives and campaigning
material from a variety of organisations.
In any case, authentic materials should be presented in their context, or ensure
that the text-book does this. It is important for learners to know information
about a text or document such as the following:
Context, e.g. date the text was produced; the type of publication; the place
where it was produced; the intended readership or audience; significant
external events that influenced its production or may have been in the minds
of readers/ listeners; likely political, religious or cultural viewpoint;
Intention e.g. to persuade, to argue, to entertain, to sell something
(advertisements).
Learners can be encouraged to examine the textbook critically, including
cartoons, photographs and other non-print material it may contain. They can also
be encouraged to look for similar texts or other items from their familiar culture
and compare and contrast them.
It is important to use authentic material but to ensure that learners
understand its context and intention. Materials from different origins with
different perspectives should be used together to enable learners to
compare and to analyse the materials critically. It is more important that
learners acquire skills of analysis than factual information.

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How can I promote the intercultural dimension if I have to follow a set curriculum or programme of study and teach grammar?

Posted on December 16, 2011 by Matthew Vetter

The set programme of study is likely to be based on themes as well as
grammatical structures. Textbooks can be presented in a way that suggests that
the materials are authoritative and definitive or in an intercultural and critical
perspective. When developing intercultural skills, teachers can start from the
theme and content in the text-book, and then encourage learners to ask further
questions and make comparisons.
Themes treated in text-books can lend themselves to development in an
intercultural and critical perspective. The key principle is to get learners to
compare the theme in a familiar situation with examples from an unfamiliar
context.
For instance the theme of sport can be examined from many perspectives,
including:
• Gender – are there sports that are, in the familiar context or in the unfamiliar
context, predominantly played by men or by women? Are things changing?
• Age – are there sports for younger people and older people?
• Region – are there local sports? Do people, including the learners, identify
with local teams? Do some teams have a particular cultural tradition?
• Religion – are there religious objections to playing sport, or days when some
people choose not to do sport because of religious observance?
• Racism – is this found in spectator sports? are the players of foreign teams,
or foreign players in local teams always treated with respect? Are there
incidents of racist chants or insults?
Other themes e.g. food, homes, school, tourism, leisure, can receive a similarly
critical perspective.
Grammatical exercises can reinforce prejudice and stereotypes or challenge
them. For instance female subjects may be linked to stereotypically female
activities or actions (Mary likes cooking; John likes football); stereotyping
generalisations may be encouraged about groups (The French like…; Germans
are…..; Older people…..). Teachers can encourage learners to comment on such
statements and challenge them.
Similar exercises can be proposed, which include a broader view of culture (e.g.
use a wider range of names; include activities more likely to be enjoyed by
minority groups, or clothes worn by minorities; include a wide range of names of
countries and peoples, not just European and North American).
Starting from the exercises proposed by the text-book, learners can devise
further exercises, reinforcing the same grammatical structures, but using a
different range of contexts and examples. They can then swap exercises and work
on examples provided by other learners.
One important contribution to an intercultural perspective is the inclusion of
vocabulary that helps learners talk about cultural diversity. This can include
terms such as: human rights; equality; dignity; gender; bias; prejudice;
stereotype; racism; ethnic minority; and the names of ethnic groups, including
white groups.
A set curriculum or programme of study can be modified and challenged
by simple techniques which make learners aware of the implicit values
and meanings in the material they are using

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How do I use a study visit or exchange?

Posted on December 13, 2011 by Matthew Vetter

Intercultural competence involves attitudes, knowledge, skills and values (see 2).
Language teaching classrooms are usually places where knowledge and skills are
the focus, and where attitude change or re-consideration of values happen only
incidentally. Attitudes and values are not usually the focus of teachers’ planning
or the explicit objectives of a lesson and there is very little pedagogical theory to
help teachers plan for the affective aspect of learners’ development. In a study
visit or exchange however, it is the affective aspect of the experience which is
likely to be the most important. Learners experience some degree of ‘culture
shock’. Young children can feel homesick and even physically ill as a
consequence of suddenly being in an entirely unfamiliar environment – and so
can adults!
So teachers have a responsibility to prepare for this reaction, and to take
advantage of the opportunity it gives to help learners to decentre, to make the
strange familiar and the familiar strange. In other words, the study visit or
exchange is an opportunity to promote savoir être. This is best done through
experiential learning, where learners can experience situations which make
demands upon their emotions and feelings and then reflect upon that experience
and its meaning for them, thus combining the affective and the cognitive. The
teacher’s role is to structure the learning experience, to ensure that the ‘culture
shock’ is productive and positive, and not overwhelming and negative, and to
help learners to analyse and learn from their responses to a new environment.
The major opportunity offered by the study visit or exchange is the development
of the skills involved in the ‘discovery’ of a new environment, savoir apprendre.
Learners can be trained in simple or complex skills, depending on their maturity
and language skills, with which they can investigate the environment, look for
what is unfamiliar and for explanations which help them to understand. The
explanations may come from analysis of documents or from interviewing,
formally or informally, those who live in that environment. This is also the
opportunity for cooperation with teachers of other subjects, especially
geography, history, and other social and human sciences, since learners acquire
skills of social investigation in those subjects too: doing surveys, analysing
statistics, reading historical and contemporary texts, both factual and fictional.
It is important to remember that there are three phases for any study visit or
exchange:
– in the preparatory phase, learners need to externalise their thoughts,
anxieties and excitements about their visit. For example, ask everyone in a
class to stand around a very large piece of paper and write or draw the first
thing that comes into their mind when they think about the place they are
going to. Later they can look back at this and compare and contrast
expectation and experience, but it also helps the teacher to know during this
preparatory phase learners’ starting point; 20
– in the fieldwork phase, learners are surrounded by and immersed in a new
environment and learn consciously and unconsciously through all the senses.
There should however be opportunity for withdrawal from the demands of
being in a new environment, an opportunity for reflection alone and together
with others. Learners should keep a diary as a safe metaphorical ‘room’
where they can express feelings and reactions. They should also be brought
into a ‘classroom’ atmosphere with their teachers so that each individual can
compare and contrast their experience and interpretation of it with that of
others, and their teachers can help them with misunderstandings or other
problems. This has to be done during the visit because the emotional
involvement is very deep and needs to be handled immediately;
– in the follow-up phase, after return home, the emphasis should be on further
reflection on individuals’ experience during the visit and, by sharing and
comparing, on an attempt to analyse and conceptualise what has been
experienced as a basis for understanding (some aspects of) the other
environment and the people who live there. One very effective way of doing
this is for them to prepare a presentation of their visit – both a factual
account and their reactions and interpretations – to friends and family. This
obliges them to de-centre, to take the perspective of their audience and think
about what they need to explain to those who do not know.
Much of this work can be done with the aid of visual representations because
this removes the constraints of foreign and first language in expressing what is
unfamiliar. Learners can draw, take photographs, make diagrams to capture
experience and to express their feelings.
It is also important to remember that, for many children, and also some adults,
the study visit or exchange is the first time that they leave home, live with
someone not of their family – even though they may have known them as
classmates – and have to be independent. The ‘shock’ may be more than the new
environment. It may be a in part the effect of living in a group, and although this
is an issue which all teachers leading school groups have to meet, the
responsibility for language teachers is heightened by the travel ‘abroad’.
The visit or exchange is much more than an opportunity to ‘practice’ the
language learnt in the classroom. It is a holistic learning experience
which provides the means of using intercultural skills and acquiring new
attitudes and values. Language practice may be limited, especially on a
visit rather than an exchange, and the acquisition of knowledge about
another country may be minimal, but this does not matter. If teachers
create a pedagogical structure in three phases, learners can profit from a
visit or exchange in ways which are scarcely possible in the classroom.
Teachers need clear objectives, methods which take into account the
power of experiential learning, and then learners will ‘make the strange
familiar – and the familiar strange’

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Do I need to be a native speaker?

Posted on December 3, 2011 by Matthew Vetter

The concept of the native speaker is used primarily with respect to linguistic
competence. It is argued that the native speaker ‘knows’ the language of a country
intuitively and is an authority on the language in a way which a non-native
speaker can never hope to attain. There can be debate about this view of the
native speaker as an authority whom learners must try to imitate even though they
can never quite reach the same level of intuitive knowledge. Whatever the merits
of this view, however, it cannot be transferred to the culture(s) of a country,
for two main reasons:
- people who live in a particular country do not know intuitively or otherwise
the whole of ‘the culture’ of that country because there are in fact many
cultures within a country
- unlike language which is largely acquired by the age of 5, cultural learning
goes on throughout life as individuals pass from one section of a society to
another or from one social group to another, or as they move into new social
groups each with their own beliefs, values and behaviours, i.e. their own
culture.
So an individual native speaker cannot be an authority on the cultures of a
country and cannot give authoritative views on what is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ as might
be possible with language.
Furthermore, intercultural competence is only partially a question of knowledge,
and it is the other dimensions (savoir être, savoir apprendre/faire, savoir
comprendre and savoir s’engager) which must be given importance in the
teaching and learning process. These savoirs are however not automatically
acquired by the native speaker since they focus on how people interact with other
cultures. So a native speaker who has never ventured out of their country or even
out of their restricted local society, does not have these other savoirs which are
crucial to intercultural competence.
What the teacher should ask is not how much more information about a
country and its cultures can I include in the syllabus, but how can I develop
those other competences which will help learners to interact successfully with
people of other cultures and identities.
There is therefore a shift from the information based approach to an approach
which involves analysing cultural products. This has an advantage of teaching
analytical skills which are much less ‘perishable’ than just facts, and which are
flexible enough to keep up with constant cultural change, and can be applied to a
wide range of ‘cultural products’. Thus information only becomes ‘food for
thought’ whose importance may be temporary and transitory. Learners gain the
tools which can be recycled, and get the best of both worlds.
So the non-native teacher and learner have the advantage of seeing a culture
from a distance, and then taking the perspective of that other culture to look
back on their own. In other words, the insider, someone who belongs to a culture,
is very often unable to analyse and conceptualise what is too familiar, “they can’t
see the wood for the trees”. With all the wealth of experience of the national
culture they grew up in, much of what they know is unconscious and incomplete,
not to mention the fact that a person normally belongs to only one out of many
subcultures that each national culture encompasses.
Thus, a non-native speaker inferiority complex is only the result of
misunderstanding and prejudice. What is more important than native
speaker knowledge is an ability to analyse and specific training in
systemic cultural analysis is an important aid in becoming a foreign
language teacher, regardless of the teacher’s mother-tongue. This is not
to deny the importance of linguistic competence and it may be important
to follow the authority of the native speaker in linguistic competence, but
intercultural competence is a quite different matter.

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How do I teach the intercultural dimension if I have never left my country?

Posted on December 3, 2011 by Matthew Vetter

“Being exposed to the target culture is an absolute must for any learner/teacher.
How can a person acquire the competence…..?” This is the question which
many teachers ask and if they have no opportunity to leave their own country
and visit one where the target language is spoken they do not see how they can
teach ‘the target culture’.
The first response to this is to say that the main aim of teaching the intercultural
dimension is not the transmission of information about a foreign country.
The intercultural dimension is concerned with
- helping learners to understand how intercultural interaction takes place,
- how social identities are part of all interaction,
- how their perceptions of other people and others people’s perceptions
of them influence the success of communication
- how they can find out for themselves more about the people with whom
they are communicating.
So a teacher does not have to know everything about ‘the target culture’. This
is in any case impossible and in fact there are many cultures associated with a
particular language, for example many countries where French is spoken as the
first language, and within those countries many variations on beliefs, values and
behaviours which people share, in other words many cultures.
So a teacher should try to design a series of activities to enable learners to
discuss and draw conclusions from their own experience of the target culture
solely as a result of what they have heard or read. The teacher might provide
some factual information related to the life-styles current in the culture(s) and
patterns usually followed by members of these cultures, but the important thing
is to encourage comparative analysis with learners’ own culture. For example,
foreigners’ views about the learners’ country as represented in travel guides or in
tourist brochures might be compared with the learners’ own experience of and
views about their own country; they will quickly discover there is a difference.
They can then be asked to think whether their perceptions of the foreign country
will be the same as those of the inhabitants themselves.
The methods of doing this can include simulations and role-play which will
activate their schemata and background knowledge about other countries and
cultures: learners act the role of visitors to their own country and meet with
other learners acting as themselves and not as the stereotypes that the visitors
are expecting. This kind of experiential learning is powerful in developing
self-awareness as well as perceptions of other countries. The teacher can
encourage learners to become more observant in terms of various subtleties of
cultural behaviour. Learners are sure to emerge out of these experiences much 15
better prepared to communicate with other intercultural speakers, tolerate the
differences and handle everyday situations they are likely to encounter in a
foreign country.
There is in this kind of work no need for the teacher to be an expert about other
countries. The focus is on how learners respond to others and others’ views of
themselves, and how they interact with people from other cultures.
Of course, there is some factual information which learners need about other
countries where the target language is spoken, but this is available to teachers in
reference books, through the internet and so on. This kind of information does
not depend on having been to the countries in question, and in fact when one
does visit another country it is not this kind of information that one acquires. In
this respect the issue of cross-curricular dimension comes into focus to highlight
the point that intercultural education need not be linked to language alone, but
can extend to the exchange of information/experience on content subjects across
the curriculum.
The choice of topics for comparative study is therefore partly determined by
learners’ existing perceptions of other countries and cultures, not by some predetermined syllabus which is supposed to represent the ‘correct’ view of another
country. This means that no curriculum for language education should or could
be transposed directly from one national system to another. This is especially
true about the cultural curriculum which should be set from within the particular
educational system and, in particular, should not reflect the intentions of one or
more of the target cultures. The use of books produced in the countries in
question is therefore not necessarily the best way to develop a syllabus and a
choice of topics.
There is a danger of culture being limited to the all-too-familiar stereotypical
icons of the target culture – the instantly recognisable pictures of the clichéd
sights mentioned in a popular guide book. There is also a danger of believing
that there is one authoritative account of another country and its cultures, that
there is a ‘real’ account which only the native speaker can know.
The question is often asked “Can an ‘outsider’ know the ‘national identity’ of a
country from a cross-cultural perspective, will the way one nation imagines the
other from a distance be adequate?” The response to this is that the outsider’s
understanding of (a part of) another country’s identities and cultures is just as
valid as that of an insider. Of course, teachers have to simplify to match their
learners’ language level or their stage of intellectual development, but this can be
overcome by returning to the same topics at a later stage with more subtle and
complex materials.
Where direct encounters with a foreign culture are not available for either teacher
or learners, the important issue is to prepare learners for asking questions of the
appropriate kind. There may be people from one of the countries in question
ready to talk with learners but the important thing is not for them to ask questions 16
about facts, but about how the person perceives the learners’ country and why
they have these perceptions, before going on to asking about the target country.
In this way, learners can be come aware of the power of perceptions.
The teacher does not need to have experience or be an expert on the
country. The teacher’s task is to help learners ask questions, and to
interpret answers.

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