Technology: a Multicultural Space to Express in L2 in Monolingual Environments

Margareth Marmolejo

                                                                                                                                                   
 

As economy moves the world (Dwyre, 2009), being competitive has arisen as a clue to achieve better work possibilities. Nowadays, being bilingual is a must around the world, that is why bilingual education is highly estimated. Out of the different types of bilingual education, Immersion Bilingual Education is one of the most applied types in bilingual schools located in monolingual environments (Cummins & Swain, 1986). Nevertheless, some researchers have found that many immersion bilingual students are not bicultural and do not develop completely their expressive skills in the second language because they do not have spaces or activities to produce in spoken and written second language. Regarding this fact, I believe necessary to consider the role of culture but overall the role of technology in the Foreign Language Classroom (FLC) as tools to help students to become balanced bilinguals. This topic can be considered relevant because it concerns current teaching problems such as developing student skills within a social context. This paper is written especially for students in training but also for practicing teachers.

First, let us know that a balanced bilingual is a person who is able to use the languages (the native and second one) more or less with the same level of proficiency. Now, let us take a look to what immersion bilingual education is. This type of bilingual education is the result of some experiments done in 1965, Canada, in kindergartens where English speaking children (their first language, L1) were taught in a non-English language (L2) in their first stages of learning. As they went through higher grades they were taught both English and the non-English language in a balanced way. At the end of their high school studies, they were taught most of the curriculum in English, mainly, rather than in the second language (L2). Children taught through this type of education were able to understand reading and listening and to write and speak in the L2 as well as in L1, that is to say they were balanced bilinguals (Baker, 2011). As the result of immersion education was positive, many schools throughout the world have adopted it, even where the environment does not allow children to have a direct contact with the second language.

According to Cummins, (1998) the French immersion program evaluations done in Canada, showed there were significant gaps between immersion program speakers and native speakers in spoken and written French as well as ignorance to some cultural aspects of French. Harley, Allen, Cummins, y Swain (1991) have found that by the end of 6^th grade, students’ receptive skills are better than expressive skills because in most of the bilingual immersion programs, the school and especially the class are the only places available for students to express themselves in the foreign language. Consequently, many authors have researched on how to improve the students’ performance in L2 even if they are in monolingual communities. As it was said before, teaching culture through technology is one way of improving expressive skills. Let us see why.

Moran (2001) defines culture as “… the evolving life of a group of persons, consisting of a shared set of practices associated with a shared set of products [language], based upon a shared set of perspectives [perceptions, beliefs, values and attitudes] on the world, and set within specific social contexts” (p. 24). We can say then, that language and culture are integral to one another. However, they also determine how those norms and values are shared because language is the one of through which culture is transmitted. The study of culture in the classroom aims at helping students achieve an integral understanding in order to communicate successfully in different contexts.

Of course, teaching culture is avoided by many educators for several reasons drawn by Lange (1998): they may feel that students at lower proficiency levels are not ready for it yet; they may feel that it is additional material that they simply do not have time to teach; in the case of formal culture, they may feel that they do not know enough about it themselves to teach it adequately; in the case of popular culture, they may feel that it is not worth teaching it. In addition to this, some people argue that language learning comes first, and culture learning second, and students need to learn the language in order to truly appreciate the culture but they do not need to learn about the culture in order to truly comprehend the language. Although, if part of what was mentioned is true, teaching communication without teaching culture might be enough for “survival and routine transactions” (Byram, 1989: 40-41). Communicative competence is incomplete without cultural awareness and understanding (Mountford & Wadham-Smith, 2000).

Moreover, teachers have at present times the technology revolution as a tool for teaching culture. Technology, especially the Internet, can provide access to authentic sources of language that are simply unavailable any other way. Via technology, students have the opportunity to engage in interpersonal communication with native speakers through e-mail exchanges, real-time “chats”, video conferencing, etc. A class can be set up on a website through which students and teachers can communicate with each other in the target language. It is important to say that teachers should creatively use technology but not rely on it alone.

In conclusion, immersion bilingual schools and other bilingual schools, at their aim to create biliterate students can easily forget that being bilingual includes also being bicultural (Baker, 2011). Class-centered immersions, where understanding reading and listening are the main purposes, inhibit students to produce in the second language. One way of solving this problem is using technology as a strategy to foster students’ expressive skills while learning the second language culture. Some authors (Scinicariello, 1995; Hertel, 2003) have studied the good impact technology has had on students’ written and spoken skills at different learning levels. So why not try it.