The Role of English Language Teaching in Intercultural Education Michael Byram Universities of Durham and Luxembourg

Purposes/Overview NOT techniques etc of language teaching BUT educational purposes of language teaching in European context Explain a new model of intercultural and democratic competence Consider relevance for language teaching 2

Axioms of language teaching FLT develops competence/skills AND education /understanding – i.e. ability to ‘speak about the world’ and ‘speak about self’ in new ways FLT teaches how to ‘speak about the world and self’ in new ways by learning how others use other languages to ‘speak about the world’ and ‘self’ - in ‘foreign languages’ 3

Europe ‘foreign’ languages – looking outwards European ‘foreign’ languages – some looking outwards (e.g. Chinese) and some inwards (e.g. German) – ELT looks outwards and inwards European Union – 28 states – economic and political Council of Europe – 47 states – cultural and Human Rights 4

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Europeans ‘old natives’ – people and languages/cultures (languacultures) ‘new natives’ – people and languages/cultures (languacultures) And conflicts among natives – There is something rotten in the state of Denmark/Europe’ – Hamlet What is to be done? – Intercultural not multicultural – White Paper on Intercultural Dialogue (2008) 6

A ‘framework’ for Intercultural and democratic competence Identify the skills, knowledge and attitudes needed for the intercultural dialogue AND democratic processes Based on ‘Common European Framework of Reference for Languages’ For schools – locations of economic AND moral/humanistic/democratic education 7

The timetable of the project [thanks to Prof Martyn Barrett] The project is taking place in four phases, from Developing a conceptual model of the competences which citizens require to participate effectively in democratic culture and intercultural dialogue (2014) Developing behavioural descriptors for each competence that is specified in the model – using the language of learning outcomes (2015) Scaling the descriptors – assigning the descriptors to different levels of proficiency ( ) Writing supporting documents - explaining how the competence model and the scaled descriptors can be used in curriculum design, pedagogy and assessment ( ) 8

The conceptual model For the purposes of the framework, we have defined ‘competence’ as: The ability to mobilise and deploy relevant values, attitudes, skills, knowledge and understanding in order to respond appropriately and effectively to the demands, difficulties and opportunities that are presented by democratic and intercultural situations Not designed from scratch – instead, grounded in an analysis of existing conceptual schemes of democratic competence and intercultural competence 9

Core goal to construct a model for use in educational planning, THEREFORE all of the competences should be: – Teachable – Learnable – Assessable (through either self-assessment or assessment by others) Applying these (and other) criteria led to the identification of 20 competences for inclusion in the model 20 competences → 4 categories: values, attitudes, skills, and knowledge and critical understanding 10

Values Values are general beliefs that individuals hold about the desirable goals that should be striven for in life 3 sets of values necessary for democratic culture and intercultural dialogue: – Valuing other human beings, human dignity and human rights – Valuing cultural difference, diversity and cultural otherness – Valuing democracy, justice, fairness, equality and the rule of law 11

Attitudes An attitude is the overall mental orientation which an individual adopts towards someone or something (e.g., a person, a group, an institution, an issue, an event, a symbol, etc.) Attitudes – 4 components: – belief or opinion about the object of the attitude – emotion or feeling towards the object – evaluation (either positive or negative) of the object – tendency to behave in a particular way towards that object 12

6 attitudes for democratic culture and intercultural dialogue: – Openness to cultural otherness and to other beliefs, world views and practices – Respect for other people, beliefs, world views and practices – Civic-mindedness – Responsibility – Self-efficacy – Tolerance for ambiguity 13

Skills A skill is the capacity for carrying out complex, well-organised patterns of either thinking or behaviour in an adaptive manner in order to achieve a particular end or goal 8 sets of skills for democratic culture and intercultural dialogue: – Autonomous learning skills – Analytical and critical thinking skills – Skills of listening and observing – Empathy and decentring – Flexibility and adaptability – Linguistic, communicative and plurilingual skills – Cooperation skills – Conflict-resolution skills 14

Knowledge and critical understanding Knowledge is the body of information that is possessed by a person, while understanding is the comprehension and appreciation of meanings knowledge and critical understanding required for democratic culture and intercultural dialogue: – Knowledge and critical understanding of the self – Knowledge and critical understanding of language and communication – Knowledge and critical understanding of the world (including politics, law, human rights, culture, cultures, religions, history, media, economies, the environment and sustainability) 15

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Use for practice (like the CEFR) FOR EXAMPLE -- for historians or mathematicians Clarify aims – how my subject creates intercultural can democratic competence and objectives – how I can plan the learning outcomes 17

Language teachers Use existing models of intercultural competence Examples of teaching intercultural competence already exist AND new experiments show how language teaching can be combined with citizenship education …. EXAMPLE (S) …. 18

Green Kidz project Green Kidz: Young learners engage in intercultural environmental citizenship in English language classroom in Argentina and Denmark. Melina Porto, Petra Daryai-Hansen, María Emilia Arcuri and Kira Schifler In: Byram, Golubeva, Han and Wagner (eds) Education for Intercultural Citizenship – Principles in Practice. Multilingual Matters (forthcoming)

Participants and aims Learners in Argentina and in Denmark - learning English (ages 10-12) – connected by internet Aims: THINKING encouraging children to explore and reflect on environmental issues - globally and locally understand environmental issues and how to recognize them in their own surroundings, challenge taken-for-granted representations of the environment, ACTING engage in trash sorting and recycling practices, contribute to improving the environment in their local communities = ACTION IN THE COMMUNITY 20

Activities STAGE 1 – DISCOVER ABOUT ‘US’ AND PREPARE FOR ’THEM’ Pupils identified green crimes in their schools and in their communities and drew or video-taped these crimes. trash analysis listing, classifying and sorting trash in waste bins in schools STAGE 2 – PRESENT ‘US’ TO ‘THEM’ AND COMPARE compared and discussed results using a wiki. survey among family members, friends, etc. about their environmental habits - compared on wiki analyzed critically (audio) visual media images and texts, produced in Argentina and in Denmark, STAGE 3 – WORK TOGETHER – IN ‘US AND THEM’ GROUP collaboratively online using skype and wiki (ie Argentinean and Danish pupils in mixed groups) designed advertisements to raise awareness of environmental issues 21

Using the internet to share understanding Argentina/ Argentina/

Action in the community STAGE 4 – FOCUS AGAIN ON ‘US’ AND ACTING … Argentine pupils: created videos and songs and shared in facebook page were interviewed by a local journalist and got the collaborative posters published in local newspaper, designed a “pasacalles” (banner) and hung in the school street. 23

Falklands / Malvinas Project Citizenship education for a culture of peace: The case of the Malvinas/Falklands project in language teaching in Higher Education Melina Porto & Leticia Yulita In: Byram, Golubeva, Han and Wagner (eds) Education for Intercultural Citizenship – Principles in Practice. Multilingual Matters (forthcoming)

The Malvinas/Falklands War (1982): An opportunity for citizenship education in the foreign language classroom in Argentina and the UK 50 Argentinean university students of English (CEFR C1) AND 50 UK students of Spanish (Honours) AIMS – THINKING encouraging STUDENTS to explore and reflect on historical issues – nationally and internationally understand historical issues and how to analyse them in national and international context, challenge taken-for-granted assumptions about history AIMS – ACTING Research (historical documents – newspapers, interviews …) Communicate with people about historical issues – from international perspective 25

Activities STAGE 1 – DISCOVER ABOUT ‘US’ AND PREPARE FOR ’THEM’ researched newspapers, talked with parents, created PPTs about the war STAGE 2 – PRESENT ‘US’ TO ‘THEM’ AND COMPARE communicated synchronically and diachronically (wiki and Elluminate) interviewed Argentine and English war veteran - created blogs/facebook pages and noting reactions STAGE 3 – WORK TOGETHER – IN ‘US AND THEM’ GROUP collaboratively created leaflets etc to show both national perspectives and reconciliation

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‘Action in the Community’ STAGE 4 Distributed leaflets taught special class in English language school taught class with NGO in poor neighbourhood [youtube] ETC Melina Porto (2014): Intercultural citizenship education in an EFL online project in Argentina, Language and Intercultural Communication, DOI: /

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Language Teaching Therefore, we have ideas in language teaching to combine languages and citizenship / action in improving the community BUT there is a need to examine how languages look outwards AND inwards into our own societies (in Europe) Understanding others in and beyond our societies – understand is NOT accept/condone – ‘jaw jaw, not war, war.’ (Churchill) [talk not fight] 31

Relevance for/comparison with China? Europe and China have languages within frontiers ‘intercultural dialogue’ is both outward looking and within frontiers Teaching intercultural competence - transferable to dialogue with all groups inside and outside frontiers (using any language) 32

Conclusion QUESTION: How to implement new model in all subjects? LANGUAGE TEACHERS Teaching ICC = education for intercultural and democratic competence /citizenship Language teachers as pioneers (also working with other teachers) …. 33

A third axiom foreign language education is a social phenomenon which has societal improvement as one of its goals. 34

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