How to integrate cultural values into English speaking classes for communicative competence

This study will be useful for anyone interested in finding specific ways to integrate cultural activities into an English classroom whose goal is to improve communication skills. Invite you to refer to the article for detailed research content.

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c ngo i ng xu th h i nh p Tháng 11/2014 ĐƯA CÁC GIÁ TRỊ VĂN HÓA VÀO TRONG LỚP HỌC KỸ NĂNG NÓI TIẾNG ANH NHẰM MỤC ĐÍCH NÂNG CAO NĂNG LỰC GIAO TIẾP CHO SINH VIÊN Nguy n Th Thu, Thi u Ng c H
ng Trường Đại học Cảnh sát Nhân dân Tóm t t: Văn hóa khái niệm quan trọng giảng dạy tiếng Anh, tách rời khỏi việc giảng dạy ngôn ngữ Một thực tế mà nhiều người thừa nhận việc thiếu hiểu biết kiến thức văn hóa thường dẫn tới việc sử dụng chiến lược giao tiếp không phù hợp hậu khả giao tiếp hạn chế, người nắm vững ngữ pháp có vốn từ vựng tương đối Chính năm vừa qua, việc đưa vấn đề văn hóa vào chương trình giảng dạy ngoại ngữ nói chung, tiếng Anh nói riêng, đặc biệt lớp học giao tiếp ñược quan tâm Bài viết báo cáo kết nghiên cứu việc lồng giá trị văn hóa vào dạy nói tiếng Anh cho sinh viên ngành tiếng Anh Trường Đại học Khoa học Xã hội Nhân văn, Đại học Quốc gia Tp Hồ Chí Minh Nghiên cứu ñược thực nghiệm hai lớp dạy kỹ nói mà tác giả trực tiếp giảng dạy Kết thu ñược từ phiếu khảo sát cho giáo viên giảng viên từ quan sát giảng viên q trình giảng dạy cho thấy việc đưa giá trị văn hóa vào lớp học nói tiếng Anh ñã mang lại hiệu tăng cường ñộng học nói khả nói tiếng Anh cho sinh viên ngành tiếng Anh Như vậy, nghiên cứu hữu ích cho quan tâm tới việc tìm kiếm phương pháp cụ thể để lồng ghép hoạt động mang tính văn hóa vào lớp học tiếng Anh mà mục đích nâng cao lực giao tiếp T tiếp, sinh viên ngành tiếng Anh Abstract: Culture is such a crucial concept in language teaching that it cannot be separated from language teaching It is widely acknowledged that the lack of cultural awareness often leads to inappropriate speaking strategies, communicative which competence results of in English limited learners including those with good grammar and a wide range of vocabulary Thus, the integration of culture in second language curriculum has been widely discussed in recent years, particularly if the course is for English majors or for communicative language learning This article describes how cultural values were employed in teaching oral English to English major students at University of Social Science and Humanities (USSH) Experimental teaching was done in two speaking English classes at the USSH The findings from questionnaires and observation show that the integration of cultural values was successful in increasing English majors’ motivation and speaking competence Thus, this study would also be useful for those who are interested in finding specific ways to employ culture-related activities in English classes for successful communication Key words: culture, cultural values, communicative competence, English majors khóa: văn hóa, giá trị văn hóa, lực giao HOW TO INTEGRATE CULTURAL VALUES INTO ENGLISH SPEAKING CLASSES FOR COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE Introduction The integration of culture in language classrooms has been prevalent for the past years, especially in the course whose purpose is communicative competence Thus, language teachers have been attaching increasing importance to the improvement of students’ cultural understanding However, not enough attention has been paid to students’ own-bound behavior or to the preparation required for opening students’ minds to new experiences Thus, in order to improve students’ communicative 629 Ti u ban 4: Văn hóa ho t ñ ng gi ng d y ngo i ng th i kỳ h i nh p competence, teachers not only need to help students revise their linguistic and cultural patterns but also prepare students for acculturation Laying this groundwork requires an understanding of a necessary preparation and of how meaningful culture teaching can be integrated into the foreign language classroom When culture is presented, it must be employed in a gradual way and coordinated across levels The gradual approach means that a culture-integrated course must take for granted the need to start with an awareness of one’s own patterns of behavior and proceeds from there to the examination of foreign patterns of behavior Such a course will enable students to build a cultural framework and extend the new understanding to cultural differences Following this procedure, practical activities will be presented with skill-building culture teaching in a foreign language class This article describes how cultural values were employed in teaching oral English to English majored students at USSH Experimental teaching was done in two speaking English classes at USSH In the experimental teaching, a modified course syllabus with the integration of cultural values was employed to teach first year English majors The instruction of the expression of cultural values (attitude towards challenges, completion and cooperation, relationships, individuals, money, health and leisure, etc which are the unit topics of the course book Mosaic Speaking and Listening 1) and the reinforcement of the speaking skill are incorporated in the language classroom The findings from questionnaires and observation show that the integration of cultural values was successful in increasing English majors’ motivation and speaking competence Thus, this study would also be useful for those who are interested in finding specific ways to employ culture-related activities in oral English classes for successful communication Literature 2.1 Culture Culture is a very broad term which is very difficult to define "Culture is a social system that 630 represents an accumulation of beliefs, attitudes, habits, values, and practices that serves as a filter through which a group of people view and respond to the world in which they live." This is the definition of Culture given by Nobles in one of his textbooks in 1990 “Culture is a system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors and artifacts that the members of a society use tocope with Their world and with one another, and that are transmitted from generation to generation through learning”; “Culture consists of all the shared products of human society” (Robertson, 1981:67) To simplify, culture refers to the entire way of life of a society, “the ways of a people.” 2.2 Cultural values Values are: concepts or beliefs; about desirable states or behaviors; that transcend specific situations; guide selection or evaluation of behavior and events; and are ordered by relative importance.” (Schwartz &Bilsky, 1987, p.551) Cultural orientations differentiate fundamental ways of defining reality, or worldviews 2.3 Culture and language teaching It is pointed by Politzer (1959) that “If we teach language without teaching at the same time the culture in which it operates, we are teaching meaningless symbols or symbols to which the student attaches the wrong meaning” Politzer also states that unless the students are warned or unless they receive cultural instruction, they may wrongly associate cultural concepts or objects with the foreign symbols Moreover, “Learning culture while learning language can be more enjoyable for the students, since they must read, speak, or write about something, and listen to something, why should not that something have a cultural content?” (Valdes, 1992:121) 2.4 Cultural introduction into English classes Methodological framework Dickinson (1987) offers a framework for the Chi n l
c ngo i ng xu th h i nh p teacher’s role in FLL whose main aspects cover the methodological approach of culture teaching in which there are two essential function attributed to the teacher: to help students develop their communicative competence and their competence as learners Since cross-cultural understanding must necessarily rely on communication, the development of students’ communicative competence is closely related to culture teaching The communicative approach is based on two main principles: language is mainly considered as a vehicle of communication, so that the importance of message and content are emphasized; the selection of content requires taking a decision on the semantic fields involved and real communication take place, as well as on the specific functions of communication (Sanchez, 1987) Taking into account both the psychological preparation and the communicative methodology as guidelines for culture learning, three initial steps in teaching cultural concepts are presented (Seelye, 1987) First, teachers must identify the skills involved in cross-cultural understanding and communication These skills become the goals of cultural instruction The second step consists of the development of performance objectives that are goal-related and, finally, goal-related learning activities for cultural instruction are to be integrated in the FL classroom Approaches of cultural value integration into English classes - Specialized course on culture introduction Nowadays more and more universities in Vietnam have been aware of the importance of the culture introduction into college English Specialized courses on culture introduction are adopted nationwide Thus, besides the basic knowledge about words and grammar, students also have access to a variety of cultures, which enriches their knowledge and inspires them to communicate more Thus, their cross-culture communicative ability will gradually be improved - Culture introduction with English language teaching Tháng 11/2014 It is therefore indispensible to integrate college English with culture introduction A good introduction of culture will help students understand the teaching material better, and motivate them to work harder For example, when we are working on the text about George Washington, it is necessary for us to know the relevant knowledge about the great man involving US history and politics And then we can make a comparison with the Vietnamese great leaders Thus, it will be an easier and much more interesting task for the college students to learn English - Create meaningful activities The background and culture of the target language is essential to English learning and teaching So it is important for the learners of, who are members of a particular culture to interact with knowledgeable people in the society or the authentic context However, thereal world environment that employs the context in which learning is relevant is rare in Vietnam It is thus the teachers’ duty to create meaningful activities both in class and after class There will be meaningful activities such as role-play, situation talk and classroom presentation, etc The more they get involved in the real world environment, the better and faster they will master the cross culture communicative ability Necessity of cultural background knowledge in oral comprehension There are a number of cultural factors influencing English learners’ failure in successful communication, some of which are: lack of background knowledge of words and phrases, inadequate of daily expressions, ignorance of nonverbal language, neglect of different values, etc Likewise, speaking is not merely concerned with pronunciation and intonation Students can only improve their oral English and reach the aim of communication by means of enormous reading, mastering rich language material and acquaintance of western culture Therefore, in oral training, teachers should lay stress on factuality of 631 Ti u ban 4: Văn hóa ho t đ ng gi ng d y ngo i ng th i kỳ h i nh p language and adopt some material approaching to daily life, such as daily dialogues with tape, magazines, newspapers and report etc., because the material is from real life, and it helps students to be well acquainted with standard pronunciation and intonation, to speak English appropriate to the occasion, to understand western way of life and customs etc Otherwise, misunderstanding and displeasure are inevitably aroused Methodology 3.1 Research questions 1) How are students at USSH aware of the importance of culture in their English learning? 2) To what extent is culture integrated in teaching English by teachers at USSH? 3) How is culture integrated in the teaching of speaking to English majorsin Language 4.1 course at USSH and how effective was it? 3.2 Research design This is a qualitative research In order to find out the answer the research questions, the following instruments were used: questionnaires for students and teachers, and class observation 3.2.1 Questionnaires - Questionnaire for students: A questionnaire of 20 questions were deliver 120 first year students in two English classes at USSH in order to find out students’ experience and attitude towards the integration of culture into their classes (10 questions) as well as their cultural awareness and understanding (10 questions) - Questionnaire for teachers: A questionnaire of 20 questions were deliver 15 teachers of English, Faculty of Foreign Languages to find out: their experience with the integration of culture in their teaching (10 questions in part 1); their awareness, understanding and attitude towards the integration of culture in their teaching (10 questions in part 2) 3.2.2 Teacher’s observation - The group discussions enable students to 632 cooperate with each other and to pay attention to various opinions when other students express their opinions Meanwhile, the teacher can observe how individual student participate in the discussion (Graves, 2000) Moreover, through observing, the teacher can judge students' interests and learning preferences (Graves, 2000) When observing the group discussions, the teacher can fill out the following sheet - The role-play activity is employed in order to assess if students absorb the classroom content and to evaluate each student's speaking ability The use of role play activities can be regarded as an on-going and communicative assessment tool (Kodotchigova, 2002) While students engage in the role-play activity, the teacher observes each group of students and fills in the sheet (Lambert, 2003) Findings and discussion 4.1 Results of questionnaires to the students and teachers: Responses to the two questionnaires to students and teachers at USSH help to answer Research question and The results are briefly described as followed: - Based on the percentage of correct answers to questionnaire about cultural knowledge, it can be concluded that the students’ knowledge about the target culture is rather limited Although it may be argued that information about the other culture should not be the aim of the teaching of culture, it cannot completely ignored For language students, it means that this “core information” is crucial if they are to understand the other culture - The results of the two questionnaires reveal that both teachers and students considered the teaching of culture important However, when being asked to define culture, they did not appear to have a clear perception of concept as most of them (80%) defined culture by listing its elements Few teachers described culture as an integrated system of various components Chi n l
c ngo i ng xu th h i nh p - A major problem concerning the teaching of culture seems to be finding time to it No teacher admitted that the never mention culturerelated issues in their teaching, only one quarter of them responded that they did it in almost every lesson Interestingly, it was agreed by many researchers that culture should be an integral part of every language class Up to 90% of the students also thought that, they would like to know more about Britain and the best place to learn its culture is in the class - The teachers’ and students’ preferences concerning the way culture is integrated into their English classes is not much different + Both groups regarded talking about current events and discussions of cultural similarities and differences the most important + Most of the teachers agreed that they use the Internet and newspapers to find out the sources for talks and discussions + Not surprisingly, watching videos was also the most popular choice with both the students and teachers + The students ranked songs were the third place It means that the teacher s have not made full use of students’ interest + Listening to radio received relatively low scores by the learners It can be concluded from the responses to the questionnaires that little attention is paid to the integration of cultural factors into the teaching of English at the USSH Besides, the students should more realize the significance of the native culture The teachers should rethink what is to be taught and how it is to teach in an English speaking class The teachers should make the lesson useful and meaningful for the students so that English learners are able to experience a sense of pride and achievement in successful second language communication Information from the two questionnaires to realized the necessity of the integration of cultural Tháng 11/2014 values in the teaching speaking The description of the Language 4.1 course at USSH and how the course is modified with the integration of cultural values in teaching speaking is briefly described (see APPENDIX 1) 4.2 Results of teacher’s observation Observation students’ communication activities, the teacher and also the researcher have lotsinformation about the students’ speaking performance, which can be summarized as followed: - To a great extent, the integration of cultural values in the course has enrichedstudents’ awareness and understanding of cultural values of western people, similarities and differences in comparison with Vietnamese ones - Students have been more and more active, motivated and self-confident in role-plays or groups discussion due to the frequent exposure to such types of activities - Students’ communication or language mistakes have decreased remarkably with the help from the teacher - Students’ vocabulary range used by Americans when expressing and responding in a conversation related to the speaking topic of the unit has been enriched - More attention has been paid to the cultural values of the target culture in pair and group conversations, for example: giving complements, doing apology, expressing thanks, etc - Students have increasingly connected specific language items to cultural ways of thinking, feeling and acting - The majority of the students (71%) in the two classes of Language 4.1 got band C or above for their speaking performance, 25 needs improvement (band D), and required (band E) In short, the reflection papers of the teacher signal students’ positive improvement in students’ speaking motivation, communicative competence, cultural knowledge and some other skills 633 Ti u ban 4: Văn hóa ho t đ ng gi ng d y ngo i ng th i kỳ h i nh p Conclusion and recommendation The lack of culture may lead to the failure in real communication Thus, it is highly important to abandon the practices of teaching phenomenalistic descriptions and to limit activities intended to reveal information concerning institutional question in an English course whose purpose is communicative competence Teachers should encourage comparison and discussion with the students about how these options may be similar or different from their own For that matter, awareness of students´ own cultural identity before introducing a foreign culture is a necessity Generally said, there are many skill-getting and skill-using activities, which encourage students to explore patterns of everyday life, examine cultural behaviour, and discuss the values and attitudes of British and US people Language teachers may use different kinds of realia such as souvenirs, postcards, or stamps, poem, literature, proverbs, songs, radio broadcasting, role-plays, etc To observe cultural behaviour, activities such as watching video, listening to radio broadcasting, role-plays are for that purpose What more, the use of Internet for videoconferencing is the most modern teaching supplement, which supports the cross-cultural communication Finally, it is difficult to set a detailedsyllabusfor the teaching of culture in the language classes It is, thus, teachers’ responsibility to set such goals, which the students can reach, and also to evaluate and control the students´ work to see the students ‘growth In order to achieve set goals teachers need to plan their lessons carefully and choose good activitieswith a regardto students’interest and abilities The lesson plan of a cultureintegrated unit should follow the procedure as followed: Pre-teaching: conduct some warmup activities in which T can combine culture with the lesson content, always provide the background at the beginning of each units through many techniques; While- teaching: explore all aspects of culture mentioned in the lessons; Post-teaching: check if students understand and 634 are aware of culture mentioned in the lessons or not, design activities for students to practice communication with culture REFERENCES Aleksandrowicz-Pędich, L., Lázár, I & Skopinskaja, L (2000).Cross-national study on crosscultural awareness Network 3(3), 3-8 Aleksandrowicz-Pedich, L and Kjartansson, R (2002).The case for culture: Teachers’ views on intercultural competence in the language classroom University of Bialystok: Linguodidactica VI, 9-21 Barry Tomalin (2008) Culture – the fifth language skills Retrieved September 29, 2008 from http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/culture-fifthlanguage-skill Byram, M (1997) Teaching and Assessing Intercultural Communicative Competence Multilingual Matters Fantini, A E (2000) A central concern: Developing intercultural communicative competence School for International Training Occasional Papers Series Inaugural Issue Autonomy, Cultural Awareness (pp 141-150) European Centre for Modern Languages Strasbourg: Council of Europe Halverson, R J (1985) Culture and vocabulary acquisition: A proposal Foreign Language Annals, 18(4), 327-32 Hofstede, G (1994) Cultures and Organizations – Software of the Mind London: Harper Collins Publishers Holló, D and Lázár, I (2000a) The neglected element: Teaching culture in the EFL classroom NovELTy.Vol.7, No.1: 76-84 10 Kramsch, C (1998) Language and Culture Oxford: Oxford University Press 11 Lázár, I (Ed.) (2003) Incorporating intercultural communicative competence in language teacher education European Centre for Modern Languages Strasbourg: Council of Europe 12 King, J (2002) Preparing EFL Learners for Oral Presentations Retrieved October12, 2004, from http://iteslj.org/Lessons/King-PublicSpeaking html 13 Kodotchigova, M A (2002) Role Play in Teaching Culture: Six Quick Steps for Classroom Implementation Retrieved November 4, 2004 fromhttp://iteslj.org/Techniques/KodotchigovaRolePlay.html 14 Lazaraton, A (2003) Evaluative criteria for qualitative research in applied linguistics: Whose criteria and whose research? The Modern Language Journal, 87, 1, 1-12 Chi n l
c ngo i ng xu th h i nh p 15 Manes, J (1983) Compliments: A mirror of cultural values In N Wolfson and E Judd (Eds.), Sociolinguistics and Language Acquisition (pp 82-95) Rowley, MA: Newbury House 16 Patton, M Q (2002) Qualitative research and evaluation methods (3rd ed) Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage 17 Politzer, R (1959) Developing Cultural Understanding through Foreign Language Study Report of the Fifth Annual Round Table Meeting on Linguistics and Language Teaching, Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press Tháng 11/2014 18 Sercu, L., Bandura, E., Castro, P., Davcheva, L., Laskaridou, C., Lundgren, U., Mendez García, M., & Ryan, P (2005).Foreign Language Teachers and Intercultural Communication: An International Investigation Languages for Intercultural Communication and Education 10.Clevedon: Multilingual Matters 19 Schwartz, Shalom H.; Bilsky, Wolfgang (1987) Toward a universal psychological structure of human values Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 53(3), Sep 1987 635 ... a foreign language class This article describes how cultural values were employed in teaching oral English to English majored students at USSH Experimental teaching was done in two speaking English. .. finally, goal-related learning activities for cultural instruction are to be integrated in the FL classroom Approaches of cultural value integration into English classes - Specialized course on culture... and it helps students to be well acquainted with standard pronunciation and intonation, to speak English appropriate to the occasion, to understand western way of life and customs etc Otherwise,