Maximizing Study Abroad: Teaching
Strategies for Language and Culture
Learning and Use
Presenters:
Holly Emert and Rachel Shively
The Center for Advanced Research on
Language Acquisition (CARLA)
Summer Institute 2007
University of Minnesota
1
Institute Goals
• To provide participants with:
– a grounding in the philosophy and
principles of strategies-based language and
culture learning
– hands-on experience using the MAXSA
materials
– an understanding of resources contained in
MAXSA
– opportunities to network with other
participants to enhance their understanding
& use of the guides
– opportunities to design their own curricula
and/or projects using MAXSA
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MAXSA: A System’s View of
Language and Culture Learning
• Integration of language and culture learning
• The learning process begins long before
departure and extends past reentry
• All individuals have a role to play (program
administrators and staff, instructors, students)
in multiple roles (as program developers,
facilitators, and participants)
• Workshop format: A train-the-trainers model
designed to enhance participants’
understanding and skills for their own benefit
as well as that of their target audience(s)
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Content-Context-Process
Need Holly’s graphic
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Introductions Activity
• This activity takes place in silence.
• Draw 5-6 pictures that represent who you
are.
• Find one partner. Don’t show them your
picture until asked to do so.
• Hold the picture up at chest level so your
partner can see it.
• Examine your partner’s picture but…
No talking!!
• Each round lasts 1 minute; there will be 3
rounds.
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Introductions Activity
• On a sheet of paper, answer the
following questions:
– What did you like/dislike about
the activity?
– Was it easy to communicate
what you wanted to?
– What do you think are the
learning goals of this activity?
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Verbal Introductions
• In pairs, please share the following information
about yourself (maximum 2 minutes each):
– Name
– Professional position and institution
– A brief overview of your culture- and
language-learning experiences
– Your goals for the workshop
• Introduce your partner to the rest of the group by
sharing the information s/he told you about
him/herself.
• Be sure to note other participants who share
similar experiences/goals that you could
network with!
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Maximizing Study Abroad
Surveys
• Language Style Survey
– A survey covering 11 dimensions of
learning styles, grouped into the following
categories:
• Sensory/perceptual learning styles
• Psychological type (personality)
• Cognitive learning style
• Language Strategy Use Inventory
• Culture-Learning Strategies Inventory
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Language Strategy Survey
Activity: Similarities &
Differences (LIG, p. X)
• Find others in the room who share
– 3 learning style similarities and
– 3 learning style differences
• What did you discover about
yourself? About others?
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MAXSA Surveys:
Uses, Benefits, and Challenges
• Contexts of use: When would you
use the surveys?
• Benefits: What are the benefits of
using the surveys?
• Challenges: What are the
challenges of using the surveys?
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MAXSA Surveys:
Uses, Benefits, and Challenges
• Contexts of use: When could you use the surveys?
– During 1st/2nd week of language course
– In study abroad orientations
– For staff development
• Benefits: What are the benefits of using the
surveys?
– Raise students’ awareness about specific strategies they
can use and being strategic about language and culture
learning
– To help students set learning goals
– To advise students who are frustrated about their progress
in learning by giving them practical learning tips
– Articulate learning that takes place in the study abroad
environment in academic terms
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• Challenges: What are the challenges?
– Time and sequencing constraints
– Students think that they know all of the
strategies already and that the survey didn’t
teach them anything new - need to
inoculate!
– Lack of immediate application to practice.
– Dissemination issues (if students aren’t
face-to-face)
Others?
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Learning Styles Activity
1. PLACE: If you could learn in any
environment you wanted, describe the
place in which you would most like to
learn.
2. PROCESS: What methods (processes)
do you most like to use when you learn?
3. PERSON: If there was a person involved
in guiding your learning experience, what
personal and professional characteristics
would you like that person to have?
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Learning Styles
• A learning style is the manner in which
a learner perceives, interacts with, and
responds to the learning environment.
• Learning styles are often influenced by
a person's cultural background.
• Each individual has learning style
preferences.
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Learning Styles Components
Learning styles have six components:
(Oxford & Anderson, 1995; PPG pg. 33)
• Cognitive: Habitual mental patterns
• Affective: Attitudes, beliefs, and values that
influence how learners learn
• Behavioral: Learner tendencies to seek situations
that “fit” best with their style
• Executive: The extent to which learners look for
order, organization, and closure in the learning
process
• Social: Preferred level of involvement with others
while learning
• Physiological: Body-based sensory and
perceptual learning tendencies
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Kolb’s Learning Styles
(PPG pp. 39-47)
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17
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Rachel Shively
User:
Two ways of viewing Kolb’s
model
I added this
slide because if
they’re new to
Kolb, the 2faceted nature •
of the model
can be
confusing I
think. Also this
sets up for the
•
upcoming slides
more explicitly.
Four different learning preferences (i.e.,
CE, RO, AC, AE).
A cycle of learning that takes learners
through four different stages in the
learning process (NOT SURE ABOUT
WORDING).
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Using Kolb’s Learning Cycle as
a Problem-Solving Tool
• Taking Students Through the Learning
Cycle (PPG, p. 39-42)
– Read about Kolb’s four learning
preferences on p. 39.
– Read the critical incident about Joshua on
p. 41-42.
– Fill out the table on p. 42, describing
learning preferences for problem solving.
– Share your answers with a partner.
– Group discussion: What were some of the
strengths and weaknesses of each
approach?
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An Example of Taking Students
through Kolb’s Learning Cycle with
an in-class activity
•
•
•
•
•
•
Activity “Specific Communication Styles” (Students’ Guide, p.
130-132)
Reflective observation: Show students a dialogue or video in
which different communication styles have caused
miscommunication and ask students to make hypotheses
about the source of the miscommunication.
Abstract conceptualization: Give a lecturette about
communication styles across cultures.
Active experimentation: Have students complete the activity,
applying the theory to real-life examples.
Concrete experience: Interview a host country individual about
communication styles in their culture.
Reflective observation: Discussion of the activity.
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Applications of Learning Styles for
Instructional Design and Delivery
• Kolb’s experiential learning cycle can serve
as a comprehensive framework for
instructional design in the following ways:
– It can inform the sequencing of activities
– Awareness of each student’s learning style
can be used to anticipate reactions to
various activities and teaching styles
– Knowledge of cognitive, cultural, and
learning style differences can help structure
language and culture learning opportunities
that balance challenge and support in both
content and process (Janet M. Bennett,
1998)
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Maximizing Study Abroad: Teaching
Strategies for Language and Culture
Learning and Use, Day Two
PLEASE CONSIDER
SITTING NEXT TO A
DIFFERENT PARTICIPANT
TODAY!
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Culture and Culture
Learning
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Objects Activity
• What is it?
• What is it used for?
• What might it tell us about the group
that uses it?
• How did you come to your decision
about the object(s)?
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How We Learn About Others
• Positivism (social science approach)
– Reality is knowable and predictable
– Focus on quantitative methods
• Interpretive approach
– Reality is subjective and resides with each
individual
– Focus on qualitative methods
• Critical approach
– Reality is subjective and based in power
relationships
– Focus on examination of texts and cultural
products (media)
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An Updated Framework:
Dialectics (tensions)
• Emphasizes process, relationships, and
contradictions
• Six dialectics:
– Cultural-Individual
– Personal-Contextual
– Differences-Similarities
– Static-Dynamic
– Past-Present-Future
– Privilege-Disadvantage
– Others?
(See Martin & Nakayama)
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Culture Learning
• …refers to the strategies and processes
students can use to learn about their
own and another culture as well as
communicate and relate effectively with
people from other cultures in any
context, domestic or international
(LIG pg. 49)
• There are many ways to learn about
culture
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Theories/Models of Culture Learning
• Multicultural perspective (P. Adler)
• Intercultural sensitivity (M. Bennett)
• Constructive marginality (J. Bennett)
• Intercultural (communicative)
competence
(J. Martin)
All of these models (and others)
inform knowledge and practice
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What is Culture?
• Take a moment to think about what
the word “culture” means to you.
• Write a brief definition of “culture”
on a piece of paper.
• You will be asked to share your
definition.
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What is Culture?
• Culture is…
• What is your culture?
– Culturally Diverse You activity (PPG pg.
H-23; LIG pg. DM-35; Students’ p. 44)
• How we define culture
– How We Define Culture: The Iceberg
Analogy (PPG p. H-25 to H-32; Students’
p. 46)
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Learning about Culture but
Who’s Culture?
• Culture is a system—it is the sum total
of what a particular group of people has
created together, share, and transmit
(Paige, 1990).
• Cultural competence refers to the
ability to perform and behave
appropriately in one’s own culture.
Almost everyone is culturally competent
but that does not mean they understand
or can explain their own culture.
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Cultural self-awareness means
understanding culture in general
and one’s own culture in particular.
It means being culturally
competent (in one or more
cultures) with the added ability of
understanding and being able to
explain one’s own culture.
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Intercultural Communicative
Competence (ICC)
• …emphasizes culture learning and
adaptation skills that can be
applied to any situation.
• Interculturally competent
individuals tend to be more
effective when dealing with
culturally diverse others of their
own and other culture groups.
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Dimensions of ICC include…
• Cultural competence and cultural selfawareness
• Culture-general understanding of
cultural differences, e.g., Big C/little c
• Culture-specific knowledge of two or
more cultures
• Skills and ability to behave
appropriately in multiple cultures
• Culture-learning skills
What sort of sequencing of content does
this suggest?
(see LIG pp. 54-55)
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Becoming Familiar with Culture:
The Iceberg Analogy
• Related Activities:
– Joshua and the Iceberg (SG, p. 4650; PPG, p. 74)
– Identifying Aspects of Culture (SG, p.
50-51)
• What did you learn from this activity?
Would you use it in your own context?
When? For what purposes?
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Culture learning requires…
• Self-reflection of learners about personal
experiences with cultural difference
• Process-oriented learning versus solely
fact-based learning
• Exploration of worldviews that differ from
one’s own
…and all of these can be challenging
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Language Learning in Study
Abroad
• PLACEHOLDER SLIDE FOR POSSIBLE
SECTION ON LANGUAGE LEARNING - AM
WORKING ON IT.
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Using MAXSA in Varied
Contexts: Examples
• On-site, for-credit university class based on
the MAXSA materials
• Introducing MAXSA into an existing study
abroad program (“London model”)
• University-level language classes that
integrate the MAXSA materials into a set
curriculum
• Advising for university language majors and
study abroad students
• Intercultural training and professional
development
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Placeholder for Varied
Contexts for MAXSA
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Maximizing Study Abroad: Teaching
Strategies for Language and Culture
Learning and Use, Day Three
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Facilitation and
Sequencing
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Process and Content:
Balancing Challenge and Support
• For students to make the most gains in
language and culture learning in the classroom
or abroad when is it appropriate for them to:
– Rest?
– Be challenged?
• The Challenge and Support Model (J. Bennett,
1993) provides a useful framework for learning
(see LIG pp. 54-56)
43
Process: Lower to Higher
Challenge
Lecture
Film, Video
Reading
Instrument
Critical Incident
Case Study
Fish Bowl
Role-Play
Simulation
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Content: Lower to Higher
Challenge
Culture
Interpersonal Perception
Language Use
Cultural Stereotypes
Nonverbal Communication
Communication Styles
Values (note: potentially threatening)
Problem Solving
Gender
Intercultural Adaptation
Cultural Privilege & Race
Contexts of Power
Sexual Orientation
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Culturally Diverse Environments
and Their Stress Factors (PPG p. 57)
• Differences in cultural values, beliefs,
practices
• Ethnocentrism
• Language issues
• Cultural immersion
• Cultural isolation
• Language
• Prior intercultural experience
• Expectations
• Visibility/invisibility
• Power and control
• Status
46
The Intensity Factors Index (PPG
pgs. 57-60)
• Thinking about your own audience(s),
please fill out the chart on p. 59.
• How can this index be used in your
work?
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Cultural Variables
• Diverse Learners and Key Cultural
Variables
– Learning styles
– Communication styles
– Non-verbal communication patterns
– Cultural values
– Cultural identities
– Issues of cultural adaptation
– Levels of intercultural sensitivity (the
ABCs)
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The Developmental Model of
Intercultural Sensitivity
“As a culture-general developmental model
of intercultural competence, the DMIS
offers a way for language teachers and
study abroad professionals to (1) assess
the developmental readiness of their
students to pursue certain kinds of
intercultural learning and (2) select and
sequence learning activities that contribute
to their students’ development of general
intercultural competence.” (Bennett,
Bennett, & Allen, 2003: 246)
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Key Intercultural Sensitivity Concepts
• Intercultural sensitivity is developmental.
• Intercultural sensitivity levels represent
distinct worldview structures regarding
cultural difference in which affect,
behavior, and cognition regarding cultural
difference varies.
• Higher levels of intercultural sensitivity can
be acquired and learned, but cannot be
assumed. It is not a naturally occurring
human quality.
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The Developmental Model of
Intercultural Sensitivity (PPG pp. 61-64,
Students’ pp. 101-105, LIG pp. 65-69)
A. ETHNOCENTRIC (MONOCULTURAL)
WORLDVIEW ORIENTATIONS
• Denial of Difference
• Defense against Difference
• Minimization of Difference
B. ETHNORELATIVE (INTERCULTURAL)
WORLDVIEW ORIENTATIONS
• Acceptance of Difference
• Cognitive and Behavioral Adaptation to
Difference
• Integration of Difference
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Denial
In Denial, one’s own culture is
experienced as the only real one,
and consideration of others is
avoided by maintaining
psychological and /or physical
isolation from differences.
• Example: “Society would be better off if
culturally different groups kept to
themselves.”
Source: The Intercultural Development Inventory Manual by Mitch Hammer and Milton
Bennett (1998; 2001). All statements come from the Intercultural Development Inventory.
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Defense
In Defense, one’s own culture (or
an adopted culture) is experienced
as the only good one, and cultural
difference is denigrated (opposite
stage is called Reversal on the
IDI).
• Example: “They’re in our country
now. They should do things our
way.”
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Minimization
In Minimization, elements of one’s own
cultural worldview are experienced as
universal, so that despite acceptable
surface differences with other cultures,
deep down those cultures are seen as
essentially similar to one’s own.
• Example: “When it comes right down to
it, people are people.”
54
Acceptance
In Acceptance, other cultures are
experienced as equally complex
but different constructions of
reality.
• Example: “I always try to learn
about a new culture before I go
there.”
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Adaptation
In Adaptation, one attains the ability to shift
perspective in and out of another cultural
worldview; thus, one’s experience
potentially includes the different cultural
experience of someone from another
culture.
• Cognitive: “I don’t think I can be effective if I only
look at the situation from one point of view.”
• Behavioral: “We are a diverse group. Effectiveness
means being able to solve problems in lots of
different ways.”
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Integration
In Integration, one’s experience of
self is expanded to include the
movement in and out of different
cultural worldviews.
• Example: “Although I am a member of
my own culture, I am nearly as
comfortable in one or more other
cultures.”
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Statements Activity
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Reflection Questions
• Reflect on your first intercultural encounter. What was
the situation/ How did you respond? Using the DMIS
model, how would you characterize your behavioral,
emotional, and cognitive response?
• Now think about a more recent intercultural encounter
and apply the DMIS.
• What process have you gone through in your own
intercultural development that brings you to where you
are now?
• In what stages of the DMIS would you place your
students? In what ways might their study abroad
experience reinforce their stages? Help them move
forward?
• What specific facilitation techniques can you employ to
move your students forward along the DMIS continuum?
PPG, pg. 62
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The Value of the DMIS
• Knowing the DMIS can help you:
– Be more understanding when conflict or differences
arise by looking for cultural as well as other
explanations.
– Expand your options in both problem formulation and
searching for solutions.
– Identify new knowledge and skills you can focus on in
your own and others’ professional development.
– Discover new tools you can use when your co-workers
and colleagues are working on sensitive issues of
diversity.
– Create a climate that is more responsive to cultural
diversity.
– Assess the intercultural effectiveness of your
organization.
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Adjusting the materials to meet
the needs of your specific
audience(s)
• Modifying the MAXSA materials to make them
more challenging for your audience(s).
• Differentiation
• PLACEHOLDER SLIDE FOR NOW - WILL
WORK ON.
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Maximizing Study Abroad: Teaching
Strategies for Language and Culture
Learning and Use, Day Five!
62
Maximizing Study Abroad
Research Project with
Students, Program
Professionals, and
Language Instructors
Primary Research Question: To what extent
does a strategies-based approach to
developing language and culture skills –
transmitted through a set of study abroad
guides – promote language gain and cultural
adaptation by study abroad students?
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Results of Study Abroad
for University Students
• Study abroad (three months in Spanish-and
French-speaking countries) appears to have
had a positive impact for all students on their
pragmatic language ability, intercultural
development, and increased frequency of
culture learning strategies (quantitative and
qualitative data).
• Student journals and follow-up interviews
indicate that students found the Students’
Guide useful for their language and culture
learning.
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Findings: Study Abroad
Advisors
• Conducted both culture learning and language learning
orientations with mixed results.
• Theory behind the guides assisted them in planning.
• Two main challenges: Time and how to integrate these
activities into already existing orientations.
• Other challenge: How to use the PPG materials with
differing levels of students.
• Three surveys: Great tools to use for discussion.
• Suggested to other program professionals:
– Read the entire PPG before deciding on what
activities to use during an orientation
– Try to integrate the materials into the fabric of
existing orientations as time is always a factor
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Findings: On-Site Resident
Directors
• PPG and SG material assisted in discussing the
processes and experiences of students during
the study abroad sojourn.
• ORDs used different approaches from the PPG
to integrate materials into their on-site
programming.
• The materials should be included in regular
programming: “Think of the PPG materials as
one giant activity and not to use them in a
compartmentalized fashion.”
• Theory in the PPG was helpful in planning
activities through a more holistic approach.
• Students should receive academic credit
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Language Instructors’ Case
Study: Findings
• The four instructors found the LIG to be a useful tool
for language teaching, whether or not their students
were planning to study abroad.
• Two of the instructors reported that the LIG helped
them both to understand the theory behind language
and culture strategies instruction as well as to put
theory into practice in the classroom.
• One instructor reported that the use of the LIG can
encourage students to study abroad by piquing their
curiosity and by giving them the tools and confidence
to navigate another culture.
• Challenges the instructors faced included finding time
to adapt materials to student needs and proficiency
levels as well as integrating the LIG into a set
curriculum.
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Research: Final Thoughts
• The styles- and strategies-based approach of
the Maximizing Study Abroad materials can
enhance students’ language and culture
learning, both at home and in study abroad.
• The Maximizing Study Abroad materials can be
integrated into the curriculum of a variety of
courses related to language and culture
learning, both at home and in study abroad.
• Language instructors have an important role
to play in helping students become strategic
with regards to language and culture. The
MAXSA Language Instructors’ Guide can aide
them in this work.
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Maximizing Study Abroad: Teaching
Strategies for Language and Culture
Learning and Use, Day Five
Evaluations and Wrap-Up
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Thanks so much for taking part in the 2007
Maximizing Study Abroad Through
Language and Culture Learning Strategies
Workshop at the University of Minnesota!
Please keep in touch!
Holly Emert
emer0102@umn.edu
Rachel Shively
shiv0012@umn.edu
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