Culture: The fifth Skill

Blog about: TEACHING CULTURE IN THE LESSON
By Lilliana Castro
Culture: The fifth Skill
For this homework, we did not only have the opportunity to plan a lesson developing the cultural component, we also had the chance to visit another school and see other way of working, organizing and teaching, other culture into a school different than mine. The first step of the task was sharing the lessons plan in order to enrich our points of view, in order words, to give a kind of feedback, and in my case was very useful because my peer teacher Angie Zeledón mentioned that I had problems with my objectives because they were focused only in English language and the cultural aspect was not relevant enough into them so I wondered “but this has been happening during all these thirteen years working as a teacher and one classmate can synthesis all my problems in just one skimming”. Wonderful! When I visited Teacher Angie Zeledón ‘s school YURUSTI the first thing that caught my attention was that this school is surrounded by green areas, where children can play soccer, have a picnic, take a walk or stay in the outside during the break. Another aspect that was very impressive was how teachers can work in the middle of those children. They are so young about four or five years old, twenty-one students in the same classroom at the same time? But Angie told me that everybody has its own ability because she can`t imagine herself working with teenagers because they are difficult to manage. But I was wondering the same with those little kids. She (Angie) is a pre- school teacher in a private institution located in Santo Domingo in Heredia. When she was doing her activities, the song, showing the pictures, the discussion in class and the closure of the lesson, at the end one student was asking to himself: “Where does his juice could come from?” After the class this little child got curiosity about his belongings; he thought that the things that surrounded him came from different countries (or other planets he said) and were people doing things for him. When I heard that big conclusion everything got perspective for me, I know that I do not have the enough knowledge and basics of English and research skills to be taking this Master’s degree, also when you got a tenure you are so conform and the result is that you get conformist! Then you say to yourself “I do not need to pass the TOIEC test, I do not need to get involved in educating because I just teach the ABC’s”. But always human beings’ generosity appears and during this course something has changed and I am starting to believe that I do not teach English; I am an educator and I teach culture.

CULTURE IS MORE THAN KNOWLEDGE

She said that German people still have into their minds the wall. It is a real, an ideologist from Algeria said onto the context of the Argelian independece process from France "first we have to set free our minds before getting independence". Most of the time, buildings, structures could disappear but the damaged is done and it is into our minds. Socities could change but their citizens are not changing their feelings, behavoirs or toughts as quick as it is required. khalil Gibran the poet wrote about this "...If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand forehead. You cannot erase it by burning your lawbook nor by washing the forehead of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them. And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed..." Our behavoir is really determine by culture environment.

MULTICULTURAL VRS IDENTITY

WE LEARN FROM DIFFERENT CULTURES

BUT WE ARE NOT MULTICULTURAL

– WE HAVE AN IDENTITY

Identity is defined as the state of remaining the same the condition of being oneself and not another, the sense of self. Learning from other cultures will modify, enhance and influence myself, will change me. But there is a root that will accept all the aspects mentioned before putting everything in perspective from my own identity.

WE ARE NOT TEACHERS WE ARE EDUCATORS

IT IS A MATTER OF BEING A ROLE MODEL,
GETTING INVOLVE GETTING INTO !

After thirteen year of teaching English I realized why I love this job. Not only do I have the wonderful opportunity to know different people working with
children....I have had the opportunity, over the years, to actually MAKE A CHANGE with several students and I truly enjoyed the experience with each
and every student and our goal to go beyond

It is not only to study and learn. It is also to internalized, understand that we are part of this society and we have to take care of it.
Why? Because, we can change and improve our world, to make it better. When we will become compromised citizens of the world it is going to be an the opportunity of a lifetime! It is going to be a matter of being a role model.

CULTURE INSTEAD OF ENGLISH

During these 13 years I realized that I am not teaching English I AM TEACHING STUDENTS A LANGUAGE USE IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO EXPRESS. The main purpose of learning a second language is communication. Nevertheless, many students are surprised when they realized that, in spite of having a perfect dominion of the L2 grammar rules, they have difficulties at interpersonal level when establishing a conversation with native speakers. Thus CULTURE constitutes a fundamental element of language ability for L2 learners. However we as teachers often overlook culture, due to the difficulty of its teaching and instead of focus on the cultural aspects of the language.

Our global students expect to open their minds and hearts to people from all over the world. They have to be aware that learning other language is a great opportunity for them and their families to learn about other cultures and customs as well as sharing their own, but it also gives to them a new opportunity to see and appreciate our diverse city, customs and lifestyle through the eyes of a global student. It is a time for both the educator and the students to 'Discover' new cultures, 'Learn' new ideas, 'Teach' each other and 'Accept' one another for who we are.

TEACHING ENGLISH INTO A DYNAMIC CULTURE

Why Teaching if I was studying Social Work?
Easy there couldn’t be any way of working with permanent changes, surprises and challenges such as in this field.

Culture for me is the way we human beings do the definition of our specie and teaching the way we share our knowledge with humanity.

In my opinion the manner of perceiving life is; here and right now. My philosophy is moving and life is knocking at my door. We humans, have the power to do wonderful and amazing things for ourselves and others.

For example this space I hope to share with all of you the issues, points of view, definitions, experiences that will happen during this trip, taking the course LANGUAGE TARGET AND CULTURE at the National University in Costa Rica into the master’s degree program.