Comunichiamo

The Journal of AsiaTEFL, 2020

International conference KNOWLEDGE-BASED ORGANIZATION, 2018

There has been an increase in the importance of the cultural aspect in teaching and learning foreign languages, and teachers nowadays are supposed to stimulate the acquisition and development of intercultural competence in their students. Foreign language teaching and learning should be regarded from an intercultural perspective. The foreign language classes can be the link between the two cultures by which students have the opportunity to discover other values, mentalities, and facets of life. In doing this, a new vision should be taken into consideration, in which the teacher naturally and harmoniously combines the linguistic and cultural elements in the educational process during all types of lessons, irrespective of the topic being dealt with, or whether they focus on grammar or vocabulary issues. The culture and civilization notions must not be regarded separately, but should be integrated in the activities meant to develop the four language skills. This paper highlights the ro...

Being able to understand another person’s viewpoint is essential for effective communication. Intercultural communication studies serve to prepare instructors for the complexity of the modern L2 classroom by identifying how cultural differences influence the teaching and learning in the classroom and by suggesting possible methods and approaches to improve L2 instruction and acquisition. This paper presents a brief background on the influence of culture on language, the benefits of studying L2 for cultural acquisition, the importance of recognizing different cultural motivations for L2 acquisition, intercultural differences that lead to misunderstandings and poor learning/teaching, the prevalence of ethnocentrism, and lastly, methods and approaches that may be useful in second language teaching. Since learning about culture requires an intellectual effort, perhaps the L2 teachers’ most difficult task is balancing the need to learn about a language with the need to learn the language itself.

The Reading Matrix: An International Online Journal, 2022

Cypriot Journal of Educational Sciences

This research aimed to study and design the formation of intercultural competencies in language education classes at the university. The quantitative research method was used. The research was carried out in the spring term of 2021–2022. 198 volunteer students who continue their education in schools participated in the research and 4 weeks of online training were given to the students. The ‘language and proficiency’ measurement tool developed by the researchers and compiled by experts in the field was used in this study. The measurement tool was delivered to the students online and then collected. The analysis of the data was made by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences programme, frequency analysis and t-test; the results are added to the research in the form of tables. According to the results obtained, it was concluded that students' proficiency in language education classes and their intercultural status were high. While this situation was determined as good for...

The purpose of this study is to discover the perceptions of language instructors who teach English at the School of Foreign Languages, Gazi University, about textbooks' content in terms of ICC. The present study is based on the analysis of language instructors' perspectives gathered through a questionnaire in 2012-2013 academic year. The data were obtained by conducting 'Teaching Materials Evaluation Guide' with 20 items. As a result of the present research, it was found that language instructors think textbook series of English for Life is not sufficient to enhance language learners' intercultural competence through its content. Concerning the components of Intercultural Communicative Competence, the results of sections which are related with attitudes, knowledge and intercultural awareness indicate that language instructors believe sub-dimensions of ICC are not included in the units of the textbooks. Özet Bu çalışma Gazi Üniversitesi, Yabancı Diller Yüksekokulunda İngilizce öğreten dil okutmanlarının Kültürlerarası İletişimsel Yeterlilik açısından ders kitabı içeriği konusunda bakış açılarını araştırmıştır. Çalışma 2012-2013 akademik yılında dil okutmanlarından anket ile alınan bakış açılarının analizine dayanmaktadır. Çalışmaya ilişkin veriler, 20 maddelik 'Öğretim Materyalleri Değerlendirme Rehberi' ile elde edilmiştir. Çalışmanın sonucunda, 'English for Life' isimli ders kitabını öğretim materyali olarak kullanan okutmanlara göre ders kitabının içeriğinin öğrencilerin Kültürlerarası İletişimsel yeterliliklerini artıracak yeterlilikte olmadığını düşündükleri bulunmuştur. Kültürlerarası İletişimsel Yeterliliğin bileşenlerinden tutum, bilgi ve kültürlerarası farkındalık ile ilgili olan bölümlerin sonuçları dil okutmanlarının Kültürlerarası İletişimsel Yeterliliğin alt dallarının ders kitabı içeriğinde sunulmadığını düşündüklerini göstermektedir.

International Journal of English Language & Translation Studies, 2014

The development of learners' communicative competence has been regarded as the major goal of foreign and second language teaching. Several authors have advanced various communicative models in order to better explain how language teaching and learning work (e.g. Canale & Swain, 1980; Canale, 1983; Bachman, 1990; Celce-Murcia et al. 1995; Usó-Juan & Martínez-Flor 2006). One of the elements of the communicative model is that of intercultural competence (Byram, 1997; Usó-Juan & Martínez-Flor, 2008). This competence has been defined by Meyer (1991, p. 137) as "the ability of a person to behave adequately in a flexible manner when confronted with actions, attitudes and expectations of representatives of foreign cultures". Cultural dimensions play a paramount role in learners' learning process; however, there is not apparently a particular approach for its integration in the language classroom. Taken into account those aspects, in this paper, I attempt to provide an instructional approach for the integration of culture in the language classroom so as to foster learners' communicative competence. The present paper presents first a revision of different communicative models, then, a description of the notion intercultural competence is provided. Finally, an instructional approach for the teaching of this particular competence is proposed.

Languages are seen to be existing in watertight self sufficient compartments which share a relation of mutual interference than of an aid. While CUP (Common Underlying Proficiency) (Cummins, 1983) proposes that languages share a mutual space developing a common ‘conceptual attributes’ as a result of interaction between languages. This when put into practice defeats the popular argument of English only classrooms that criminalize the use of L1 which thereby handicaps the learner by restricting the access to a great resource of learning, i.e., L1. The paper proposes that L1 can be a valuable pedagogic resource in an ESL classroom. It discusses the study in using L1 in ESL writing classroom as a cognitive resource.