On Cultural Contexts

Integrating culture into curriculum is as undeniably indispensable aspect of foreign language education. This is why “Culture” figures so prominently into the Five C’s comprising the Standards for Foreign Language Learning. Foreign language instruction involves more than merely imparting some grammatical rules and vocabulary and sending students on their way. Students need some sort of context for the content; a pragmatic and practical framework into which they can input their newfound knowledge. In this way, the learner begins to recognize the value of the target language beyond the classroom, as he or she is able to apply the material being taught to them in a meaningful way.
Unfortunately, efforts to expose students to the target culture by instructors may be met by obstinacy on the part of the learner. The root of this reluctance to accept other cultures lies in the individual learner’s own culture. Students’ attempts to understand a new culture often involve comparing it to their own, and the end result is that they simply dismiss the new culture as inferior or “stupid”. This is particularly true with American adolescents. They are at an age when they have been more or less fully indoctrinated into their own culture and when developmentally they are still relatively egocentric. At the same time, they are living in a country that is relatively isolated and that is more accustomed to exporting it own language and culture, rather than importing others. Therefore, it is difficult to expect American students to be able to look at the world through a different lens.
Yet this is, nonetheless, one of the primary goals of foreign language instruction and it has become increasingly crucial in a world of dissolving borders and integrated economies. Educators must do everything in their power to broaden students’ intellectual horizons so that they realize, as I once read on a bookmarker, that “other cultures are not failed attempts to imitate [their] own.”
In order to accomplish this lofty goal, foreign language teachers need to first find ways to encourage students to recognize how their own culture influences their perception of the world. How does this translate into actual classroom practices, lessons, and units? It is a process of starting with the individual student’s frame of reference and moving on to investigate the target culture. For example, in a lesson about “homes and houses” a teacher might first ask students to describe their own homes or possibly even draw maps of their houses (as I once observed in a lesson). From here, the lesson can progress to examining homes within the target culture. In my case, the class might give a description of what their homes look like, and then examine photos that explore the different architectural styles that exist within France.
The class I am currently taking at RIC, as well as the school in which I am conducting my practicum, have placed a great deal of emphasis on Understanding by Design (UBD). For SED 410, I am in the process of developing my own UBD unit. Meanwhile, the school in which I have been placed, International School of Dakar (ISD), has required all teachers to input their curriculum into UBD units. Therefore, it is highly appropriate for me to address how cultural contexts relate to UBD units, specifically the one I am working on. Developing a UBD unit has certain stages, and choosing a cultural context is part of Stage one. However, I am beginning to come to the conclusion that there is no particular order within stage one. For example, I could decide what vocabulary and grammar I want students to learn, and then choose the context in which the content will be presented. From there I can build a unit accordingly. I could also reverse the order of the first step by choosing the topic or cultural context I want to explore and then deciding what grammar and vocabulary students will learn over the course of the exploration.
Right now, I am mulling over two units. The first is one about the Francophone world and I would be teaching it next March. The second is centered upon the theme of life for teenagers in France and it would be comprised of some lessons I already taught at ISD for which I generated my own material. For the Francophone unit, it has been more a matter of me choosing the context before the content. For the latter, I chose the context based upon the content I wanted to cover.
In my experiences at ISD, I try to evaluate the role culture plays in the lessons I teach and observe, and over the past three months I have noticed some things. First of all, teachers here do not necessarily face the same cultural obstacles as those faced by American foreign language teachers. The students at ISD are from around the world and most have lived in or visited several countries, so for the most part, they are accepting of the other cultures. In addition, most of them see the value in learning other languages because they have already had to learn another language at one point in their lives in order to socially interact with their peers. I should also point out that Senegal is a French-speaking country and the benefits of learning French are fairly obvious.
The next thing I noticed in my time at ISD is that the cultural aspects of lessons do not necessarily have to be glaring. Sometimes, the cultural component is extremely subtle. The French department at ISD only teaches in French; in part out of fairness to English Language Learners, and in part trying to strike a balance between language “acquisition” and “learning’ (i.e. introducing students to words before they use them in class). In doing so, they bring French culture into every lesson. As TLC points out, students’ attempts to equate other cultures with their own is similar to assuming that every word in a foreign language can be literally translated into their native language (Hadley, Alice Omaggio Teaching Language in Context; Third edition, pg 347). In French, people do not say “I AM 15 years old” or “I AM hungry.” They say “I HAVE fifteen years” or” I HAVE hunger.” There is really no such thing as literal translation and by conducting lessons entirely in French and rarely providing English equivalents of new vocabulary, the ISD teachers avoid the misconception that such a thing exists. My only question is how does that bode for “Comparisons”, which insists that students should be encouraged to make comparisons between the target language and their own? When I talked with my cooperating teacher about UBD and my difficulties grappling with how to inject culture into lessons, this is what she said. “The entire lesson is culture. Their binders are not ‘binders’. They’re ‘classeurs’. I use French songs and gestures to do everything from teaching the alphabet, to scolding students who misbehave. Simply doing everything in the French exposes them to French culture.” Of course, that is not a literal translation of what she said.
Incorporating culture into French curriculum can be potentially complicated for me. Culture is dynamic and though I have spent a significant amount of time in France and other Francophone countries, I am not French and I am by no means an expert on French culture. The Francophone world is vast and the influence of French language extends well beyond the borders of “l’hexagone”. There are Francophone countries in North and sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, North and South America, and Southeast Asia, and each of these countries and regions has its own unique culture. For me this creates two problems. First, it requires me to have at least a basic understanding of a very large geographic area, to be able to identify the majority of these countries, and to be capable of explaining the role France played in their history.
The other problem revolves around the question of how much time I should devote to each of these countries and regions. If my lessons focus almost exclusively on places like France and Canada, it would only provide students with a narrow glimpse of the massive Francophone world. At the same time, doing so would inherently assign a greater value to what some may deem to be “real” French culture, implying that one culture is “superior” to others. All of this could certainly be difficult. However, as much as the size and scope of French culture poses a challenge for me, it is precisely what I think I will enjoy most about being a French teacher. In the end, it will create countless opportunities for me to encourage students to look beyond their own back yards.