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| TEACHING
CULTURE:
Problems & Solutions |
By Nada AbiSamra
(Based on "Teaching Language in Context" by Alice Omaggio Hadley & "Teaching Culture Strategies for Intercultural Communication" by H. Ned Seelye)
The Second problem teachers are facing is: Fear of Not Knowing Enough.
Teachers are afraid to teach culture because they fear that they don’t know enough about it, thinking that their role is only to impart facts.
Solution: Even if teachers’ own knowledge is quite limited, their proper role is not to impart facts, but to help students attain the skills that are necessary to make sense out of the facts they themselves discover in their study of the target culture. Then, the objectives that are to be achieved in cross-cultural understanding involve Processes rather than Facts. A "facts only" approach to culture for which the only goal is to amass bits of information is ineffective. Goals and objectives have to be set that relate not only to descriptive or analytical knowledge of facts, but also to procedural knowledgethat would enable students to observe and analyze cultural elements and patterns; after all, students should have the ability to react appropriately in any social situation, even those not previously studied.
Nada AbiSamra
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