TESL 0100: Unit 1 Reflection - Putting Yourself in Someone Else's Shoes

                                      TESL 0100 Unit 1 Reflection: Putting Yourself in Someone Else’s Shoes

                                                                    (Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mens_brown_derby_leather_shoes.jpg)

After having taken the last four months off to enjoy the summer, I’ve finally returned to continue my TESL journey with the University of Manitoba. I must say, it’s good to be back! This will be the last course I take before I complete the program, so I’ll be sure to make this one count!

For this week’s reflection, I’d like to go over a concept that Brown and Lee (2015) discuss in chapter eight of their book “Teaching by Principles”, that is, the concept of "intercultural competence." According to them, intercultural competence allows people to be “…able to perceive cultures in relationship, both within and outside a society, and are able to interpret each culture in the perspective of the other.” (Brown & Lee, 2015, p.167). In addition to this, they add that such a person is “…someone who has a critical or analytical understanding of (parts of) their own and other cultures – someone who is conscious of their own perspective, of the way in which their thinking is culturally determined, rather than believing that their understanding and perspective is natural.” (Brown & Lee, 2015, p.167).

 This stood out to me because I think intercultural competence is at the heart of a successful classroom environment. Whether entering an ESL class in Canada for adult immigrant students or an evening EFL class in Japan full of young business professionals, a teacher needs intercultural competence to best reach out to their students. By being interculturally competent, a teacher can be more sensitive to the needs of their students, by considering their viewpoint, without holding it up to their own cultural bias. It requires the teacher to consider the interests, motives, values, and expectations of each student from their own unique perspective, and not simply their own. A teacher must accept the fact that there is more than one way to experience the world!

Without intercultural competence, students and teachers alike can end up misinterpreting the words and actions of one another, leading to breakdowns in communication. Of course, this is the last thing you want happening in a classroom! In some cultures, such as in South Korea, it’s considered impolite to look superiors directly in the eye. However here in North America, the opposite is true. A teacher seeing a South Korean student avoid eye contact may worry that the student is shy, or feeling uncomfortable approaching them, all the while that very student may simply be wanting to show respect. The teacher may then misinterpret the student’s actions.

While not specific to the classroom, I had an experience of my own which for me illustrates how intercultural competence can change the way we interpret things. When I was in Japan several years ago for the first time, I went out to eat at a ramen shop. Ramen is a hot noodle dish served in a broth and is often garnished with meat and vegetables. When I got to this ramen shop, I was surprised to hear the people around me slurping loudly as they ate. Initially I thought to myself that they were being sloppy and disruptive, because back in North America, slurping while eating is poor manners. However, upon asking my Japanese friends about it, they pointed out that the opposite was true! By slurping the noodles, you are showing the chef that you are enjoying the ramen, the idea being that you want to eat the noodles quickly, while they are hot, because they are just that tasty! By looking at this custom from a different perspective, I no longer considered this to be odd or rude. In the end I ended up slurping my noodles too!

With all that said, how does someone become interculturally competent? For me, I believe it all starts with mindfulness; taking a moment to reconsider what you perceive and view it in a different way. To put it simply putting yourself in another person’s shoes; it requires us to learn about others and to apply that knowledge in the future.

To wrap up this blog post, I’d like to include a link that outlines five stages to becoming interculturally competent. Guillaume Gevrey, illustrates each stage with his own experiences living in India. I definitely recommend checking it out!

https://ggevrey.wordpress.com/2013/03/12/5-stages-to-become-interculturally-competent/

Anyway, tune in next week for my next blog post!

References

H. Brown, H. L. (2015). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. White Plains, NY: Pearson Education, Inc. .