Embodied Cognitive Experiential Learning in a Multicultural Foreign Language Classroom
Béatrice Boufoy-Bastick, Trinidad and Tobago
Dr. Béatrice Boufoy-Bastick lectures in French at the Department of Liberal Arts, the University of the West Indies in St. Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago. She has wide cross-cultural experience of teaching and she has an interest in developing innovative culturally sensitive language teaching methods. Her latest book "Academic Attainments and Cultural Values" explores the interaction of language teaching and culture. Email: bboufoybastick@gmail.com, bbastick@fhe.uwi.tt
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Abstract
Introduction
Using subjectivist pedagogy for enhanced foreign language learning
Utilising multi-modal subjectivist pedagogy in a French as a foreign language class
The six integrative multi-modal activities
Conclusion
References
This paper discusses the need for language learning methods designed to capitalize on the rich cultural diversity of students in today's multicultural societies. It introduces psycho-pedagogical principles from embodied cognition theory and shows how these were successfully applied to enhance the learning of French as a foreign language in a multicultural class.
The paper underlines the importance of promoting language proficiency by designing language curricula aimed to maximise educational attainments for all students. European political integration together with the economic globalisation of trade with its inherent labour movements now makes it an imperative to speak a foreign language for professional recognition and social mobility. Foreign language teaching is no longer the preserve of elitist schools and increasing numbers of culturally diverse students are expected to develop functional competence in English and at least in another language. European national educational systems are now mandated to devise inclusive foreign language curricula which are responsive to the cognitive needs of all students. This mandate has major pedagogical implications and is a challenge to language teachers who need to develop techniques to utilise effectively this student diversity. In response to such a pedagogical challenge, a culturally responsive language teaching approach using multimodal subjectivist techniques is presented. This paper presents these powerful techniques aimed at empowering students through enhancing positive feelings of learning using illustrative examples from a subjectivist French as a foreign language lesson.
This paper recognises the importance of language competence for social, economic and political development within an increasingly globalised world. While the last quarter of the 20th century recognised the status of regional and national languages (European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, 1992) as fundamental tools for cultural recognition and social unification, the 21st century is set to place greater emphasis on the role of foreign languages within an increasingly economically and politically integrated Europe. A major implication for European national education systems is the need to devise language curricula which maximize attainments for all students not only in their mother tongue but also in at least one foreign language. Providing quality language learning to large culturally and intellectually diverse student populations is a pedagogical challenge which can be met through a culturally responsive subjectivist language teaching methodology. This paper presents such a methodology and shows how its integral powerful multimodal subjectivist techniques were successfully tested in a multi-ethnic, multi-ability and multi-age French foreign language class.
Subjectivist language teaching is a psycho-pedagogical response to educational changes. It aims to provide empowering experiences for all students through engrossing learning tasks. Its main characteristics are described below.
Theoretical stance of subjectivist language pedagogy
Subjectivist language teaching is an application of Bastick's (1998; 1999a; 1999b, 1999c) 'Subjectivism' to language teaching. Subjectivism is an Embodied-Cognitive Theory (Brown & Reid, 2006; Niedenthal, Barsalou, Winkielman, Krauth-Gruber & Ric 2005), and Subjective teaching is one of its applications to Education (Bastick, 2003). Subjectivist teaching aims to enhance learning by utilising the personal 'subjective' feelings that accompany learning, that is it uses affect-structured constructivist language methodology to emphasise feelings and emotions that increase cognitive learning (Kramsch, 1997; Lozanov, 1979; McCarthy, Mejia & Liu, 2000). Fundamental characteristics of multi-modal language pedagogy are the indivisibility of affect and cognition of all learning experiences that occur in the language classroom. These methods utilise developmentally appropriate cognitive and affective activities and the use of techniques of 'enculturation' for learner 'empowerment' (Bastick, 2003, p. 210).
Enculturation is the process through which competent language users develop their linguistic skills and their socio-cultural understanding. This enculturation is a natural process which is enhanced in the classroom by designing learning activities that enable the language learner to rapidly internalise the culture of the subject (Jacobson, 1996). The use of 'enculturation' techniques in the classroom is intended to sensitise the learner to the values inherent to the culture of the discipline.
Learner 'empowerment' is the process by which the learner grows as a self-directed life-long learner (Martinez, 2001). The process of empowerment is demonstrated by the learner's autonomy in choosing what best to learn and how best to learn it. To this end, the role of the language educator is to provide sufficient diverse learning experiences from which the learner can make informed decisions towards empowerment.
The two theoretical principles of 'enculturation' and 'empowerment' are articulated in pedagogic activities designed to guarantee the learner's success (Salmon, 1996). These activities, called 'surface purposes', range from simple rote-learning games to complex needs-driven social communication tasks. These surface purpose activities distract students' attention from the 'pedagogic purpose' of the teacher by focusing the learner's awareness on the surface purpose of the activity. These activities use three subjectivist affect-structuring techniques. These are: an emotional anchor (for task-focusing), a cognitive direction (for learner guidance) and a motivator (for activity engagement). These three techniques are demonstrated in the French foreign language class described below.
Subjectivist language pedagogy was successfully used in the experiential French foreign language class presented here.
Methodological design
Participants: This multi-modal experiential French lesson was taught to a multi-cultural, mixed-age and mixed-ability class. The participants were 23 students and 3 adults from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds. The students were from grades 9 to 13 of a local International School. It is important to stress that the multi-facetted diversity of the participants is an exaggeration of the diversity found in traditional streamed single-age classrooms. This extreme diversity is to show more clearly how subjectivist language pedagogy can be used to positively utilise the diversity that is found to be problematic in more traditional language classrooms.
The participants were divided into two proto-groups ('Conservative For' and 'Green Against'), which were further divided into two smaller working sub-groups. The participants' division into four small groups of 5 or 6 was to optimise involvement and facilitate in-group convivial communication and inter-group competition.
Description of the learning situation: The context of the learning situation was the main setting for the lesson followed by six integrated activities culminating in a 'For vs. Against' debate and ballot on French nuclear testing in the Pacific. The methodological design for each activity is a mini-example of the methodological design of the whole lesson. The whole lesson was choreographed so as to maximise students' participation as befitting their varied levels of linguistic and cognitive development. One student proto-group was encouraged to represent the Conservative party in favour of nuclear testing, whereas the other proto-group chose the ecological Green party and were against nuclear testing. Students wrote their names on iconic labels and wore them to enhance identification with their roles.
Identifying the surface and pedagogic purposes: The culminating surface purpose of the lesson was a debate and a ballot on nuclear testing. This surface purpose was chosen because learners were self-motivated by the opportunity to express their disapproval of nuclear testing. The personal involvement and strong feelings of the French learners in this newsworthy topic were utilised for the initial setting of the lesson which consisted of the main emotional anchor to hold their emotion for the duration of the lesson, the main motivator making them want to participate, showing them how to participate and confirming that they can successfully do so, and the cognitive direction carrying the motivation into showing them how to start. The emotional anchor was a commercial video news clip of an official spokesperson, a General, supporting arguments on nuclear testing and showing the bomb blast rupturing their peaceful South Pacific paradise.
This was chosen as the highly arousing emotional anchor for the lesson because it was a current news issue about which all students had recently demonstrated and felt vehemently abhorrent. An interview with a popular member of the class had been edited into the prepared video of the official pro-spokesperson as a motivator with which students readily identified, implying that they had an equal public voice and right to speak and the ability to successfully speak publicly on the issue. The cognitive direction was the simplifying stark question 'Pour ou Contre les essais nucléaires' (For or Against nuclear testing) suddenly presented in a different black and white medium to call them back to imminent action.
The pedagogic purpose was to learn and practise an argument register in French. This was articulated through six language activities such that each was a supporting foundation for the next, namely (i) headlining a news article, (ii) listing arguments For or Against, (iii) selecting one's argument, (iv) phrasing one's argument as a question, (v) presenting one's argument, and finally (vi) expressing one's true opinion on the issue of nuclear testing. These six communication-driven activities aimed at the integrative use of the four language skills of speaking, listening, reading and writing through the cooperation-directed design, that is, by encouraging individual contributions, practising them, and bringing each individual's contributions together in small groups before having them appreciated by the whole class. The pedagogical purpose of this experiential French class was achieved when each participant presented his or her argument at the level of complexity reflecting his or her maximum linguistic and cognitive competence.
The following description of the six integrative language activities shows how both the surface purposes and the pedagogical purposes were achieved.
The surface purpose for each activity utilised a feasible and energising communicative role-play. The description of these activities is intended to show how this energy of the class is choreographed and how needs-driven communication is privileged. These brief descriptions of the six constituent activities are organized by (i) presenting the setting, (ii) describing the surface purpose, and (iii) describing the hidden pedagogic purpose for each activity. Each description is followed by an explanation of the methodological design for the activity. This affords six illustrative explanatory examples of the application of multimodal subjectivist methodology to foreign language teaching. As the methodology for each activity is a mini-version of the methodology of the whole lesson, the setting for each activity comprises an emotional anchor, motivator and cognitive direction with the same functions as those in the main setting.
Activity 1: Headline that article
Setting: Each group of participants is a small group of investigative journalists working in a Paris news office.
Surface purpose: As investigative journalists, the learners need to find a suitable headline for a news article. When the students have decided on a headline for their group, they put it on the editor's desk, simulated by the teacher's overhead projector.
Pedagogic purposes: (i) practising reading French for understanding to a socially-defined standard (ii) communicating to agree on a one-line headline for their group and (iii) practising and learning relevant lexical register.
Methodological design of the activity: In this first activity, the teacher suggests party membership. A balance of ability is necessary in each group, and both proto-groups included participants from different ability levels. Participants from each proto-group choose one of the two sub-groups, but subtle changes are encouraged to ensure a balance of ability between sub-groups. Abilities needed for this activity are an intermediate level of French to summarize the article, a high level of French to confirm the authenticity of the summary against the original article, and a low level of French to suggest headlines and choose the 'best' headline.
The implicit requirements of this activity encourage relevant communication in the groups and ensure needs-driven communication. Practice slips are provided so that students can try out a headline before committing the group to one answer. The same article is given to each group, so that the contributions can be compared. This implicit comparison uses the same energy for completion that is generated in the groups and it also gives implicit feedback on the quality of the group's efforts. Note that 'empowerment' comes from peer recognition and never from teacher approval. In particular, the least able needs and receives high empowerment. In this activity the students with the least ability have equal 'power' to judge the work of the most able. The teacher is careful to maintain participants' empowerment and the potential of each contribution being the best by avoiding giving 'authoritative' comparative evaluations of the groups' contributions.
Activity 2: List arguments 'Pour ou Contre'
Setting: Each group of participants is a small group of political researchers working for potential spokespeople (ministers) as in the party's research office.
Surface purpose: The less proficient participants have to find and discuss arguments to give to their most proficient group members who are to represent them as official party spokespeople. The group members also need to be aware of what counter questions 'journalists' might ask against their arguments.
Pedagogic purpose: Further practice of skills introduced in the first activity and integrative use of the four language skills.
Methodological design of the activity: The pedagogical purpose is the same as in activity one. However, rather than by extending activity 1 e.g. by giving more articles to headline, the energy of the class is intensified by recasting the pedagogic purpose in a different surface purpose, This difference in surface purpose was enhanced by physically transforming the workstations from 'newsrooms' to 'party research offices' and by arranging the party membership so that all students physically moved to different workstations. This physical re-positioning was unnecessary for the pedagogic purpose and was included to enhance the surfaced activity. Notice again that the least proficient have high empowerment by choosing arguments for the most proficient to present as their spokespersons. The arguments "for" and "against" were then summarized and listed on sheets provided. This was an open-ended activity - it could have gone on indefinitely. It was stopped when the energy of the class was at the highest - even though all arguments, or even the best arguments, may not have been recorded. The atmosphere was choreographed to give a sense of urgency-building to the controlled climax of the ballot result, in the same way as the media build the climax to an election result. To add to this affective energising 'urgency', the next activity, Activity 3, was cut short by an 'unexpected' event, which was itself cut short by Activity 4, the live TV debate.
Activity 3: Choosing your arguments
Setting: At the party central office. Each party member chooses an argument with which, he or she, feels comfortable. Then, he or she agrees with the party leader to one or two roles, to be the official party spokesperson for this argument, and/or to be an investigative journalist, to use his or her argument in the form of a question to ask the opposition at the time of the debate.
Surface purpose: Party leaders agree who should be the official party spokespersons for the various arguments in the coming debate and prepare journalists with challenging questions for the Opposition. Each spokesperson has to choose an argument that, he or she, can repeat in the TV debate, and which the most able can defend when questioned by opposing journalists.
Pedagogic purpose: To focus the learners on smaller content areas in which they can achieve high mastery level and inevitable success/empowerment as judged by social/peer approval from the whole class.
Methodological design of the activity: This activity builds on the previous activity. It is a larger group activity in that the two previous sub-groups from the last activity re-combined into one proto-group for this activity. Students bring and share their lists from the previous activity. The surface purpose motivation for this activity is that it is an administrative necessity to prevent duplication of arguments in front of the media, that is each student has to have his or her own argument. In addition, for the debate, the party leader needs to know whom to call as a spokesperson for each argument. These administrative difficulties are utilized by the surface purpose of a party needing only one official spokesperson for each argument, and for the leader needing to agree to this. So, within the surface purpose, the leader confirms each participant's written choice of argument or question for the next activities. Having the arguments and questions written also gives participants the security of being able to always refer to their written record. Within the surface purpose this record acts as a confirmation record/contract of their assigned role as official party spokesperson or journalist. Although each participant can choose the argument with which, he or she feels most comfortable, it is in the party's interest that the lower ability students are given preference of choice and 'coached' by party members of higher ability. This ensures peer-teaching within needs-driven communication for this activity. When the energy peaks, this activity is interrupted by a fourth 'surprise' activity.
Activity 4: Interviewing the whistle-blowers
Setting: Learners, in their roles as journalists, have a tip-off to go to a warehouse and to a hotel room for inside information that might help them win the coming debate. The classroom is thrown into darkness, lit only by lights on the faces of each 'whistle-blower' at opposite corners of the room.
Surface purpose: Anonymous party defectors are willing to 'spill the beans' and divulge confidential information about nuclear testing at the last moment before the debate. This can help investigative journalists to expose the official spokespeople who support (or oppose) nuclear testing during the coming live TV debate, by asking the 'right' questions.
Pedagogic purpose: The whistle-blowers, and where necessary their aids, are chosen from reasonably competent speakers so that the participants can, by phrasing their argument as a question, both practise and hear French relevant to increasing their mastery of their chosen content, further guaranteeing their public success in the imminent debating activity.
Methodological of the activity: To enhance the emotional change between surface activities the change was rapid - to take advantage of this unexpected opportunity - the classroom went from light to semi-darkness. The intimate setting of the warehouse and hotel room workstations in the darkened room contrasted markedly with the open setting of the last activity. This activity is duplicated in two medium-sized groups to give the students double the opportunity to practise and hear relevant French lexicon. This is achieved by having the two workstations: a warehouse and a hotel room at opposite corners of the classroom so the 'sound' is separate. The journalists then move as they choose between the two sites. Two smaller groups were chosen rather than one large group so that all students would be able to speak more spontaneously to a 'whistle-blower'. Again, at the height of the class energy, this activity is also cut short, simply by switching on the lights to destroy the emotional ambience of the warehouse and hotel room settings, rather than by explicit instructions that would threaten the participants' autonomy. This is done by changing the lighting and sound in preparation for the TV debate.
Activity 5: The live TV debate
Setting: A TV studio with a presenter/compère (the teacher), an expert panel of the two party leaders and their aids who will call their official spokespeople, in front of the audience of investigative journalists.
Surface purposes: (i) the participants as spokespeople, have to convince the TV viewing public (the rest of the class not currently debating) of their party's point of view, Pour ou Contre les essais nucléaires dans le Pacifique, and (ii) the participants as investigative journalists in the audience, have to represent the viewing public, by asking searching questions of the official spokespeople, possibly exposing any hidden agenda as intimated by the whistle-blowers
Pedagogic purpose: To experience the greatest success/empowerment, in terms of social/peer approval of the whole class, by publicly demonstrating their practised competence at a high level of mastery in support of their shared endeavour.
Methodological design of the activity: Loud cacophonous music and bright lighting mark the change of activity. The loudness of the music encourages informal chatter amongst the students. The need for a 'television' camera accommodated the use of the camera taking a research record of the lesson. The teacher in her role as compère reminds the leaders that they can advise their spokespeople of official party policy, if they think it is necessary. This uses the surface purpose to enable the higher ability students to help the lower ability students in a 'win-win' situation ensuring success. The role of the compère/commentator allows the teacher some control hidden under the surface purpose, inter alia to encourage the students, and subtly to correct and simplify the students' French expression for the other students. This is achieved under the guise of explaining for the 'less knowledgeable' viewing public.
This activity is designed to ensure that every student experiences maximum success of learning to the limit of his or her ability. The minimum any student is expected to do is simply to repeat his or her argument, as it is written on the sheet they have carried since the third activity, and they have practised in the fourth activity. Hence, every student can successfully fulfil the requirements of the surface purpose. Some higher ability students have confidently discarded their written sheets and are ready with investigative questions. What drives the students to speak to the limit of their ability is their involvement in the surface purpose. Their need to communicate is greater than their accuracy in using their new learning. Thus, the teacher has to be skilful and sensitive in maintaining the effectiveness of the pedagogic purpose (accuracy) yet maintaining such a high emphasis on the surface purpose that the pedagogy used to meet the objectives (i.e. to learn and to practise argumentation in French) remains totally below the students' awareness. To this end, two techniques are employed in this activity to ensure that the surface purpose remains paramount, while best achieving the invisible pedagogic purpose. The first technique is to model the standard of skills required, whereas the second technique is to allow some inaccuracies compatible with the students' needs, even to the extent of allowing some English intrusions.
Activity 6: The ballot
Setting: A French polling station where everyone casts his or her vote 'Pour ou Contre les essais nucléaires dans le Pacifique'. A ballot box is on the table.
Surface purpose: To ascertain the public's opinion - the winners of the debate.
Pedagogic purpose: Throughout the lesson it was necessary for the learners to support arguments to which they were opposed. This ballot resolves any dissonance that may have arisen, first, by allowing the learners to vote for their true opinion, and then, by rewarding them, for their participation in the lesson by giving them the result they all want, that is, to express their disapproval of nuclear testing in the Pacific - this outcome fulfils the surface purpose of the lesson and resolves their intrinsic motivation to take part. The ballot also gives opportunities to further enculturate students by demonstrating how the French vote. This cultural addition is made relevant to the lesson by the surface purpose ballot activity chosen to close the lesson.
Methodological design of the activity: This last activity has three major functions. First, it is intended to influence positively any re-constructed memory of the lesson. Secondly, it is expected to motivate further learning. Thirdly, it acts as a de-briefing bridge between the illusion of the surface purpose and the reality of the lesson's end. The purpose is to de-emphasize the students' roles in the surface purpose and simultaneously to raise their awareness of having been successfully and enjoyably learning French language and culture. A cultural insight into French voting is given in this last activity. Students cast their votes The votes are then separated into those "for" and those "against" and counted in French. The students finally choose one student to announce the result of the ballot. As it is expected, the students naturally choose whom they consider to be the most deserving student - the one who will benefit from the most empowerment. The lesson ends with their chosen student proclaiming the result, which is the needed 'Contre' result, to the applause of class peer approval for her. This grand finale also signals the official end of these enculturation and empowerment activities.
Evaluating the pedagogical success of the subjectivist French language class
Qualitative and quantitative student feedback is used to improve teaching and learning (Alvarez, 2001; Shepard, 2000) rather than merely assess the obvious improvements in language use, which can be done more rigorously by traditional language testing. The success of Subjectivist teaching is in the degree of Empowerment and Enculturation engendered by the activities. An indicator of this success is students' lack of awareness of the pedagogic purposes and teaching methodologies used to achieve them. To this end, the students who participated in this Enhanced French language class were asked to state what they liked or disliked, and to rate their liking on a ten-point scale. Content analysis of the students' evaluative feedback showed the lesson was very successful in that no reference was made to any of the pedagogic purposes or teaching methodologies as described above. The feedback students gave only referred to liking or disliking aspects of their experiences within the surface purposes. The content analysis showed that the students were totally engrossed in the surface purposes of the lesson and no attention was given to the pedagogic purposes or methodologies. For example, it was not unexpected that the most prevalent dislike came from the students who were required to speak vehemently and convincingly against their own beliefs. As shown in the students' lesson feedback, this French language class through its multimodal subjectivist techniques engaged all students in collaborative learning tasks.
This paper presented aspects of a foreign language pedagogy which employ multimodal subjectivist strategies for promoting needs-driven collaboration and inter-communication between culturally and cognitively diverse students. It showed how subjectivist affect-driven strategies derived from embodied cognitive psychology can be used effectively to empower highly diverse students to communicate through French as a foreign language and to enculturate them into the accompanying values and attitudes of French culture. It is suggested that European national education systems can employ such methods to unlock the potential of students to reach the competences required globally in foreign languages.
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