Talking about stereotypes

We are surrounded by stereotypes that set the way we behave according to our culture. In fact, stereotypes are a way of classifying or dividing people into many “categories” which may become denigrating. It is truth that many stereotypes does not always mean that people from a specific country or culture behave as we believe; however, some of such stereotypes represent to some extent how a country generally is seen from outside.

Spanish stereotypes

For example, in the reading “When cultures collide: leading across culture, third edition” written by Lewis Collin, they are described some Englishmen stereotypes we may hear in our day to day. As I could read, some of such stereotypes are not totally false if we make reference to British people. Otherwise, we would be classifying all English people such as Scottish or Welsh people in the same box where British are. Indeed, depending on the area of UK we may find different behaviours; that’s an example that Scottish people are ruder than Brits.

There are also Spanish stereotypes that define us as a culture. Actually, one of the most used statements to describe Spain is the next one: “Spain is different”. That’s why we have different costumes, beliefs and values in comparison to our Europe neighbourhoods and countries beyond the Atlantic Ocean. Doing some research, I found interesting points of view some foreigners have about Spain as a culture. (HuffingPost, 2015).

• ·     Some North Americans from U.S.A. consider that “Spanish people like parties, dancing and drinking. In general, they appreciate all of those pleasures such as eating, taking a nap…”

• ·     Germans hardly understand “why Spanish people talk so fast and loud. It sound as if they were talking making use of exclamations”.

• ·      Italians consider that Spanish people “know to find the balance between duty and pleasure.

• ·      French people state that “Spanish people are kind and friendly with everyone”.

• ·      Greeks say that “Spanish people is good at playing football”.

• ·      Koreans do not understand why Spanish people “cannot have dinner before eight o’clock”. They also state we are “too noisy and bad at speaking English”.

• ·      Canadians point out the “Spanish people tend to arrive late at our meetings”.

• ·     English people consider that “Spanish people sleep almost all the day and buy compulsively”.

General stereotypes around the world

To sum up, it was interesting to find what other countries think about our culture. Specifically, I couldn’t stop laughing at all their beliefs, since some of them are not true at all. For example, we don’t take a nap every day; in fact, there is a vast majority of people who do not have time to do that. Moreover, we have dinner later than other countries because we have more sunny hours, so we take advantage of that to spend more time doing other stuff. Our manner of speaking may be a little bit noisy, but Chinese and German people also make noise when speaking their languages; however, they do not realise about it. In any case, this research was essential to make a brief comparison betwwen how the rest of cultures see us and how we really are as a culture. 

Is it multilingualism a threat for our traditions?

Globalisation is a widespread fact in our society we cannot avoid when teaching festivals and traditions. Halloween is not just celebrated in United States, but it is also around the world. For example, Spain has its own festivity the same day that Halloween is celebrated; however, more and more people is adopting such foreign tradition. Is it an advantage or a drawback?

Advantages and drawbacks

• Let's see the advantages that globalisation and multilingualism bring in our society:

- Society adopts an open mind towards other cultures. 

- It is easier to learn more about other cultures, beliefs, values...

- Cultures can express themselves with total freedom.

- It is easier to learn new languages and ways of communication.

• On the other hand, some drawbacks we may find are the following ones: 

- We may lose our traditions and our sense of belonging to a country, so if everything is globalised and celebrated everywhere, there is nothing special that make us different regarding our traditions and festivals. 

- We can have acces to culture whenever we want, so we may lose interest for it. In fact, when we have an excess of information, we tend to undervalue what we can get easily from Internet or wherever.

Conclusions

In short, despite all the positive and negative points multilingualism brings in our society, I consider that we teachers may make use of it to work festivals and traditions in class. However, we should take into account a relevant issue: the inability of many teachers to teach culture through language. That's why I would propose activities in which pupils can develop communication skills (oral and written).For instance, students can prepare presentations about the different festivals and traditions we may find around the world; thereby, pupils would be working culture while developing their English oral skills.

 

 Another alternative would be taking advantage of multilingualism in class to engage (not to force) students from other countries to tell their classmates more about their cultures. Actually, the great majority of times we have in class the resources necessary to work culture, but we do not realise about them; that's why we are always looking for innovation when, in fact, we do not need to implement new approaches to plan a fun and interesting class about culturals aspects. 

TRANSLANGUAGING EVERYWHERE

  
 What is translanguaging?

Translanguaging is considered an approach which consists of reading, listening, watching in one language and writing and speaking in another one. Both languages are equally integrated, so the aim of the translanguaging approach is to develop skills into a language (L2) by making a coherent use of both L1 and L2. In other words, translanguaging should not be used to avoid L2 use, but to foster speakers to develop their communication skills in L2 through their L1.

Personal experience

Personally, I can state I experienced the well-known translanguaging approach when I studied at my English academy. Specifically, my teacher used it for doing her classes. First of all, she explained all the English grammar in Spanish; then, we did and corrected the exercises in English, but our doubts were clarified in Spanish. Thereby, I could set links between English and Spanish grammar more easily than if all the theory would have been explained just in English. Actually, such approach was useful for me because I could link the similarities between English and Spanish language. Moreover, I go on using translanguaging to teach and learn  English grammar and vocabulary, since I have proved that it works. 

My research

Doing research on the translanguaging approach I could learn many things about it: 

•  “Translanguaging is about communication, not about language itself” (EAL Journal, 2016).

Many teachers concern about what to asses when applying a translanguaging approach, given that students are not making a complete use of a language; they are mixing both to communicate ideas. However, there is a clear solution for such worried teachers: they should learn to differentiate between language and communication skills when it comes to assess pupils. 

On the one hand, language skills make reference to all those aspect what take part of a language: grammar, vocabulary, idioms, etc. On the other hand, communication skills mean all related to oral and written skills, language strategies, etc. which allow us to express our ideas and understand the others. 

Teachers, therefore, should also consider translanguaging as a way of promoting students autonomy when communicating ideas in class.  If pupils are constantly interrupted by their teachers when they want to express something, they will lose their self-confidence when using their L2. Indeed, it is not as important the students’ language accuracy or fluency as their skills to use both languages are when it comes to building their own learning.  

• “Translanguaging pedagogy is about you and your students” (EAL Journal, 2016).

Nowadays, societies are more globalised than some years ago. As a consequence, multilingualism is rising up faster than we expect at schools. That’s why teachers should adjust their approaches to the real context of their classes. An alternative to that would be translanguaging. 

There are many students who are still learning the official language from the country they are currently living. For this reason, they have some difficulties in expressing themselves, which makes pupils’ confidence go down. In order to foster it, teachers must allow them to use their L1 when necessary. What’s more, teachers can take advantage of that to share cultural aspects about the countries students come from. For instance, I watched a video where a teacher uses translanguaging in a multilingual class. He sometimes speaks in Spanish to correct Maths exercises and even he says some French expressions. Furthermore, such teacher sticks on the whiteboard some steps that children must follow to do their Maths exercises in Spanish. To some extent, this is a way of scaffolding their learning through the language. Below you can watch the video I am talking about:

Translanguaging is also present in many places around the world. It is curious to observe many billboards or banners where Spanish is mixed to English. In fact, I realized that the famous “Spanglish” is not more than a way of translanguaging among English and Spanish societies. The following video shows different examples of that:

REFERENCES: 

EAL Journal (2016). What is translanguaging?. EAL Journal. Avalaible [online] on:
https://ealjournal.org/2016/07/26/what-is-translanguaging/

CLIL Session 1

Hi my dear bookworms!! 

Last Friday, I started a new subject called CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning). Specifically, we were proposed to plan a CLIL lesson in groups. So, I will make use of my blog to show you our progress while planning our "Didactic Unit". 

Laura, Aroa and I are the ARTS AND CRAFTS team!! Therefore, we have to desing a CLIL lesson based on such subject contents. On Friday, we did a quick brainstorming at class and we had a great idea... Do you want to see our CLIL lesson draft? Here you are some ideas I picked from our brainstorming: 

CLIL lesson ideas (brainstorming)

Our initial idea is to work self-portraits in a 4th grade-Primary class. Through such topic, we may work description (parts of the face), feelings, complex colours (turquoise, mustard...) and some painters (briefly). Furthermore, we considered that using SCRAPBOOKS in order to introduce or review basic vocabulary and grammar would be fun for pupils. Who is who? game is another idea we had once students have finished their self-portraits. 

Well, there are just a few ideas about what we want to achieve. Yet, we will specify more about our ideas next Friday at university!! 

Task 3: Myths about how languages are learnt

Hello bookworms!

Once having analysed what parents, educators and old students of my context think about early foreign languages learning, I will describe and analyse their answers:

1. Young children learn languages as a game and they are more motivated than older learners in Primary.

English  language learning as a game

Educators, parents as well as old students think that kids are more motivated than older learners in Primary, because games are an essential part of the class during their first years at school.  Specifically, one of the parents I asked stated that young children learn languages because “they have fun and don’t see foreign language learning as a duty, but as a game”. What’s more, some parents also made reference to the fact that “older children have different motivations”, which is what Carmen Muñoz (2000) says in Bilingualism and Trilingualism in school students in Catalonia: “young people are also attracted to English because of its value as a lingua franca for use in travelling abroad and communicating with foreign people”. Older students agree with parents and their opinions are similar.

Regarding educators, they consider that games are a good strategy and resource to motivate younger children to learn a foreign language. However, we have to take into account “what type of games teachers carry out in class”, one of the educators expressed.

2. The earlier you start learning a foreign language, the better results in written language.

English language learning

This statements is a little bit controversial due to the different opinions I was given by educators and parents. Specifically, some parents think that “children have more abilities to develop writing skills since early ages”; they consider that the more inputs they receive, the more outputs there will be in the future. Nevertheless, other parents and also educators don’t agree this statement saying that younger children “don’t have enough resources to practice or develop their writing skills. For example, three year-old kids don’t know to write yet”.

Older students are more open-minded and consider that “since early ages pupils are exposed to foreign languages materials such as readings, songs, games, etc. that can develop indirectly their writing skills. If they are used to reading these kind of materials, they will assimilate some writing issues”. As far as I am concerned, it was interesting listening to such opinions, so most people are convinced that receiving inputs without producing immediate outputs doesn’t mean that children cannot do it in the future.

3. Children are like sponges because they have more resources to learn a new language.

All three educators, parents and old students agree this statement. Actually, their opinions express the same ideas: “the earlier kids are exposed to a new language, the more links they set in their brains. Therefore, they build a clearer structure than an adult”.

I consider that this statement may have been considered true by the majority of people because bilingualism in Catalonia is a fact, I mean all children are exposed to Catalan and Spanish since they born and they learn both languages without problems. That’s why some parents consider that a new language such as English will not be difficult for children who are used to using both Spanish and Catalan.

 4. Children cannot speak a foreign language while learning it but they can understand it.

This statement was also considered true by educators, parents and old students. However their opinions were different. For instance, some parents think that children “can understand general information given that they have developed basic listening skills in such foreign language”. Others say that children can understand a language without speaking it because “they have not enough confidence to speak a foreign language”.

Educators consider that children cannot speak a foreign language, but understand it because “their listening skills are more developed than speaking ones”. On the other hand, old learners believe that children “cannot difference language structures, but understand them. Yet, when they get older, they will be able to set links and apply all what they have learnt”.

5. Is the early introduction English going to affect the development of the other 2 languages?

Educators, parents and old students answered “no” to such question. They believe that “children cannot confuse all 3 languages when learning them, so they can learn more than one language at the same time”. Specifically, one of old learners state that “it (English) can actually make easier the learning of new foreign languages”.

Bilingualism in Catalonia

In any case, English doesn’t affect negatively to Spanish or Catalan development. Indeed, bilingualism in Catalonia is positive for introduction of other foreign languages at early ages. That’s why young children develop some metacognitive abilities that imply language transfer strategies and interlanguage dependence. Nevertheless, we may take into account that these cognitive benefits only take place if young pupils are exposed to massive inputs in formal or natural contexts (Cenoz, n.d.).

MY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE: 

Personally, I would like to tell my experience related to early foreign language learning, since I consider important my parents decision when I was just a child. My parents didn’t want to join me in an academy when I was 6 years old, my Primary teachers even insist on being enrolled in a language schools. However, my parents didn’t consider that it was necessary for me receiving extra classes of English until I was on Secondary schools.

Despite my parents didn’t want to join me in an academy, I insisted on going to one because I loved all what I did in my Primary English classes. Then, when I started secondary school, my parents gave me the opportunity to improve my English, but I refused it. It wasn’t until I was 16 years old that I ask my parents for enrolling an academy. My main motivation was my educational and professional future, not having fun as I expected when I was just a child.

It was frustrating observing how some of my classmates had more English skills than me. Here it was when I blame my parent for not having enjoined me in an academy when I was 6 years old. I thought that the sooner, the better. However, I could observe how in just 6 years I improved my English until getting an advanced level. It was thanks to lots of strategies I set to learn vocabulary, expressions, grammar and so on (some of them are the same ones I use for Catalan and Spanish); lot of practice during the week in the academy through role playing and communicative situations.

French language learning

I would also like to highlight that in 3^rd of secondary I chose French as 2^nd foreign language. It was fun observing that I mixed French and English because some words were similar in both languages. Later, I learnt to difference them by using some strategies. However, I didn’t consider it a negative fact; actually, mixing languages means that learners are building a strategies network and are transferring knowledge from one language to another. In such transfer, there may be mistakes related to foreign languages learning process.



CONCLUSION:

In conclusion, I strongly believe that most parents and educators are concerned about English early learning because they are influenced by society. I mean the more languages you master, the more professional prospects you will have. That’s why parents want their sons to learn it since they born.

What’s more, another issue for parents and educators is the insignificant number of hours schools teach studentsEnglish. Consequently, most parents think of enrolling their children to academies or language schools. However, schools are increasing English hours in class by applying CLIL approach. Thereby, pupils develop English language skills at the same time they learn Science, Maths or Geography contents, for instance. 

In the case of academies, I must highlight that a vast majority of them apply a communicative approach, which is meaningful for English learning. Nevertheless, pupils only go 2 days per week, which is few for developing proficiency skills. 

To sum up, Catalonia situation is absolutely advantageous for learning foreign languages, so bilingualism allow pupils to transfer their knowledge (from L1 and L2) to L3 acquisition; this transfer implies language interdependence and learning strategies. This process would be like learning to divide: if we know to add, substract or multiply, we will be able to do a division. 

Task 2: Teaching different languages in Saint George School

Hi bookworms!

Today, I am going to show you what have been my observations after having analysed the linguistic context of the academy where I work. These observations have been done in a chart format so that it could be appreciated the differences between the different teachers’ methodology.

First of all, I should mention that more or less 40% of students are sons or daughters of immigrants from South American, China or Morocco; the other 60% are Spanish. However, it is not a problem for learning English because all these children are totally integrated in Catalan schools; therefore, students speak either Spanish or Catalan without difficulties.

Teachers	Group-age	Group Level	Language in use	Materials	Plurilingual strategies
1	1st  -  4th E.S.O.	English reinforcement	30% English 70% Spanish	-Book + CD -Photocopies made by the teacher	-Translations -Translanguaging - Preview view review
Observations	All grammar explanations are made in Spanish, but exercises are expected to do in English (preview view review). The communication students-teacher is a mix of English and Spanish or Catalan. Heteroglossic pedagogy: Both teacher and students understand each other either use English or Spanish/Catalan to explain formal aspect of English language (structures).
2	4th E.S.O. – 1st “bachillerato”	PET Pre-FIRST	100% English Just Spanish for translations or jokes	-Book + CD -Photocopies made by the teacher -Films and songs in English	-Translations
Observations	Monoglossic pedagogy: this teacher uses a communicative approach, which is positive for students’ learning. However, she does not let pupils speak in Spanish nor Catalan. Therefore, she considers English teaching must be separated from other languages.
3	“bachillerato” and university students	FIRST CAE	100% English	-Book + CD -Digital board (oral activities, examples) -Songs	- Translations - Paraphrasing - Transfer knowledge strategies.
Observations	Heteroglossic pedagogy: If students make a mistake, she let them express their ideas without correcting; she only corrects them if it is a huge mistake. The teacher also allows students to express difficult ideas in Spanish or Catalan and motivates them to look for strategies to express these complex ideas in English. Sometimes, students speak among them in Spanish, Catalan and English at the same time. There is no difficulties to change from one language to another. Nevertheless, the teacher only uses English or a little bit of Spanish to make some translations.
4	1st -  3rd Primary	Flyers Beginners	50% Spanish 50% English	-Book +CD -Interactive activities on computers -Songs, films -Oral presentations -Cultural activities	-Translations -Preview view review
Observations	Monoglossic pedagogy: All activities done in class are bounded to learn vocabulary, basic grammar structures and promote oral communication. The teacher focuses more on pronunciation and fluency than communication in class. As teacher 1, some explanations are done in Spanish or Catalan, but exercises and other activities in English.
5	4th-6th Primary 1st and 2nd E.S.O.	PET Pre-First	90% English 10% Spanish	-Book + CD -Interactive activities on computers, -Songs, films -Oral presentations -Cultural activities	-Translations -Paraphrasing -Guessing games -Mimics
Observations	Monoglossic pedagogy: The teacher try to use just English for communicating ideas to students. Her objective is promoting communication spaces in class. That’s why, she puts into practice strategies where she has not to use so much Spanish or Catalan languages.
6	2nd “bachillerato”, university students and adults	CAE PROFICIENCY	100% English Native teacher from U.S.A.	-Book + CD -Computer activities -Speaking dynamics	-Paraphrasing -Mimics -Students translations (dictionaries) -Translanguaging
Observations	Heteroglossic pedagogy: He teaches in a meaningful and communicative way. All the class is in English, so students may make an extra effort to adjust their minds to a real English context (the teacher does not speak Spanish nor Catalan). There are a lot of plurilingual strategies in these classes. The teacher only corrects huge mistakes that can make difficult communication; other mistakes such as pronunciation ones are corrected just in specific cases. I must highlight that this teacher allows students to communicate in their L1 or L2 and sometimes he tries to be integrated in pupils’ conversations in order to learn some Spanish/Catalan expressions or words. Therefore, students help one each other in Spanish/Catalan, but often they start solving their doubts in English without noticing it. The teacher usually ask pupils to translate their conclusions or conversations to English, but it is important to state that there is no languages prohibitions.

As I could observe, there is a mix of monoglossic and heteroglossic pedagogies, since each teacher has different conceptions about teaching English. Generally talking, Saint George School academy aims to prepare their students to take Cambridge official exams. That’s why, the majority of teachers are expected to use formal approaches in order to teach English. However, teachers try to introduce communication approaches and other activities that motivate pupils to learn English in a meaningful way. For example, some teachers plan classes where students watch a film and then discuss some aspects of it; I consider that this is a good task for implementing English without following formal book activities.

 However, what it is really important is how it is treated plurilingualism in class. Teachers who follows a monoglossic pedagogy try to use just English because they feel that the best way to achieve a good command of language is being immersed in it. Teacher feel that speaking in Spanish/Catalan is not a good strategy to introduce some formal concepts (as teacher 1 does). In my case, I understand such feeling of guiltiness when I use Spanish for translating or explaining a formal aspect to children. However, some researches state that “bilingualism has a great positive influence in third language acquisition” (Cenoz & Genesee, 1998).  Actually, these benefits comes from “linguistic interdependence, the major metalinguistic awareness development and strategies of languages learning” (Cenoz, n.d.). Therefore, what is the problem to use Spanish or Catalan in class? What’s more, why shouldn’t we allow our students to speak their L1 and L2 in class?

Some plurilingual strategies I could observe are extremely interesting. For example, teacher number 6 comes from U.S.A. (Los Ángeles, California), so he does know a little bit of Spanish and Catalan. His classes are absolutely plurilingual which is positive for developing lots of strategies. Students speak Spanish/Catalan and even English among them for making clear some formal aspects of grammar or vocabulary; there is no languages prohibitions, so communication is essential in this class, independently the language you use. 

The unique rule this teacher sets is trying to communicate ideas in English; it doesn’t matter how long you take to build your ideas in your brain, the objective is learning to set connexions. In fact, I have evidences of adults that had a rusty English and they have improved a lot their communication skills in just 6 months by following such approach. For instance, in my case, I was enrolled in a 4 months intensive course with this teacher because I wanted to pass my Advanced Exam. Not only I got my Advanced Certificate in English, but I also improved a lot my English communication skills.

In case of translanguaging strategies, I think they are positive for students so that they can set links between their L1/L2 and English in an easier way. However, the objective of learning a language is communication. That’s why, I consider that formal aspects sometimes should be integrated as a part of oral communication activities in class, as it is the case of teacher number 6. Yet, we must take into account that this teacher is English native speaker and students are who solve their doubts among them by using Catalan/Spanish.

In conclusion, Saint George School academy mixes heteroglossic and monoglossic pedagogies, but I have evidences explained above that heteroglossic pedagogy works better. On the one hand, children set links between their L1/L2 knowledge and English (L3). On the other hand, they feel comfortable and don’t doubt to express themselves either English or Catalan/Spanish.

I also must highlight that Saint George School academy offers language exchanges for adults and cultural activities during the course for kids. In fact, there is offered a summer camp in July and August for children and teenagers where they can practice their English through communicative activities. In these cases, we can observe an heteroglossic pedagogy, since during all summer camp children communicate among them in Spanish or Catalan (it is unavoidable) and English in specific activities done with teacher’s control and guidance.

 More information about Saint George School: http://stgeorgeschool.es/