Culture & SLA - Week 6 - Culture Learning Outcomes

Introduction: Hello and welcome to Week 6 of the course Culture and Second Language Aquisition. In this class we discuss Moran's framework for articulating the learning outcomes you seek to achieve when teaching culture and we begin to articulate our beliefs about our role as cultural educators.  

Today's Goals:

• Describe value orientations in Costa Rican culture and identify contrasting values.
• Discuss appropriate culture learning goals for different contexts.
• Articulate several core beliefs about how you see yourself as a cultural educator.
• Collaborate with your partners to brainstorm potential topics to explore in your Moxie paper.

Guiding Questions:

• How do economic and socio-historical factors influence cultural values of countries?
• How can I articulate and classify the aims of culture learning?
• How do I view myself as a cultural educator?

Task 1: Contrasting Values

Last week we studied Hofstede's 6 Dimensions of Culture that allow us to explore contrasting value orientations at a national level. Click your group link below and classify the values of Costa Rica in general and match them with their contrasting value pairs. When you finish, go on to pages two and three and discuss the prompts.

• Group 1: CLICK HERE
• Group 2: CLICK HERE
• Group 3: CLICK HERE
• Group 4: CLICK HERE
• Group 5: CLICK HERE

Theory Break: Cultural Values

• Moran identifies four categories of cultural perspectives (perceptions, beliefs, values, and attitudes) which he organizes in a continuum from tacit to explict. The most explicit category of perspectives are attitudes which are "visibly manifested in practices (p. 77)." On the far end of the spectrum are perceptions, the least visible category of perspectives.

• Perceptions: What we perceive, what we ignore; what we notice or disregard

• Beliefs: What we hold to be true or untrue

• Values: What we hold to be right/wrong, good/evil, desirable/undesirable, proper/improper, normal/abnormal, appropriate

• Attitudes: Our mental and affective dispositions - our frame of mind, our outlook - charged with feeling or emotion

Task 2: World Values Survey

The World Values Survey is a massive international research project that began in 1981. It consists of an extensive survey of the value orientations of individuals around the world in order to produce country level results. The survey seeks to contrast countries on two separate value dimensions or scales.

• Traditional Values vs Rational-Secular Values (y axis)
• Survival Values vs Self-Expression Values (x axis)

This allows the researchers to place countries in a coordinate system which creates a visual way to easily compare, contrast, and group different countries. Also, by comparing survey results of different years, researchers can chart how the values of a specific country change over time.

Click your assigned link below. Read the information with your partners and discussion the questions at the end. Be prepared to share your ideas when you return to the main room. 

• Exploring Traditional vs Rational Values Axis 
• CLICK HERE

• Exploring Survival vs Self-Expression Values
• CLICK HERE

Inglehart-Welzel World Culture Map

Instructions: Click the picture to view the full resolution image and discuss the questions below.

• Explore the map, which countries can you find at the extremes of each value dimension (axis)?
• What catches your attention about the way the countries cluster by geographic and socio-historical cultural regions?
• Where do you think Costa Rica would fall on this map? (WVS plans to include CR in the next value survey.)

Now watch the video that shows how these cultural areas have shifted over the last 40 years through different maps that have been created based on the survey results since it began in 1981. Discuss the questions below the video.

• Do you notice any general trends among the countries in the Latin American region?
• Watch the video again. This time focus your attention on France. How does this country's values orientation shift through the decades?
• Watch the video again. This time focus your attention on Mexico. How does this country's values orientation shift through the decades? What might explain this variation?

Task 3: Culture Learning Outcomes

Your reading this week focuses on the topic of culture learning outcomes; the different possible results of the culture learning process. Moran provides us with a useful way of classifying these outcomes which can help us choose a particular way of focusing our teaching efforts depending on our context. Click the group worksheet link below to explore the what, how, and why of the six culture learning outcomes.

• Group Worksheet: CLICK HERE

Theory Break: Culture Learning Outcomes

• “To generalize … across all these culture learning outcomes, I would say that all intend that learners confront, comprehend, accept, and overcome cultural differences. This process involves an interplay of mind, body, heart, and self - or, in technical terms, cognition, behavior, affect, and identity. As part of mastering the language, learners need to change the way they think, act, feel, and perceive themselves and their roles if they are to function effectively and appropriately in the other culture (p. 119).”

• The particular culture learning outcomes you seek for your students will inform the focus you give your lessons and the model of culture teaching you develop. Moran says, “the key distinction among [culture teaching]... models lies with differing notions of ‘overcoming’ cultural differences. These range from simply changing one’s mind or feelings about a given culture (culture-specific understanding) through recognizing how one’s own culture affects acceptance of other cultures (culture-general understanding), learning to communicate appropriately in a second language/culture (competence), integrating oneself into another language and culture (adaptation), developing a distinct sense of self (identity), to taking action to transform a culture based on one’s own beliefs (social change). Ultimately, the individual learner decides how to respond and develops skills as a culture learner (personal competence) (p. 119).

• Which of these outcomes resonate with you and the way you view yourself as a cultural educator?




• What beliefs about culture form part of your learning philosophy that guides your approach to teaching?

Task 4: Moxie Peer Brainstorming 

For homework you completed a brainstorming worksheet based on free-writing tasks and brief internet searches. Through this, you were able to identify 2-3 core ideas that you may want to explore in your Moxie paper. Take a moment to share the ideas you have with your partners. Give each other feedback and make suggestions of related concepts or ideas that your partners may want to consider including in their final paper. Take note of your partners' suggestions for you so that you do not forget.

• Guiding Question: Is your teaching purpose aligned with prevailing social and cultural values of the 21st Century?

Moxie Resource: Webinar

Since your Moxie umbrella topic requires you to explore your teaching purpose and the degree to which it is in alignment with modern cultural values, you will have to reflect on your deeply held beliefs about teaching and learning. This webinar by Dr. Neil J. Anderson from the 2021 National Conference for Teachers of English Costa Rica provides a practical workshop to identify and articulate your learning philosophy statement, another way of saying your teaching purpose. I hope you will find this to be a useful resource.

References:

Hofstede, G. (2011). Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede Model in Context. Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, 2(1). https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-0919.1014

Moran, P. (2001). Teaching Culture: Perspectices in Practice. Heinle, Cengage Learning. 

World Values Survey Association. (2020). Findings and Insights. World Values Survey. 

https://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/WVSContents.jsp