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Professional Development AP® Japanese Language and Culture Instructional Strategies to Incorporate Culture Curriculum Module The College Board The College Board is a not-for-profit membership association whose mission is to connect students to college success and opportunity Founded in 1900, the College Board is composed of more than 5,700 schools, colleges, universities and other educational organizations Each year, the College Board serves seven million students and their parents, 23,000 high schools, and 3,800 colleges through major programs and services in college readiness, college admission, guidance, assessment, financial aid and enrollment Among its widely recognized programs are the SAT®, the PSAT/NMSQT®, the Advanced Placement Program® (AP®), SpringBoard® and ACCUPLACER® The College Board is committed to the principles of excellence and equity, and that commitment is embodied in all of its programs, services, activities and concerns The College Board acknowledges all the third party content that has been included in these materials and respects the Intellectual Property rights of others If we have incorrectly attributed a source or overlooked a publisher, please contact us © 2010 The College Board College Board, ACCUPLACER, Advanced Placement, Advanced Placement Program, AP, AP Central, SAT, SpringBoard and the acorn logo are registered trademarks of the College Board inspiring minds and SAT Subject Tests are trademarks owned by the College Board PSAT/NMSQT is a registered trademark of the College Board and National Merit Scholarship Corporation All other products and services may be trademarks of their respective owners Contents Introduction Yoshiko Saito-Abbott Strategies to Integrate Culture Eiko Ushida Unit Plans Obon Festival (お盆) Mieko Avello 19 Energy Conservation (省エネ) Kyoko Shoji 57 Travel and Transportation (旅行と交通機関) Naomi Okada 77 About the Contributors 117 Introduction Yoshiko Saito-Abbott California State University, Monterey Bay Seaside, California Teaching culture is an essential element of Standards-based instruction What are the successful instructional strategies to incorporate culture into an AP® Japanese course? In this curriculum module, the first article, “Strategies to Integrate Culture into AP Japanese Language and Culture,” written by Eiko Ushida, briefly summarizes how cultural knowledge is examined in the AP Japanese Exam; she then discusses some useful strategies to teach culture in the classroom and follows with an introduction of content-based instruction (CBI) as one approach to incorporate culture in the target language She thereby shows how to create a theme-based unit with instructional strategies and sample activities Three unit plans introduced in this curriculum module, written by Mieko Avello, Kyoko Shoji and Naomi Okada, respectively, were taught in their AP class and modified based on students’ performance The first unit, “Obon Festival,” written by Mieko Avello, illustrates with step-by-step instruction how the author taught a Japanese cultural event, the Obon festival, one of three major holidays in Japan Avello helps students to understand and be able to talk about the cultural practice and perspectives of Obon and related summer festivals, using authentic materials The second unit, written by Kyoko Shoji, focuses on environmental issues, including global warming and recycling She incorporates multiple technologies in her teaching The Internet-based authentic materials help students to develop three modes of communication skills and cultural knowledge Assessments include various types of tasks in formats similar to AP Exam questions The last unit, written by Naomi Okada, teaches students how to travel around Japan and instructs students on how to check for lodging, create a realistic travel itinerary, and use public transportation to navigate around the city Her unit plan incorporates extensive supplementary materials from many teaching resources A Curriculum Module for AP Japanese Language and Culture These unit plans were designed to help students develop cultural knowledge in three modes of communication in order to improve their overall communicative competency Each unit includes an overall outline of the unit that shows when and how vocabulary, new grammatical structures and cultural knowledge are introduced in class with an approximate timeline They also include detailed lesson plans with assessment tasks, rubrics and sample activities with teaching materials The collection of articles and unit plans in this publication is a resource to aid reflection, to reassure and to explore effective instructional strategies to guide students in reaching higher levels of language proficiency Strategies to Integrate Culture Eiko Ushida University of California, San Diego La Jolla, California Introduction Culture has played various roles in foreign language classrooms Its importance has become greater since the Standards for Foreign Language Learning in the 21st Century (Standards) were published in 1996 For Japanese language education, the importance of culture was further highlighted by the beginning of the AP Japanese Language and Culture Exam Up to now, culture has been included in secondary Japanese education in many ways, such as conducting culture demonstrations or events, watching films and so on Now, the Standards and the AP Exam require us to look at culture as an integrated aspect of language learning, not a separate one Students need to be introduced to a wide range of Japanese culture and engage in cognitively challenging topics through carefully designed lessons that enhance language learning (College Board, 2007, 2008) To conduct such a course, the emphasis must rely on language use and culture, integrating them in such a way that opportunities for learning culture are maximized in a rich language context In this article, I will discuss the definition of culture for AP Japanese and look at the role of cultural knowledge in the Standards and the AP Exam Then, I will present some useful strategies for the classroom Finally, I will introduce content-based instruction (CBI) by showing how to create a theme-based unit with instructional strategies and sample activities A Curriculum Module for AP Japanese Language and Culture What Is Culture? 2.1 Culture in the Standards Culture, together with Communication, Connections, Comparisons and Communities, is one of the five goal areas in the Standards Among the five, the Cultures and Comparisons goals most directly target cultural learning They specifically state, “gain knowledge and understanding of other cultures” and “develop insight into the nature of language and culture,” respectively Furthermore, culture is embedded in the remaining goals as shown in the following: • Students are to communicate in a different mode on cultural topics using culturally appropriate manners (Communication) • Students are to acquire information and learn distinctive points of view through Japanese language and culture (Connections) • Students are to use Japanese language to participate in Japanese communities within and outside of classrooms (Communities) Culture has been studied in various disciplines and defined in many different ways over time For example, some view culture as “everything in human life,” whereas in the field of intercultural communication, it is more specifically perceived as values, beliefs, perceptions and social relationship patterns Sometimes, it is divided into two groups: “big-C culture” and “little-c culture.” Big-C culture is considered formal, and it often includes what are perceived as traditional or higher forms of it, for example literature, theater (e.g, kabuki, noh) and art (e.g., ukiyoe, sumie) Little-c culture, on the other hand, is perceived as including things that happen in daily/mundane life, such as human interaction and behavior (e.g., shopping, dating, eating) In the Standards, both aspects of big-C culture and little-c culture are viewed as inseparable and important for language learning In the Standards, culture is defined as practices (i.e., patterns of social interaction), products (e.g., books, foods, music) and perspectives (e.g., meanings, attitudes, values, ideas) Of these three, the ultimate goal for learners of foreign language is to understand the perspectives because cultural practices and products are based on cultural values Additionally, the Standards emphasize the importance of raising students’ cultural awareness at every stage of language learning to develop cultural understanding and respect by analyzing both similarities and differences between their own culture and other cultures Under this philosophy, the standards presented in the Cultures goal are aimed at students demonstrating an understanding of the relationship between the practices and perspectives (standard 2.1), and between the products and perspectives (standard 2.2) of the cultures studied Under the Comparisons goal, students are to demonstrate their understanding of culture through the comparison of cultures studied and their own (standard 4.2) What these standards tell us is that students are expected not only to know Instructional Strategies to Incorporate Culture about Japanese culture but also to demonstrate (e.g., explain, describe, show, illustrate, teach) their understanding (e.g., what they have understood, interpreted or learned) of it through communication, using, of course, the Japanese language And this is what the AP Japanese Exam is trying to assess 2.2 Culture in the AP Japanese Language and Culture Exam The AP Japanese Language and Culture Exam is a performance assessment test/evaluation designed to see how well students can perform in assigned tasks in Japanese for three specific modes of communication: interpersonal, interpretive and presentational The concept is similar to the ACTFL Performance Guidelines for K−12 Learners (1998), which highlight the anticipated performance outcomes of the goals of the Standards, defining how well students perform In the Guidelines, culture is included as “cultural awareness” to assess how students’ cultural understanding is reflected in their communication For example, cultural awareness for the intermediate learner range looks at the following criteria for each communication mode: Interpersonal Tasks • Use some culturally appropriate vocabulary and idiomatic expressions • Use some gestures and body language of the target culture Interpretive Tasks • Use knowledge of their own culture and that of the target culture(s) to interpret oral or written texts more accurately • Recognize target culture influences in the products and practices of their own culture • Recognize differences and similarities in the perspectives of the target culture and their own Presentational Tasks • Use some culturally appropriate vocabulary, idiomatic expressions and nonverbal behaviors • Demonstrate some cultural knowledge in oral and written presentations A Curriculum Module for AP Japanese Language and Culture 2.2.1 Culture in Interpersonal Tasks Standard 1.1: Students engage in conversations, provide and obtain information, express feelings and emotions, and exchange opinions For the Interpersonal Communication standard, students are to demonstrate their knowledge of cultural perspectives, practices and products in negotiating meaning with the person(s) to whom the students are communicating Students also need to develop the ability to recognize that different language and cultures use different patterns of communication Cultural knowledge plays a critical role in three aspects: context, content and appropriate use of language Students need knowledge of cultural perspectives concerning interactions between individuals of different ages, status and background to examine the context of communication to identify with whom, when and how we are communicating, and for what purpose Then, students activate cultural knowledge to determine what to say (content) and how to it appropriately (register and style) During communication, cultural elements appear frequently as a topic, information (content), vocabulary, idiomatic expressions and/or nonverbal elements such as a gesture In order for students to engage in culturally appropriate Interpersonal Communication, they should have cultural information that they can talk about, compare to that of other culture(s) and give opinions about In the AP Japanese Exam, Interpersonal tasks (e.g., conversation, returning a telephone call or text chat) are slightly different from real-life tasks because of a lack of opportunities for negotiation of meaning and use of communication strategies Therefore, planning becomes very important Before providing responses, students should first read the instructions very carefully to understand the context They need to anticipate what they are going to communicate about, what information will be used and then what language (vocabulary, grammar structures, discourse structures, register and style) they will hear/ see/use With sufficient planning, students will be able to respond to the prompts properly, provide elaborate responses and use appropriate language 2.2.2 Culture in Interpretive Tasks Standard 1.2: Students understand and interpret written and spoken language on a variety of topics For the Interpretive Communication standard, students are to show their knowledge of how cultural perspectives are embedded in the text Students also need the ability to analyze and compare the content of the information available both in Japanese and their own language, so they can examine linguistic and cultural differences Students understand cultural content, interpret the text and negotiate meanings by processing language, and by using visual cues and background knowledge ... communication, using, of course, the Japanese language And this is what the AP Japanese Exam is trying to assess 2.2 Culture in the AP Japanese Language and Culture Exam The AP Japanese Language and Culture... geography, history, environmental studies), or it can be a theme that directly relates to Japanese culture (e.g., house, family, school) Age-appropriateness and topics raised in the AP Japanese. .. strategies to incorporate culture into an AP? ? Japanese course? In this curriculum module, the first article, “Strategies to Integrate Culture into AP Japanese Language and Culture,” written by