Revista simpozionului Eficienta si calitate in educatie 2018 Revista simpozionului | Page 56

the deep culture - that underlie the behavior of a specific culture are difficult to
observe. Using the iceberg analogy can be a fun way for students to think about
elements of culture and make distinctions between those that are visible and those
that may be so ingrained that members of a culture are not aware of them. Teachers
can pass out blank iceberg templates, or draw one on the board for students to copy,
and ask students to work in groups or individually to list elements of culture that may
be found in each of the three levels: surface culture, subsurface culture, and deep
culture. Examples of surface culture elements include food, national costumes,
traditional music and dance, literature, and specific holidays. In the subsurface
culture section, students could list notions of courtesy, body language, gestures,
touching, eye contact, personal space, facial expressions, conversational patterns,
and the concept of time. Such rules vary widely across cultures. Teachers can give
specific examples from English-speaking cultures and contrast them with elements
from the students’ own culture. Unconscious values and attitudes—the deep
culture—may be the most difficult elements for students to identify. These can be so
far ingrained that people feel these are simply the “right” and “normal” way of doing
things. While it might seem odd for American parents to share their bed with their
children, many cultures around the world view this as a normal practice. Other
examples of unconscious values and attitudes relate to the nature of friendships,
concepts of food, notions of modesty, concepts of cleanliness, gender roles,
preferences for competition and cooperation, and so on. When we teach EFL, part of
our job should be to prepare students for challenges they may meet when they travel
or move to a country where English is spoken.
Another important aspect to consider is that teaching only makes sense if it is
accompanied by learning, as the two are like the two sides of the same coin – the
teaching-learning process. There are two perspectives from which culture can be
studied: by people who live within that culture and by people who encounter it
through language learning. The latter is the focus of the present paper and the aim of
studying culture is “to enable learners to develop a more nuanced view of a country
and society whose language they are learning” (Bryam 57). Nowadays people travel
a lot, globalisation is a reality, so it is a must to get to know other cultures.
In order to learn culture, students must go through some stages or learning
interactions (Moran 15): knowing about, knowing how, knowing why and knowing
oneself. Knowing about includes all the activities that involve gathering cultural
information and acquiring it. Knowing how refers to cultural practices, behaviours,
actions and skills. This helps learners adapt to the target culture. Knowing why
means understanding perspectives, beliefs, values and attitudes so that they are
later able to make comparisons between cultures. Last but not least, knowing
oneself in the process of culture learning means that all cultural experience is highly
personal – in order to understand another culture, one must first develop awareness
of their own cultural background. These interactions can be associated with Kolb’s
stages of culture learning: knowing about – description; knowing how – participation;
knowing why – interpretation and knowing oneself – response. The culture learning
process involves changes in the way the learners think, feel, act and it prepares
them for the encounter with members of that culture. Patrick R. Moran proposes a
model of culture learning that consists of a series of encounters with the target
culture products, practices, perspectives, communities and persons within the
curriculum. With the help of teachers, students engage in description, interpretation
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