Teacher’s perception of and difficulties in teaching cultural components in "Active skills for reading 2"

508 TEACHER’S PERCEPTION OF AND DIFFICULTIES IN TEACHING CULTURAL COMPONENTS IN ACTIVE SKILLS FOR READING 2 Hoàng Kim Mai Khôi, Nguyễn Phƣơng Thảo Khoa tiếng Anh, Trường Đại học Công Nghệ TP. Hồ Chí Minh (HUTECH) TÓM TẮT Currently, various cultural elements are divergently presented in English coursebooks, which raises the question of how teachers can lecture them. Actually, perceiving the evaluation and difficulties of teaching culture in ELT materials from educator‘s perspective has received inadequate consideration. Concerning these gaps in the literature, an investigation into teachers‘ attitudes towards teaching culture in an ELT coursebook is critical. The data used for this study were collected through questionnaires with one participant. From the analysis, it can be concluded that a major proportion of ASR2 is characterised by the cultural perspective called an accomplished fact, and a future competence. Interesting, these components appear in the reading passages and many different parts of the book. Besides, the interviewed teacher encountered no difficulties in teaching such elements, as she could ask the students to search for information before class or she could provide further information in class. However, the challenge she faced was related to the diverse background of the students. Specifically, those who come from rural areas and had little interaction with English made it harder for her to explain these elements. This also suggests some implications for teachers when teaching cultural elements in particular and teaching reading in general. Từ khóa: Cultural components, cultural perspectives, material evaluation, teacher‘s perception, teaching reading. 1. INTRODUCTION Although cultural perspectives are the heart of language teaching, there exists a debate on what cultural elements are included, and how they are presented in ELT coursebooks (Hurst, 2014). Moreover, what to teach is not as important as how to pontificate about them. However, perceiving the evaluation and difficulties of teaching culture in ELT materials from the educators‘ perception has received insufficient consideration. Studies also have shown that instructors encounter difficulties teaching such elements, particularly in Viet Nam (Ho, 2011; Nguyen, 2013). Hence, regarding such literature gaps, an investigation into teachers‘ attitudes towards teaching culture in an ELT coursebook is considered necessary. Especially in the researchers‘ teaching context, it is observed that cultural knowledge is not frequently mentioned in reading classes, which can affect students‘ improvement and performance. Particularly, in foundation courses, such as Reading 1, the coursebook being used, Active Skills for Reading 2 (Anderson, 2013), is claimed to provide learners with authentic, new and engaging topics. The understanding of cultural elements is therefore, considered to be necessary for students. With this in mind, this present study investigated the perception of a teacher at HUTECH, aiming to (1) identify her perception on the presentation of culture components, (2) investigate the difficulties of 509 teaching cultural elements and (3) provide further suggestion for teaching cultural components in Active Skills for Reading 2 (ASR2). From these objectives, two research questions are: – What is the HUTECH teacher‘s perception of the presentation of cultural components in ASR2? – What are difficulties teachers might encounter when teaching the cultural components in ASR2? 2. LITERATURE REVIEW Within the scope of this study, the researchers applied the definition of Murphy (1986) and Mishan (2000) and Tornberg‘s two perspectives of culture (Tornberg, 2000, cited in Pervan, 2011). 2.1. Definition of culture In this study, the researchers employed the concepts of ‗culture with a small c‘ and ‗culture with a capital C‘. While the former ―refers to the norms, values, standards by which people act, and it includes the ways distinctive in each society of ordering the world and rendering it intelligible‖ (Murphy, 1986, p. 14), the latter is concerned with ―intellectual refinement and artistic achievement of a society, its literature, art and music‖ (Mishan, 2005, p. 45). These definitions encompass primary components of a culture. 2.2. Tornberg’s three perspectives of culture As culture is a complicated abstract concept, its analysis has raised many debates amongst the scholars in this field. Within the scope of this paper, the framework suggested by Tornberg is adopted, as the notion of culture is evaluated in its relationship with students‘ culture and their understanding of culture in general (2000, p. 40). Initially, Kramsch (1985, 1993) and Lange (1999) have stated that culture, as one of the goals of language education, should reflect the target culture (hereby C2) and provide learners chances to bridge the gap between C2 and the native language (hereby C1) (cited in Orugo, 2008, p. 40). From this approach, Tornberg (2000) (cited in Pervan, 2011) developed a framework in which culture in language textbook is perceived from the three following perspectives: (1) an accomplished fact, (2) a future competence, and (3) a meeting in the third place. (1) refers to the presentation of C2 in the target language. (2) is about intercultural competence of learners. (3) aims to indicate ―learners‘ cultural experiences they have had when faced with different people and cultures‖ (Pervan, 2011, p.18). While the first two categories focus on the subjective analysis of the material users, the last one presents the characters in the texts without specifying their identity. However, within the context of this study, the coursebook is employed at HUTECH, where all of the students are from the same country, and its target cultures are English speaking countries. Therefore, only the (1) and (2) perspectives are applied in this paper. The definition and description of these elements, according to Tornberg (2000), are as follow: 1. Historical and geographical facts: include texts that contain facts about countries, cities and historical happenings (e.g. the moon landing). 2. Artefacts: refer to cultural products that reflect the esthetical perspective on culture such as theatre, canonized culture and typical dishes. 3. Collective descriptions: a part of macro themes that deal with everyday life and lifestyles ascribed to a group of people. Stereotypes in texts are regarded as a part of this subcategory. 4. Cultural preparation: texts that are intended as practice for future communication with people who speak the target language in order to prevent possible disagreement and confusion. 510 5. Comparison between cultures: deal with comparison and urges the students to make a comparison between traditions in an English-speaking country and their home culture is an example of texts regarded into this sub-category. 3. RESEARCH METHOD 3.1. Participants A Vietnamese lecturer at HUTECH was asked to complete a written, paper-based questionnaire via email. The sampling method was convenience sampling, since this lecturer has been teaching English at HUTECH for 10 years, and has a close relationship with the researchers. 3.2. Instrument of data collection For gathering data from the participant, a paper-based questionnaire was designed. The questions were devised based on Tornberg‘s perspectives of culture, and consisted of 5 open-ended questions embedded in 2 main themes: an accomplished fact and a future competence. The focal points of these questions are the teacher‘s perception towards and difficulties in teaching the culture components presented in the coursebook. The items in the questionnaire are as follows: Figure 1. Items of culture components employed in the questionnaire 3.3. Procedures Due to time constraints and the unavailability of the teacher, the participants of this study were asked to participate in an informal paper-based questionnaire. Two weeks before the final analysis of the data, an email was sent to the participant, asking her to complete 2 open-ended sections with 5 sub-sections in each part, of which the definitions of key items were clearly defined. The questionnaire was sent via email so that the participant could feel comfortable doing it. The answers from the email would be used for further analysis of the teacher attitudes. Also, if there had been any vague or insufficient information from the email, the researchers would have contacted the respondent for further clarification. 4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 4.1. Teachers’ perception of culture components 4.1.1. An accomplished fact The cultural aspects, historical and geographical facts; artefacts; and collective descriptions of lifestyle, are reviewed and reported to be provide ample reading texts in different units in in ASR2. Cultural components An accomplished fact Historical and geographic facts Artifacts Collective description A future competence Cutural preparation Comparison between cultures 511 This participant also gave examples of some tasks. For instance, she highlighted the ―Forbidden Purple city‖ in Unit 2 - Chapter 1 as an example of historical and geographic facts. She also stated that the description of Vietnamese spring roll and pho in the same Unit was another instance of those artefacts frequently appearing in the coursebook. Similarly, the collective descriptors appear here and there in different parts of the book, such as the example of ―Hmong people‖ in Unit 2 or the volunteers of World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farm (WWOOF) in the Review Section. In general, it demonstrates the accomplished fact of culture is presented in different reading passages in each unit of the book. 4.1.2. A future competence From the participant‘s respond, a recurrent theme was that ASR2 reflected the cultural preparation and comparison sufficiently. Another plus point highlighted by this participant was that in appear in every part of all units in the book. First, it is reported that ASR2 prepared students for future communication with English speakers implicitly. For instance, in the reading text of Unit 1 - Chapter 2, the teacher gave the example of Montessori and Waldorf schools. As these types of education were quite new in Vietnam, the teacher in this case believed that the description of these school could help students ―enrich their lives with the cultural notes of other countries.‖ Another example given by the participant was from the question in Critical Thinking Section. The aim of this section was to help students think more critically about the ideas in the text. Consequently, it is not surprising that students could have opportunities to practice for future communication. Secondly, ASR2 provided learners with opportunities to compare and contrast between cultures. This participant listed down the tasks in the Critical Thinking section, where students were encouraged to make comparison between C2 and their own. Furthermore, she reported that teachers could give students further tasks to compare the differences of ―the cultural notes‖ between their culture and the target culture. From their perspective, ASR2 grants student with chances to discover various cultures while still treasuring traditional Vietnamese values. 4.2. Teachers’ difficulties in teaching cultural components In response to the heavy presentation of cultural elements in the reading text, the participant who has had ten-year experience reported no serious difficulties in teaching any of the cultural components. Upon being asked for further clarification, she explained that students were requested to search for the information on the Internet before or after each session. Also, in case any problems arose, she was the one who gave explanation in order to give students a better understanding of the context. Nonetheless, one challenge she has faced was related to the background of the students. Some students who come from rural areas have had little interaction with English, so it took her a longer time to explain these cultural elements to them in class. 5. CONCLUSION Generally, ASR2 provides learners general knowledge about culture and understanding of cultural differences. According to the participant, the diverse representation of culture and intercultural perception are some advantages of ASR2. Besides, it was found that there were no major difficulties when teaching such elements as the teacher was able to prepare the lesson carefully. However, due to the diverse background of the students, it is suggested that teachers provide sufficient explanation in order not to put those rural ones at a disadvantage. The students can work in groups so that those weak students can have support from their 512 stronger peers. Also, projects in which students research about culture would be a great opportunity for students to expand and deepen their understanding. 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