1. Introduction
2. Framework of reference
3. Three dimensions of ICC
4. Methods of assessment
5. Steps in assessing ICC
6. Assessing ICC
7. Levels of ICC proficiency
8. Conclusion
9. References
6. Assessing ICC: an example through an authentic
learning unit
Any textbook can be used for ICC assessment. We chose Mirrors
and windows: an intercultural communication textbook (Huber-Kriegler,
Lázár and Strange, 2003) published by the European Centre
for Modern Languages because since its publication many teachers have
used it as a resource material. Therefore, we refer to this textbook and
we give the aim and content of the book, and the learning outcomes, the
content and a brief summary of Unit 5: All you need is love.
It presents authentic evaluation of a learning sequence. The theme based
on "love" introduces a variety of cultural differences in terms
of romance, wedding customs, sex education, etc.
Mirrors
and windows has been prepared with language teachers
and intercultural communication trainers in mind, but it can be used by
teacher trainers, teacher trainees, secondary school teachers of any subject.
It can be used in teacher education as a practical coursebook on intercultural
communication, or as supplementary material in language development and
methodology courses. It can also be applied in upper-intermediate and
advanced language classes, in the traditional way, but most activities
can be adapted to lower levels as well. It is also suitable for individual
self-study and as the basis for project work.
Aim and content of the book
Aim: To help develop Intercultural Communicative Competence
(ICC)
Content:
There are seven units, each one dealing with a different topic. The units
are independent of each other and can be used in any order.
Unit 1: Rock around the clock
Unit 2: You are what you eat
Unit 3: Conversation and. .silence
Unit 4: Men and women, girls and boys / Gender identities
Unit 5: All you need is love
Unit 6: Bringing up baby
Unit 7: Up in the morning and off to school
Each unit is organised in this way:
Introduction
|
gives general information about
the topic of the unit |
Reflecting on your
own culture
|
contains pictures, tasks and questions
to help students reflect on their own values, customs, behaviour
and attitudes |
Discovering other cultures
|
contains reading passages about
other cultures as well as ethnography tasks and project ideas
to foster independent learning and openness towards other cultures.
|
Language work
|
consists of activities where students
can learn more about language through culture. |
Topic, learning outcomes and summary of Unit 5: All you need is love
It was beyond the scope of the present publication to produce assessment
tasks for each of the units of Mirrors
and windows (2003). Since all units
follow the same structure and aim to serve more or less the same learning
outcomes, the assessment tasks recommended for Unit 5: All you need is
love can be adapted for all units. They provide examples on how ICC can
be assessed in real classrooms.
Topic: Romantic love between men and women as an invention
or
a social-cultural
construct developed in the early Middle
Ages and accompanied
with the notions of chivalry and
knightly. So what
is love?
Learning outcomes of the unit: At the end of this unit, the students
will be able to:
- become sensitive to cultural differences (sex education, romance,
gay love, polygamy);
- become aware of and cope with ambiguities related to love and public
displays of affection in different cultures, including their own;
- understand and correctly use different linguistic notions related
to love;
- adopt an appropriate behaviour in love-related situations;
- find ways to deal with embarrassing situations that result from a
lack of cultural understanding.
Summary of the unit
There are four sections in Unit 5. Each section contains questions to
be discussed by students. These questions vary in terms of complexity.
They intend to give the reader of this chapter a spectre of the learning
activities to be taken into account when developing assessment tasks.
- Section 1: Reflecting on your own culture
- Choose one of the mentioned quotations or cite another one about love.
Explain why you agree or disagree.
- How is romantic love seen in your culture? Think of famous pieces
of art to have influenced public opinion and discourse.
- What attitudes can you observe about the way people make judgments
about relationships in your culture? Do you feel free to be with
anybody, anywhere, at any time? What would you like to change?
- Who, in your opinion, has the right to give young people advice or
even to make decisions about their personal relationships?
- Sex education is now taught in school. There is an assumption that
parents will not approach the matter satisfactorily with their
children. What are the assumptions in your culture?
- How do young couples behave when they are in love in your culture?
Is it made public?
- What is your own culture's attitude to gay love?
- What values does your culture place on marriage?
- Section 2: Discovering other cultures
Text 1: What is romance about?
The media and images of sexuality to represent sex as fun compared
to eternal love, marriage -
Q1: Men to be genetically programmed . ?
Q2: Selling products with the help of pictures. ?
Q3: Is divorce legal in your culture?
Text 2: Dislocated polygamy
Q1: Is there unofficial polygamy in your country?
Text 3: Intercultural relationships
The parents of a 19 year old immigrant student expel from their home their
daughter who is dating a boy from the dominant culture.
Q1: What is more right or wrong in the conflict?
Q2: In pairs, collect arguments for each party in the conflict and
try to find solutions
Q3: How do people make friends and develop romantic and/or
sexual relationships in cultures
you are familiar with?
- Section 3: Activities and projects
- Conduct interviews among friends and acquaintances / Do they believe
in love at first sight?
- Analyze lyrics of popular love songs- What clues about the attitudes
and values concerning love do you discover?
- Analyze folk songs / Do they transmit a lot of cultural information
about values, behaviours and traditional courting customs?
- Do you know some bilingual and bicultural couples and families? Ask
them about their cultural differences?
- Section 4: Language work
Terminology
Q1: Does your language have similar words to these
terms?
Idioms
Q1: Is there a famous couple or love story
in your culture like
Shakespeare's
Romeo and Juliet? What is their story?
Metaphors and similes
Find a song with metaphors and try
to explain these. Ex :
Love is a splendored thing.
Writing
Write a love story: create the beginning and
invite the others
to continue.
6.1 Before teaching unit 5 - Survey to assess
students' ICC Profile
Unit 5 is about "romantic love" as it is seen in one's own
and different cultures, about famous pieces of art, attitudes about relationships,
etc.
Before starting to teach unit 5, it would be interesting to find out what
students have in mind and to build teaching on the attitudes, the perceptions,
apprehensions, etc. they expressed. Here is an example of a survey to
be filled out by each student as self-evaluation. It will help teachers
in observing the learning process and the students to realize the change
that can occur during that process.
Attitudes concerning love: All you need is love
Sex: female o male
o Age: ____
Nationality: ____
Opinions |
I
agree |
I
don't know |
I
don't agree |
Don't marry be
happy! Written on a picture card. Do you agree? |
|
|
|
Love is too much
responsibility. |
|
|
|
The value of "love"
has changed completely nowadays. |
|
|
|
Young people don't
care about love. They change their partners like their clothes. |
|
|
|
Romantic love doesn't
exist anymore. |
|
|
|
Love stands for
sex only. |
|
|
|
It's better to
have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. |
|
|
|
You are in love
with someone. You show your feelings everywhere any time. |
|
|
|
People should be
forbidden to show love in public places. |
|
|
|
Sex education should
be done by parents only. |
|
|
|
Legalized abortion
is good. |
|
|
|
It was high time
that homosexual couples were allowed to marry in certain countries. |
|
|
|
I don't mind sitting
next to a homosexual couple who openly show their affection in
a restaurant. |
|
|
|
Men should mate
with as many partners as possible before marriage. |
|
|
|
Women should mate
with as many partners as possible before marriage. |
|
|
|
Children are a
reason for not getting divorced. |
|
|
|
Living together
makes life easier than getting married. |
|
|
|
I agree that polygamy
is still the right way of living in some cultures. |
|
|
|
Your daughter gets
pregnant at the age of 15. You advise her to abort the unborn
baby. |
|
|
|
You want your 15-year-
old pregnant daughter to marry her partner. |
|
|
|
Sex education must
be taught at school. |
|
|
|
Your daughter/son
falls in love with a partner of a different culture (e.g. Islamic,
Jehovah's Witness, . ). You try to persuade her/him in finding
another partner. |
|
|
|
Your daughter/son
wants to marry a partner of different skin colour. You worry about
her/his future. |
|
|
|
Having an affair
with a married partner is not a problem for you. |
|
|
|
Your partner tells
you about a short love affair with a colleague during a business
trip. You don't feel good about this but it doesn't cause any
conflicts. |
|
|
|
An "open marriage"
is the best way to handle a partnership nowadays. |
|
|
|
"Everlasting
love" can hardly be lived in the western world. |
|
|
|
Finding a partner,
getting married, setting up a family, . are the only aims which
make sense in life. |
|
|
|
Better once married
and divorced than always single. |
|
|
|
Love lasts only
a few months. Then it becomes routine like all things in life. |
|
|
|
The aim of this self-evaluation is for the students to come out with a profile
of their cultural awareness related to romantic love. Students should not
be graded but it could be useful, at the end of the unit, to have the students
to complete the task again and find if there are changes in their perceptions
and attitudes, not in terms of good and bad, but of judgments they make
on other people and cultures. 6.2
During teaching - Use of the portfolio
Guidelines for students:
The portfolio is designed to be a collection of your learning journey
through this unit. As you work on your portfolio, you should be able to
notice progress in your language, intercultural skills and attitudes.
You will have physical evidence of your thoughts on topics covered in
this unit about romantic love: reflection, projects, and your personal
interests.
Finally, the portfolio is a great way for you and your teacher to assess
your improvement over this unit. You should write about interesting things
you have learned, questions or concerns that are not answered or addressed
in class or in the course book, how your opinions have changed, etc.
However, if you need some guidance there are questions below for this
unit that you may choose to write about:
- What did you learn from interviewing people of other cultures about
body language?
- Is there only one way of expressing feelings of love? If not, name
some of the ways used to express such feelings.
- Reflect on your own country: How have you felt about people that express
their feeling in other ways than you? Has your attitude changed? In
what ways?
- What did you find the most interesting in this unit?
6.3 At the end of the unit
At the end of the unit, the three dimensions should be assessed separately
or by pairs or all three together by using an integrated task. When defining
tasks, we must remember that to demonstrate skills or abilities implies
that the learner has the necessary knowledge, but the opposite is not
true.
6.3.1 Assessing each dimension separately
(a) Assessing intercultural "Knowledge /
Savoirs"
There are different levels of complexity that can vary in reference to
the levels of learning (with beginners, intermediate or advanced students)
when assessing knowledge. Therefore, most of the following examples present
complexity in the assessment task in order to cover the three levels of
competence (low, medium and high).
The following classification can be used to assess written or oral comprehension
skills according to the different levels of complexity of the tasks.
1) To identify and describe explicit knowledge
(Who is doing what, where, when and why)
2) To regroup / to reorganize
(In the following text, group into one column words which
express openness to the other culture and into another column words which
express antipathy between the two cultures).
3) To compare
(Read the three following short texts and find three elements that
distinguish love in England, France and Germany).
4) To infer / implicit knowledge
(What love relationship exists between the ethnic groups in the text you
just read).
5) To appreciate
(Refer to the text you just read and answer in writing what their feelings
are about love. According to you, why do they feel like that?)
6) To make a synthesis
(Read the following text and propose an alternative to the reaction of
.......... concerning .............).
7) To evaluate
(Read the text and defend the reaction of ...........after being
harassed by ............... on his behavior in public).
The following eight
examples provide assessment tasks of various complexities related to the
above classification.
Example 1. / Interview
Context
Choose a target culture and get in touch with an informant (or more) that
is willing to help and can answer two questions about love in their culture.
Try to meet your informants several times if possible; you can also locate
other bibliographical sources for general or specific information on your
target culture.
Task
After you have gathered the necessary information, in writing (no more
than 250 words) identify cultural facts that are identical
or different between the two cultures; compare similarities
and differences and give reasons that can justify the
differences described.
You can choose from the list below or you can come up with your own:
- Who does normally give advice to young people when it comes to love
and relationships? Is it parents, friends, teachers, priests? Anyone
else?
- Are you free to engage in a relationship with anybody you choose,
without restrictions?
- When is sex education introduced in schools? Are parents involved
in the process as well?
- How do young couples behave socially? Do they hold hands and kiss
openly? Are public displays of affection generally regarded as embarrassing/indecent/normal?
- What is the cultural attitude towards gay couples in your country?
Is this issue openly discussed in your culture?
- Is body weight linked to concepts of beauty and sexual attractiveness?
Example 2: Famous couples
Context
Literature is full of famous couples, like Romeo and Juliet. Here are
some examples:
Jack and Jill
Tristan and Isolde
Bonnie and Clyde
Darby and Joan
Frankie and Johnny
Punch and Judy
Victoria and Albert
Lancelot and Guinevere
Orpheus and Eurydice
Task
From the above list of couples, choose two. In writing, identify
at least three features that characterise their love and make it special.
Compare the features of the two couples and give
reasons for your choice.
You have one week to complete the task and you may use different sources
of information.
Example 3 - Dating customs
Context
We know that relationships can vary according to different customs. The
six (6) statements below give information about the relationships between
men and women in the UK and the US.
Task
First, read the six following statements. Then, state if these customs
are the same or different in your country? If different,
write a brief note to explain differences.
In
the UK and the US |
In
your country |
1. Around
the age of 14-15, boys and girls go on dates. |
Similar
Different
Notes
. . . . . . . |
2. Parents
very rarely choose dates for their children. |
Similar
Different
Notes
. . . . . . . |
3. Men
and women sometimes share expenses on a date. |
Similar
Different
Notes
. . . . . . . |
4. A man
often goes to collect his date at her home.
|
Similar
Different
Notes
. . . . . . . |
5. Men
and women often date people of different ethnic, social or religious
backgrounds |
Similar
Different
Notes
. . . . . . . |
6. Women
may invite men to parties and other social events. |
Similar
Different
Notes
. . . . . . . |
Example 4 / Getting married
Read the text "What is romance about?" (pp. 52-53 in "Mirrors
and windows") and explain what reasons are given
in favour of marrying.
Example 5 - Polygamy
Read the text "Dislocated polygamy" (p.53 in "Mirrors
and windows") and compare the example with the situation
in your own country.
Example 6: Public display of affection
Context
Read the text(s) in Unit 5 related to public displays of affection.
Task
On a scale from one to five, classify the cultures discussed
in terms of public displays of love/affection from 'the most open/tactile"
(1) culture to 'the least open/tactile" (5). Then add situations
from your own culture or another culture that you have been exposed to.
You can develop your own parameters of a "love scale".
MINIMUM______________________________________MAXIMUM
OPEN
OPEN
Max/1 |
High / 2 |
Medium/ 3 |
Low /4 |
Min /5 |
In public places / formal situations |
In the presence
of older people/ parents/ teachers/
total strangers /informal and formal situations
|
Among strangers of the same age
in informal situations |
Among close friends of the same
age in informal situations |
Never
in public |
Example 7 - Giving definitions of the love
Every student should write in a sheet of paper three definitions for
«love» as presented in Unit 5. After that in small groups
read the written definitions and write down
a joint list with definitions. Finally, produce a common
definition.
Example 8: Writing a text based on proverbs
Context
From the following list of proverbs, select three that can apply to your
country; add one that is specific to your own culture and which is not
included in the list.
LOVE PROVERBS FROM AROUND THE WORLD
- Love does wonders, but money makes marriages. (French Proverb)
- Men prefer the wife of another but love their own sons more. (Georgian
Proverb)
- In love beggar and king are equal. (Indian Proverb)
- Debt severs love. (Afghan Proverb)
- There is no physician who can cure the disease of love. (African Proverb)
- He who loves thinks that the others are blind; the others think that
he is crazy. (Arabian Proverb)
- In order to really love someone you must love him as though he was
going to die tomorrow. (Arabian Proverb)
- Love makes a man both blind and deaf. (Arabian Proverb)
- The one who loves you will also make you weep. (Argentine Proverb)
- Love did not grow any garlic. (Armenian Proverb)
- The woman who loves her husband corrects his faults; the man that
loves his wife exaggerates them. (Armenian Proverb)
- Love is blind, so you have to feel your way. (Brazilian Proverb)
- Where there is love there is no darkness. (Burundi Proverb)
- If love is a sickness, patience is the remedy. (Cameroonian Proverb)
- Love is an eye that doesn't see anything. (Chinese Proverb
- Love is like a baby: it needs to be treated tenderly. (Congolese Proverb)
- Absence sharpens love; presence strengthens it. (English Proverb)
- Love is a garden full of flowers and marriage is a field of stinging
nettles. (Finnish Proverb)
- Love kills time and time kills love. (Italian Proverb)
- To offer friendship to one who is looking for love, is like giving
bread to someone dying of thirst. (Spanish Proverb)
- Love has produced some heroes but even more idiots. (Swedish Proverb)
Retrieved from:
http://creativeproverbs.com/cgi-bin/sql_search3cp.cgi?keyword=love&boolean
=and&field=all&frank=all&database=all
Task :
Describe cultural facts that are related to love, as
understood from the proverbs. Explain what conception
of love is reflected. How is this similar to or different
from your own culture?
(b) Assessing intercultural "know-how / savoir-faire"
There are different levels of complexity that can vary in reference to
the levels of learning (with beginners, intermediate or advanced students)
when assessing intercultural skills (knowing-how/ savoir-faire). Therefore,
most of the following five examples present degrees of complexity in the
assessment task in order to cover the three levels of competence (low,
medium and high).
The following classification can be used when assessing written or oral
comprehension skills according to the different levels of complexity of
the tasks.
- To respond to events linguistically correctly but in a socially inappropriate
manner
- To adapt to events in response to input from the interlocutors
- To look for input and react appropriately in social encounters
- To act using correct verbal and non-verbal behaviours
- To interact successfully using different strategies
- To take into account the sociocultural context and the interlocutors
- To cope with misunderstandings and conflict-ridden situations
Role-playing, simulations, case studies and problem-solving are some
of the techniques that can be used to assess the know-how / savoir-faire
of students. The following five tasks take into account the above classification.
Example 1 - Public talk to teenagers
Context
You are a councillor at a teenagers' summer camp. You are asked, somewhat
tentatively, to break the topic of "safe sex" to a multinational
group.
Task
(a) Decide on what is appropriate to
say; (b) how you are going to discuss it (directly and
bluntly; using euphemisms; to a single-sex or mixed group?) Write
down the major issues you have to take into account. Make
a presentation for your colleagues as you would deliver it in
front of the teenagers.
Example 2 - Role play
Context
Your friends from a Muslim country/ the Middle East/ Far East are baffled
by the amount of commercials and advertisements featuring half-naked bodies.
Task
Act out a conversation. Use the language that will enable
you to make your point effectively from an intercultural communicative
competence perspective.
Student A (from a Western country) explains why it is a successful selling
strategy in most Western countries to have advertisements featuring half-naked
bodies - by mentioning at least three arguments.
Student B (from the Middle East, etc) expresses surprise and lists at
least three arguments against.
Example 3 / Misunderstanding
Context
Your Russian friend has married an American. One day she calls you in
tears accusing her husband of being emotionally cold, unhelpful and unloving
because he refused to drop a word for her to her boss whom he had known
for a long time. What do you think is the reason for misunderstanding?
Task
Act out a conversation with your friend (approximately
5 minutes) where you should make her see her husband's point of view,
from an intercultural perspective.
Example 4 / Finding agreement
Context
Work in groups of three or four. Decide which of the following statements
you agree with and which statements you disagree with. Brainstorm these
with the other members of your group for 20 minutes. Try to modify any
statements you disagree with so that they represent the opinions of your
group.
Children should only leave home after they are married.
You should always ask your parents for permission to marry.
Marriage is getting steadily less popular in the modern world than it
was in the past.
People should be more tolerant of mixed marriages.
People should be more tolerant of homosexual couples.
Task
Orally report your discussion to the teacher (10 minutes)
from an intercultural perspective.
Example 5: Role play
Context:
One of your friends met a woman from a different ethnic group and culture.
She is a bit afraid of that relationship because she is convinced that
her family and friends will not share her feelings of happiness and love.
She decides to gather both families to get acquainted and in this way
to overcome their differences.
(You may even decide on the origins of the families according of the students'
culture in the group.)
Task:
Work in groups of four. Two will portrait the family of your friend and
use convincing arguments against that relationship. The
other two will portrait the other family and use convincing arguments
in favour of the relationship. You make an appointment in a café
to discuss the situation.
You have 15 minutes to prepare for your meeting and the defence of your
position. Then you will engage conversation all together to discuss differences
in culture and try to find an issue to the problem in the interest of
your friend.
Observation by the assessor/evaluator:
During the role playing, the teacher/assessor observes and may take
notes on the linguistic appropriateness of the message with the social
interactions in order to find out if learners adjust or not their responses
to the input of the interlocutors (low intercultural level); if
they take the initiative and if the interactions and answers to the input
progress in a satisfactory manner by using different strategies (medium
intercultural level); and if students use correct verbal and non-verbal
behaviours, taking into account the socio-cultural context and the interlocutors'
culture and if they finally untangle their misunderstandings (high intercultural
level).
N.B. This task can also be used to assess intercultural «being»
because the teacher/assessor can observe the attitudes of the learners
at the same time. To the language and linguistic aspects observed when
assessing the skills «know-how/savoir-faire», it is possible
to add the following criteria: understanding of new beliefs and
values and tolerance of the other culture (low intercultural level); acceptance
of new beliefs and values, openness, being able to compare his own beliefs
and values with those of the other culture (medium intercultural level);
integration of new beliefs and values, showing empathy, mediating
misunderstandings and being able to justify different beliefs and values
(high intercultural level).
(c) Assessment of intercultural "being / savoir-être"
The assessment of «Being/savoir-être» relies on three
sub-dimensions (cultural awareness, critical awareness and transcultural
internalization of values). The following examples take into account all
sub-dimensions of the domain.
The following classification can be used in written or oral comprehension
according to the different levels of complexity of the tasks.
- To understand and be able to describe new beliefs, attitudes
and values that differ from those favoured in one's own culture.
- To be tolerant of others and other cultures
- To accept other beliefs and values
- To be open-minded, being able to compare and contrast own
beliefs and values with your own
- To respect others and other cultures
- To change personal views
- To demonstrate empathy and not only tolerance and sympathy
- To manage misunderstanding, tensions and conflicts
- To integrate new beliefs and values
- To be able to justify other beliefs and values
Assessors can use pictures, posters or illustrations representing something
that could be in conflict with values shared by people who do not come
from the same culture. They can lead oral discussions or ask students
to write essays or give their evaluation of a specific ambiguous situation.
The following five tasks take into account the above classification.
Example 1 - Public display of affection
Context
You are in an art gallery visiting an exhibit on romantic love.
Task
Look at the three pictures depicting different customs of public display
of affection. Compare in writing these three types of behaviour and identify
similarities or differences with your own culture.
low level of intercultural communicative competence
Example 2 - Roles in family life
Context
You have just finished discussing the roles in family life (father-mother-children,
who makes decisions in the family, dependency or independency from the
parents, dating someone from another culture, sex education, etc).
Task
In an oral presentation (5 min), compare the roles in your own family
to those in other families. Expand your comparison to other cultures that
are strikingly different from your own.
medium level of intercultural communicative competence
Example 3 / Traditional wedding
Context
You have just attended a wedding ceremony of friends from a different
religion and background.
Task
In no more than 250 words, write an essay about a traditional wedding
in your country, taking into consideration the intercultural perspective.
Describe and compare it with another culture which surprises or confuses
you, giving convincing arguments.
high level of intercultural communicative competence
Example 4 / Critical incident
Context
James, an American student, met Zhiang, a Chinese student, at the university,
and they decided to lunch together. On their way to the cafeteria, they
met James' girl-friend Carol, who was to attend a lecture. James and Carol
had a lively conversation and then James embraced Carol and gave her a
long and passionate kiss. Meanwhile Zhiang turned away and walked off
toward the cafeteria, alone. James couldn't understand his behaviour.
(Cushner and Brislin, 1996)
Task
Read through the above critical incident and discuss the situation in
small groups of three or four. Try to find the best explanations for the
conflict and the right arguments to defend your opinion.
Possible explanations
How would you explain Zhiang's behaviour to James?
1. Zhiang was shocked by the public display of affection between
James and Carol.
2. Zhiang was offended that James didn't introduce him to Carol.
3. Zhiang was annoyed that he had to wait around while James
at talking to Carol.
4. Zhiang wanted to give James and Carol some privacy.
Comments
1. This is the best answer. In China, public displays of affection
between persons of opposite sexes are not permissible. Zhiang found James'
behaviour extremely embarrassing.
2. It is possible, but there is a stronger reason for Zhiang's discomfort.
3. It is not likely, as James was causing a brief delay. Please make
another selection.
4. It is possible, but there is a better reason for Zhiang's sudden
departure.
high
level of intercultural communicative competence
Example 5 / Values in the film « Spanglish »
Context
You have just watched the film "Spanglish" (James Brooks, 2004).
Task
Compare the different values and attitudes to love and family expressed
by the main characters to those common to your own culture. Next, justify
the characters' attitudes according to their culture. Finally, explain
what you would have done to avoid the misunderstanding.
high
level of intercultural communicative competence
6.3.2 Assessing two intercultural dimensions
"Knowledge/Savoirs" and "Know-how/ Savoir-faire"
Example 1 / Communication problems
Context
Pay attention to a particular communication problem you ran into (in and/or
out of the class) and discuss the pros and cons of the situation with
one of your classmates.
Task
You encountered a communication problem. First, describe
the problem by answering the questions a),b),c),d) below. Be specific
and include details about your situation described. Second, you
have to analyze the problem that you've recorded by answering
question e). Finally, please write details about the future action(s)
in terms of behaviour you intend to take in order to improve
your communication skills in that particular area. Then, ask a classmate
to answer the same questions and compare the answers with your own. Are
they different? If so, how are the answers different?
a)
What
was the relationship between the speakers?
Who was talking? |
b)
Where and
when did the conversation take place? |
c)
What
was the topic of conversation? |
d)
What was
the purpose of the conversation? |
e)
Describe
and analyze the communication challenge. Please
give as much detail as possible, and try to write down as much
of the language you used as you remember. |
FUTURE ACTION(S):
After this experience, what will you do next time
to improve your communication?
Example 2: Dating someone from another culture
Context
Your younger sibling is dating someone from a different culture (as described
in Unit 5). She/he isn't sure whether she/he fully understands her/his
partner and/or your parents would approve of the relationship.
Task
As a student experienced in intercultural communication, write an informal
letter of advice (appx. 250-300 words) explaining (a) the most striking
cultural differences and possible pitfalls that might result from them;
(b) how to persuade your parents to accept it.
6.3.3 Assessing by means of an integrative
task
An integrative task is an assessment situation in which the learners
are required to combine different skills or behaviours involving complex
performance. In the following example, the learners need to define terms,
support and clarify their point of view and discuss what intercultural
communication means to them according to what they learned in the unit
on romantic love.
Context:
You have just finished learning about different approaches to romantic
love.
Task:
You have to answer the following questions in writing (approx 250 words):
- What have you learned in this unit about romantic love as an intercultural
communication element?
- In what way have these new learning elements influenced your understanding
of love and how can it be experienced?
Make sure that you integrate intercultural concepts
from your unit, other readings, videos, exercises, other previous discussions.
Be sure to define your terms clearly. You may also use
personal experiences and observations (from your portfolio, for example)
to support and clarify your learning
outcomes.
As an example, you can start by discussing the idea
of intercultural communication in a concise introduction; then you may
choose several topics related to love and relationships, which will give
you frameworks for integrating the various materials used, as well as
your prior experiences and learning outcomes.
next chapter: 7. Levels
of ICC proficiency
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