INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCE L5

EGL Activity 1-5 - GROUP DISCUSSION

Intercultural competence

1- What is “Intercultural Competence” (I.C.)?

It is the ability to develop targeted knowledge, skills and attitudes that lead to visible behaviour and communication that are both effective and appropriate in intercultural interactions

2- Is I.C. important for comunication?

Of course, it is. If someone does not have intercultural competence, he or she will have difficulties to communicate with other people around the world.

3- How does I.C. relate to identity? 

Identity negotiation is a process in which a person negotiates with society at large regarding the meaning of his or her identity, and it may arise from the learning of social roles through personal experience, and through a variety of identity formation strategies. Therefore, your intercultural competence may be decisive to shape your identity.

Intercultural competence.Activity 2-5

1- How does I.C. relate to the use of a language as a lingua franca? 

I.C. competence is an asset in general communication, but particularly for immigrants and international students.

2- How would you include I.C. in your teaching of English as a global language?

If possible, I would try that my students establish real conversations with people from other countries. For instance, we could use skype in class.

Intercultural competence. Activity 3-5:

1. Describe an example of exercise, or unit, from a book, dealing with intercultural competence.

The exercicses presented have been taken from a unit names “Around the world” which has been created by us for another subject. The first activity presented consists of watching a video, concretely a piece of news on multiculturalism, which contains some racist messages and answering the questions after watching it. Afterwars, students will debate in groups or together with the whole class about the content of the video and about the situation in Spain or in their own high school, so they can relate the ideas presented to their real world. Once the debate is done, we will move on answering more questions about the topic that will help them develop their critical thinking skills.

1.Watch the video and answer the questions

1. Which are the main facts from the piece of news? 
2. Which is the school community’s response to the racist messages? 
3. How do coloured students feel about it? 
4. Why did some students take the day off? 

2. Is this situation likely to happen in Spain? Debate in groups. 

3. Answer these questions in groups:

1. What is racism? 
2. What causes racism? 
3. How to fight racism?

2. In your opinion, has the subject been dealt with appropriately? Explain why it has or it has not. 

This Didactic Unit will consist of three different lessons, even if we have just presented one here, in which we will work on different topics, all of them related to globalization. The lesson presented above has focused on racism,and the other ones not visible here talk about stereotypes and travelling. Once having explained this, we think the subject has been dealt appropriately because different topics dealing with interculturality have been presented to the students and moreover, every lesson will work on different skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking and grammar and vocabulary).

Firstly, the video and its questions will help students to activate previous knowledge on the topic of racism, to practice the listening skill aided by subtitles and to encourage critical thinking. Secondly, the debate question is designed to open the students’ minds and incite thems into a debate that encourages freedom of speech in the class and the last activity will help them to go deeper into the social issues and research about the real causes of this type of problem.

3- How would you present/include it in your teaching?

In order to introduce this lesson to the students, we would need to be very careful so none can feel threatened, most importantly if some of the students in the classroom come from countries that are not Spain. We think the best way to introduce the topic would be that the teacher presented it a little bit before starting doing the activities so they would know what they’d encounter.

In order to do so different methodologies should be used. We have decided to promote a kind of cooperative learning by putting into practise some debate activities and group assignments. In addition, we will also be using a CLIL methodology as one of our objectives is working on some transversal elements through each of our lessons at the same time they use the language to communicate their ideas.


Intercultural competence. Activity 4-5:

EXCHANGE PROGRAM 

You have organised an exchange with a school in another country. 

During their visit, the students attend each other's school and stay at each other's homes.

1. Describe the general terms of the arrengement, i.e.: country, age and academic level of students, length of the stay, who is visiting who this time, and any other detail you may consider relevant.

Students will be going to Ireland and Irish students will be coming to Spain in order to do an exchange and to learn both groups their L2 languages. The age of the students will be between 15 and 16 years old and the Spanish students will be in 4^th ESO in a public school with a medium socio-economic level. 27 students will take part in this exchange each one of them with different live experiences and a different English level.

LEVEL: A2, 4th ESO
AGE: 15-16
COUNTRY: IRELAND, DUBLIN

We will go to Ireland, concretely to Dublin because we think it is not a really big city, it has a lot of things to do and there are many places to visit there. Moreover, there are a lot of students going there to study English and so they will be able to meet people from different countries.

We will stay in Ireland during the first two weeks of July because students will have already finished with the academic year and students will stay in a host family so they can really see how people live there and apart from that, it will be much more cheaper than a hotel.

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During the stay we will do different trips around the country, as for example to cliffs of Moher, that are one of the most famous cliffs in the world.

As the Irish students came to Spain during the last academic course now is the turn of our students to go to Ireland to learn English. It is important to mention that the level of the students goes between A2 and B1, and as the “Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment” (CEFR) establishes they should be able to

‘Understand sentences and frequently used expressions related to areas of most immediate relevance (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment). They can communicate in simple and routine tasks requiring a simple and direct exchange of information on familiar and routine matters, and also they can describe in simple terms aspects of his/her background, immediate environment and matters in areas of immediate need’. (CEFR)

2. How would you prepare your students prior to the visit, bearing in mind the above set of conditions.

WORK ON MATERIALS ABOUT IRISH CULTURE.
FOSTER LISTENING AND SPEAKING- SONGS, FILMS-

Bearing in mind the conditions explained in the previous section, we think that the best way to prepare students to go abroad is to work on the unit “Around the world” just before they travel and also to include some working materials, videos or films about the Irish culture and history so they feel a little bit more comfortable when they arrive.

Moreover, although as English teachers should foster all the different skills that an L2 has ( writing, reading, listening and speaking) we think it is really important to specially foster speaking and listening skills during the two previous months before the exchange, forgetting a little bit about essays and making them do research or the same type of activities but presenting them in front of the classroom, using realia, as for example real songs or films, so their sense of hearing is a little bit more prepared than it would be without doing it. 

Didactic unit: "Life skills: work & career"

Didactic unit

In order to fulfil the needs of the all the different students (ADHD, gifted students and students who are repeating the course), we will adapt some of the activities of the didactic unit we have been assigned, which is “Life skills: work & career”.

Ice-breaker activity

Number these inventions in order from 1 (you could not live without it) to 8 (you could easily live without it). (We use the warm-up activity that appears in the book, adapting it for the different students).

• For gifted children: They will have to number the inventions from 1 (they could not live without it) to 8 (they could easily live without it). Then, they have to explain why.
  With this activity, they will have to explain their choices, reflecting on what they like and what interest them.
• For ADHD students: They will just have to number the inventions (from 1 to 8), deciding which are more necessary for them to live.
  They will have to follow less instructions, focusing only on whether the inventions are indispensable for them to live.
• Students who are repeating the course: They will have to number the inventions in order of preference and they will also have to explain which is their use.
  Students will have to develop their knowledge, using the contents they already know.

Vocabulary activity

Write natural or manufactured for each material. Check your answers in pairs.

• For gifted children, we will adapt the activity saying that they have to describe the process of creating an object, including the materials, the different stages, etc. For example, how to create a cotton t-shirt.
  With this activity, they can be creative and we encourage them to think and design, developing their advanced skills.
• For ADHD students, they have to draw one object made of natural material (for example, wood) and one object made of manufactured materials (for example, plastic).
  This activity is appropiate for them because it is simple, the instructions are easy to follow so they will focus better on the activity.
• For those students who are repeating the course, they have to think of five natural materials and five manufactured ones.
  Since those students have already seen the unit, with this activity they can remember what they learned in previous years and can increase their vocabulary about this topic

Grammar activity

Complete the sentences with the passive forms of the verbs in brackets. (In order to study the grammar of the unit (present simple passive), we have adapted one of the activities from the book to the different needs of the students).

• For gifted children, we will give them sentences with gaps and the verbs (in the infinitive form) apart, and they have to match the sentences with the verbs, and put the verbs in the present simple passive tense.
  This activity increases the level of difficulty because they necessarily have to understand the sentences and they have to conjugate the verbs.
• For ADHD students, we will give them the same sentences with the gaps but giving them the verb the verb to the corresponding sentence, in the infinitive form.
  This activity is less demanding because they just have to conjugate the verbs, so they receive less instructions.
• For those students who are repeating the course, we give them some verbs in the infinitive form and they have to create sentences in the present simple passive, using those verbs.
  Since they have already studied this grammar point, they should be able to create new sentences using this verbal tense.

Listening activity

Listen to someone describing the process in the diagram. Match each stage a-f below to the correct picture. We have adapted the one that appears in the book:

• For gifted children: they have to listen to the audio in which the production process of an object is described, and then they have to describe the next step of production. For example, when the product arrives to the shops and costumbers buy it.
  In this activity, they have to be creative again, and think about how would they sell the product.
• For ADHD students, we will give them sentences that appear in the audio, containing gaps. They will have to fill the gaps, according to what they have listened to.
  They just have to pay attention to the audio and they just have to write one word, so they can be more concentrated.
• For the students who are repeating the course, we will give them some questions related to the audio and they will have to write short answers about it.
  They will have to pay more attention to the audio, being aware of the details and using more vocabulary.

STAGES:

• Pellets are sent to companies.
• Ethylene and propylene are heated to make a polymer.
• The oil is processed at a refinery. Ethylene and propylene are produced.
• The polymer is made into small balls called pellets.
• Oil is extracted from the ground.

Writing activity

You are going to write a review of a piece of technology you own. It could be a tablet, a computer, a smartphone, a games console or something else. (We also adapt the activity that the book proposes, in order to fulfill all the needs of the students).

WRITE ABOUT A TECHNOLOGICAL DEVICE.

• For gifted students: They will have to write a review about a technological device. We won't give them any instructions regarding structure, vocabulary, etc. REVIEW.
  They will have to be imaginative and creative, and plan their writing on their own, structuring the information, using new vocabulary,, etc.
• For ADHD students: They will have to do the same as the gifted students, but we will give them the instructions to follow, including the structure, vocabulary they may use, possible verbs, useful connectors, etc. REVIEW WITH HELP 
  They will only have to think about the device, and follow the instructions we give them.
• For the students who are repeating the course: They will have to compare one technological device that they have, with one owned by a friend of them. We won't give them any instructions. COMPARISON
  They will have to remember the vocabulary they already knew, including more words, and the extension of the writing will be a bit longer.

Final project

In order to work on the contents they have studied in this unit, students will develop a final project. This final project will consist on the real manufacturing of a product, which will be divided in two parts: The theoretical part will be the description of the process, including all the fases of production (using the vocabulary and different verbs they have learned during the unit), and the practical part will consist on building the product at a small scale. For example, a small table using pieces of wood and glue.

Students will be divided in groups by the teacher, in order to favour the inclusion of all the students. We will allow them to work freely, organising themselves when dividing the work. However, the teacher must pay attention to this aspect and intervene if necessary, because the needs of the gifted, ADHD and repeater students may not be fulfilled.

Noam Chomsky

The Universal Chomsky

As part of the collaborative project 'The other side of Linguistics' about some different theories and linguists with the rest of our classmates, we confined a short power point presentation about the linguistic theories by Chomsky:

In order to understand the triviality of Chomsky's vision of linguistic theories, we went through the five main previous theories (Contrastive Analysis; Error Analysis; Interlanguage Theory; Morpheme Order Studies; Monitor Model) and explained which were their wrong points, or which served as inspiration for Chomsky.

Then, we went on with the main points of his Universal Grammar, and finally explained the consequences it had and the criticism it received.

Even though it was much criticised, every new theory contributes positively to the linguistic discipline since it causes more research into that particular aspect. Therefore, we are highly thankful to his work in linguistics.

Happy Birthday Chomsky!!

Happy Birthday Chomsky!!

It was funny how we were all having breakfast together, when Esther received a notification to her mobile phone and stated happily that it was Chomsky's birthday.


He has become 88 years old now and we send him best wishes from Valencia :)

Chomsky: political activist

Chomsky: from linguist to political activist

In recent years, the most studied linguist in our degree has gone into politics, since he feels very disappointed with the political, economical and social situation of his country.

He has also participated in the production of a film that shows on the big screen the hypocrisy of the American people and how they doomed American dream.

He has participated in many debates and has made many speeches warning people about the danger of electing Trump as president of the United States. He defines Trump's election: "Almost death knell for the human species".