Development - Culture in our Classrooms | Delta Publishing

Culture in our Classrooms

Friday 16 April 2010

Hello and welcome

I know some of you have been looking forward to reading Mario’s blog and you might be a little surprised to be hearing from me. Don’t worry, we have simply swapped blog spots and you will be hearing from Mario very soon.

So how did I get interested in culture? Well, my family is descended from a mixture of UK and Russian/Polish characters who didn’t always understand each other, I grew up with lots of friends from India and Pakistan, in a town where the National Front (an extreme right wing political party) was based and saw the havoc it wreaked. I’ve travelled a lot (and yes, I’ve made enough cultural faux pas to fill a book) worked in lots of different contexts and I am constantly fascinated by how our culture(s) define the way we lead our lives.

Hofstede would say that Culture is “The software of the mind”, that our cultural background ‘programmes’ our everyday behaviour. Because this everyday behaviour is seen as the ‘natural’ way to behave within a home culture, it can come as quite a shock when confronted with another, different behaviour. I remember only too well, when working in the Middle East for the first time, feeling very shocked and upset, on attending a party because I was separated from the male colleagues I had gone with and shown into a room full of women I didn’t know. Actually, once I got over the shock, I had a really good time! I learned from that experience, that it is well worth suspending judgement, so that I can learn as much as possible about the situation I’m in. It’s not always easy; we can’t help seeing things from our own perspective. Let me show you what I mean..

Here’s something you can do with your students.

Ask everyone to take a piece of blank paper and very quickly draw a map of the world. It needn’t be a work of art; they should just take 2 minutes to do this.

Collect the maps and display them for all to see. If you have a multinational class, you will see VERY different maps. Generally, people will put their own country near or at the centre of the paper. Countries which are significant for the students will appear larger and nearer the centre. Allow plenty of time for your students to find out about their classmates’ maps. Lots of interesting discussion should ensue! You can find this activity and some examples of maps on page 25 of ‘Culture in our Classrooms’

I’m going to sign off, now, but I look forward to hearing if and how you work with the cultures in your classrooms!

Bye for now

Gill

Delta Development Blog

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Louis Rogers (January to March 2012)
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