Week 7. In-class writing

One thing that this week's readings have in common is that they take daily interactions that are normally conducted without a second thought and peel back the layers of culture and influence behind them to reveal almost infinite complexity.

When I as a teacher am talking to Takashi about his book review, the conversation is one thing to Takashi and quite another to me. My experience of the conversation is influenced by years of training and experience that have led me to see the information I'm offering as useful to Takashi. I'm influenced by my idea of what the relationship between student and teacher should be. I'm influenced by my opinions of Takashi himself - what kind of student he is, what kind of person, where he's from, what I know about his parents and friends, what interests we have in common, etc., ad infinitum. Takashi's experience of this conversation is influenced by his opinion of me, how much he cares about the assignment or class or subject, how he thinks he might be viewed by his friends and family, etc.

Human interaction is not only this complicated in the context of education, of course. Every interaction we have every day is this complex at its most basic level. If we thought about all of these things all the time, our heads would explode. All of us perform the function of sorting through these factors at incredible speed, though some are better at it than others.

I wish I could get the opinions of these authors on how exactly we should teach intercultural understanding/sensitivity/awareness (pick a word.) The ability to communicate across cultures is something that comes naturally to some people, in varying degrees. In order to create the kind of learning environment that Tharp and Gallimore describe or the kind that you might imagine Garcia would desire, all learners (kindergartener through superintendent) must have at least a rudimentary understanding what culture is. They also must possess a high degree of cultural tolerance and be eager to learn about other cultures. How do we make this happen?

The thing that is especially terrifying about all of this is that it is just the tip of the "cultural iceberg." Tharp and Gallimore spend a lot of time talking about all of the different ways people influence each other, and discussion of culture involves similar breakdowns of social and interpersonal influence. But culture is infinitely dynamic and too complex for anyone to sum up or map out. I guess what I'm getting at is that it seems like no amount of training or study can prepare you to look at a classroom full of thirty different cultures and get them all to learn with you.