This chapter focuses on how teachers that teach ELL students are really intercultural educators. This being because the teachers of these students must learn and respect the ELL students' cultures. A strategy to teach ELL students the L2 language is through their own culture. This could be from the use of symbols and meanings, knowledge, art, moral, laws, customs, traditions, etc. These customs make up the way the people or the student lives or has lived. Some responsibilities of an intercultural educator is analyzing how the student has learned in the past from their own culture. The learner first learns culture patterns, values, and behaviors. The intercultural educator understands this concept about the student and will apply learning strategies to accommodate the students culturally derived learning styles. Next, the educator makes sure that the language learner is fully engaged with their whole personality. Next, the culture of the student will provide rich content that the teacher may use to influence instruction. The teacher then builds off the idea of culture as content where the teacher can compare cultures by using strategies, concepts, ideas, and behaviors. The last component for the educator to include in instruction is actually teaching English to the students. "Teaching English using the Learner's culture as well as the target culture makes English more accessible" (LDR, 286). If we take a moment to reflect on the students' culture, then teaching the target culture will be less difficult for the teacher, and more easily understood for the student. It may take a lot of lesson planning, however it will be worth it!
An article that is based on higher learning, however still focuses on necessary strategies for teaching language through culture.
Wu, S., & Meng, L. (2010). The Integration of Inter-Culture Education into Intensive Reading Teaching for English Majors through Project-Based Learning. Online Submission, Retrieved from EBSCOhost.
Tiffany writes; "The students, when using the learnt language, may use the language inappropriately or within the wrong cultural context, thus defeating the purpose of learning a language". This statement shows how necessary it is to make the language transition applicable to life experiences. This way the students are able to take what they have learned and apply it to every day living.
ReplyDeleteAmanda Wright relays a monthly precedure in her class; "Culture day in my class! Families and students love this day and so does the district. I have a ninety percent parent involvement in my classroom. Once I set up culture day once a month and it will be specific culture of the month and it will be aligned with English, History, Math content standards. I honestly do not know who gets more out of the lesson between students, parents and myself, because all of us learn so much and are enriched. It is truly amazing to have this experience and see how much everyone retains". I love this idea! I would just be lost as to where to start. I would be curious to know the grade level(s) she teaches and how she intertwines to the content standards...so interesting!