This study aims to explore English language teachers’ perceptions towards teaching IC. It investigates the way in which teachers perceive themselves as professionals. How they understand and define the concepts “culture” and “IC”. To what extent they see ICC as an objective in their language classroom. How they approach the teaching of ICC in their classrooms. One of the reasons for exploring teachers’ perceptions regarding teaching ICC in FL education was to be able to provide teachers with professional development opportunities which build on their existing beliefs and teaching practices. The research findings on teachers’ perceptions indicate that teachers’ perceptions affect their conceptions of specific teaching situations and, eventually, their teaching practice (Carter & Doyle, 1995). Therefore, taking teachers’
perceptions as the starting point and trying to alter them, seems to hold the best promise for altering teaching practice. The backbone of the research is a list of questions derived from preliminary interviews with English language teachers and addressed by the study which were designed to meet the research objectives, and which have been mentioned above. This focus corresponds with Byram’s work who proposed teaching ICC on the grounds that cultures are the seed-bed for both constancy and change, and that language and culture cannot be separated. It could be argued that fulfilling this strategy necessities qualifying English language teachers and cementing their cognitive skills. Moreover, taking into consideration the importance of the English language teachers’ opinions and views as regards the reforming of both English language programs and curricula, this is a vitally critical issue. This is what the present study tries to stress as a highly important problem to be solved. The main findings of the study regarding teachers’ knowledge indicates that teachers are aware of and familiar with the TCs they are presenting to their students with the help of their
textbooks, which do not ignore such awareness or familiarity of the TCs. However most of the teachers identified culture as factual knowledge transmitted through them, or the textbooks, to their students. Some of the teachers appreciated the deep definition of culture and described culture as skills where the English culture(s) are still in focus, but now the students’ own culture is also presented, and explaining to their students how this may affect positively their own culture and their understanding of TCs. Only a few teachers accepted culture as a bi-directional belief, which will help their students’
cultural awareness where they are presenting a deeper explanation of culture in their classrooms, and preparing them for intercultural encounters. The underlying idea here is that intercultural encounters may be enriched by all cultures taking part.
Significantly, teachers’ definitions of ICU and ICC reflect building their students’
curiosity and openness, readiness to suspend disbeliefs about other cultures and beliefs about their own culture; and building their students’ knowledge of social groups, their products and their practices. This reflection may prepare students to be more open to the idea of universality of humanity, being empathetic with others and being prepared to justify themselves. When talking about the place of culture in ELT the majority of teachers agreed on presenting TCs in their classroom because they believe that this understanding will give their students the opportunities to be more open to others and make them more empathetic. The ELT teaching objectives is categorized into general teaching objectives; language teaching objectives; and culture teaching objectives.
Most teachers were willing to provide their students with general teaching objectives and language teaching objectives to help them acquire the knowledge in order to succeed in their academic studies. However, because of the changing world and its present cultural needs, and because of the multicultural society we are living in, teachers try to present culture teaching objectives as a priority in their classrooms, even though some of them lack time or cultural preparation. When teachers were asked about how they perceive the teaching of ICC in their classrooms their cultural teaching
objectives could be categorized into three dimensions: the knowledge dimension, where teachers provide their students with general background information; the skills dimension, where teachers prepare students for future intercultural encounters by giving them social and sociolinguistics skills; and finally, the attitudinal dimension, which develops positive attitudes towards other cultures in general and TCs in particular, with the ultimate goal of promoting tolerance and empathy, and in the long run, creating conditions for peaceful coexistence. Teachers were interested in promoting their students’ ability to be empathetic with people living in other cultures.
The three types of cultural objectives can be seen as stages in a cumulative process that teachers are trying to achieve, within the time constraints. Regarding how English language teachers approach the teaching of IC in their classrooms, and what their practices are in doing so these could be divided into three pedagogies: pedagogy of information, which provides students with factual information about the English speaking countries; pedagogy of preparation, which aims at preparing students for behaving appropriately when meeting people from English speaking countries; and pedagogy of encounter, which aims at reducing ethnocentric views by fostering positive attitudes towards, and respect for, representatives of both TCs and other cultures in general. Even though most teachers stated that their main cultural objective was to foster tolerance and empathy, few of them applied teaching strategies beyond the level of transmission of facts. Moreover, regarding teachers’ classroom practice, this study found that the teaching activities practiced frequently are mainly teacher- centered, rather than being student-centered, though some teachers also ask their students to explore aspects of TCs, to compare cultures or to reflect on cultural differences. Significantly, those teachers who believe that language and culture can be integrated are the ones with beliefs supporting the teaching of ICC, while the ones who believe that culture teaching and language teaching cannot be integrated are the ones who have awareness of contextual constraints of teaching ICC. To conclude the
findings, we can identify that English language teachers concentrated on the factual knowledge and skills parts of teaching the language most of the time, which could be categorized within the pedagogy of information and the pedagogy of preparation respectively; either when they were presenting culture; when they were representing their teaching objectives; when they perceived the teaching of the ICC; or when they were using activities in their classrooms. Less concentration was paid to actual teaching of culture, which could be categorized within the pedagogy of encounter;
despite their realization of the importance of it to their students and their openness to other cultures.
2. Limitations of the study
The study has several major limitations. Firstly, it is a small-scale study with a limited number of teachers at the Faculty of Foreign Language at UNETI.
Secondly, using closed-ended questions in the questionnaires also have its limitations. This type of questions proves its usefulness by asking for fixed responses, which causes the need to select the answer from a given multiple choice. It prevents the participants from providing elaboration or justification for their choice. However, the participants who do not take part in the follow-up interview are not able to add deep insights about the issues under investigations.
Thirdly, limitation of the study is also associated with teachers’ self-reported cultural teaching practice. Cultural teaching practices are reflected through teachers’
own descriptions of what they do in their classes and what the students’ feedback is.
Finally, the questionnaire administration can be a problem because the amount of time given to the teachers may affect their responses and due to the time constraint of the interview, the data is not rich enough to reflect their understanding and teaching practice.
3. Suggestions for further studies.
Despite the limitations, the main purpose behind this study is to explore English language teachers‟ perceptions towards teaching IC in ELT at UNETI. It aims to investigate the way in which teachers perceive themselves as professionals. How do they understand and define the concepts “culture” and “IC”? How do EFL teachers self-report intercultural competence in teaching practice? How is teacher’s intercultural competence reflected in their self-reported pedagogical practice in classroom? To overcome the above mentioned limitations and provide in-depth information, some further studies are desired.
Firstly, another study is hoped to be done at a larger scale which involves greater number of teachers and data should be collected from the students to get higher reliability and validity. A future avenue for research would be to explore the issues from students’ perspective, for instance, how students perceive and articulate the needs and expectations for culture teaching and learning, which also play a vital role in the integration of cultural dimension into EFL teaching.
Secondly, future research exploring teachers’ culture teaching practice through classroom observations, which would provide a more reliable and detailed picture of when, what, and how culture teaching is conducted in EFL classes is worth being carried out.
Thirdly, future research can focus on how to prepare EFL teachers for intercultural competence teaching, such as the design and carrying out of teacher training and processional development program focusing on intercultural competence teaching, and teachers’ feedback in terms of how it helps them to integrate cultural teaching into their EFL classes.
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APPENDIX A:
SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE
Dear English Language Teachers
I would like to thank you for your kindness, your precious time, and willingness in participating in this study “Intercultural Competence of EFL teachers at University of Economic and Technical Industries when teaching the course book “New Headway, Pre- intermediate, 3rd edition”. My study aims to gain more understanding of the Intercultural Competence of English language teachers, and find out how teachers self-report in the classroom as well as the relationship between teachers’ Intercultural competence and their performance in practice. I believe that by giving me your opinions in this questionnaire I might build a better understanding of your perception.
“Intercultural Competence of EFL teachers at University of Economic and Technical Industries when teaching the course book “New Headway, Pre-intermediate, 3 rd edition”
A. Teachers’ perceptions of Culture and Intercultural Competence
Question 1: According to you, what is culture? Choose one answer for each statement from 5 to 1; 1 is “least agree with” and 5 is “most agree with”.
Do you have another definition?
________________________________________________________________________
Question 2: How do you define “Intercultural Competence”?
Choose one answer for each statement from 5 to 1; 1 is “least agree with” and 5 is “most agree with”.
2 Intercultural Competence is: 1 2 3 4 5
a How to communicate interculturally with others.
b Non-judgmental communication with other cultures.
c A field of research that studies how people understand each other across group boundaries.
d It is how two different cultures relate to each other in terms
of differences and similarities.
e Analyzing and adapting ones behavior when interacting
with others.
Do you have another definition?
1 Culture is 1 2 3 4 5
a The geo-political aspects of a nation (e.g. history, geography, economics and political developments) b The artistic dimension (e.g. literature, music, art, etc.).
c Behavioral patterns of people (e.g. Customs, daily life, standard of living, religion, etc.).
d All three of the above.
Question 3: To what degree do you believe the following objectives are important for cultural teaching in EFL education?
3 “Culture teaching” is Not important
Somewhat important
Important Very important a Providing information about daily life
(e.g. social/political conditions) in English speaking countries.
b Promoting understanding of different process of individual and social interactions in English and Vietnamese culture.
c Developing a curious/ tolerant/
respectful/open attitude towards other cultures and cultural difference.
d Promoting the ability to acquire new cultural knowledge from documents/events from English cultures.
e Promoting the ability to conduct effective communication with English speaking people.
f Promoting the ability to understand and critically interpret documents/events from English speaking culture.
g Promoting awareness and understanding of different values, beliefs, and ideologies of both Vietnamese and English speaking people.
h Fostering students’ respect for world cultural diversity.
Question 4: Please rate your ability, knowledge, or willingness. ［ Please circle the answer ］ (0= Not at all, 1= Very low, 1=Low, 3=Average, 4=High, 5= Very high)
Not at all
Very
low Low Average High Very high a I am familiar with the cultural norms and
expectations of English culture (e.g., food, eating manner, clothing, greetings, public
0 1 2 3 4 5
behaviours, etc.).
b I can describe some important historical/social/political events that have shaped English cultures.
0 1 2 3 4 5
c I can contrast communicative behaviours of Vietnamese and English speaking people in social setting (e.g., family, school, office, etc.).
0 1 2 3 4 5
d I can describe the history of relationships between Vietnam and English speaking countries.
0 1 2 3 4 5
e I can describe how some events in Vietnam are perceived by people from English speaking countries.
0 1 2 3 4 5
f I am interested in knowing unfamiliar aspects of English culture (e.g., history, traditions, and people’s values, etc.).
0 1 2 3 4 5
g I am willing to understand differences between Vietnamese and English speaking people in their behaviors, values, and beliefs.
0 1 2 3 4 5
h I am interested in knowing the different ways that English speaking people see a particular event in Vietnam.
0 1 2 3 4 5
i I am willing to question my values and beliefs which are perceived differently by people from other cultures.
0 1 2 3 4 5
j I am able to identify how some misunderstandings happen in interactions between Vietnamese and English speaking people.
0 1 2 3 4 5
k While interacting with English speaking people, I adjust my behaviour, body language, and gesture according to what is considered appropriate by them.
0 1 2 3 4 5
m I am able to find out unfamiliar cultural information I come across in oral or written communication situations.
0 1 2 3 4 5
n Before I talk or write to English speaking people, I think about how they, with different cultural backgrounds, will feel about or react to what I am going to say or write.
0 1 2 3 4 5