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Articulating a foreign language sequence through content: A look at the culture standards

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2008

Heidi Byrnes
Heidi Byrnes*
Affiliation:
German Department, Georgetown University, USAbyrnesh@georgetown.edu
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Abstract

Curricular articulation and the integration of cultural knowledge with language development over extended sequences are among the most persistent challenges for contemporary language teaching and learning. The paper examines the nature of those challenges in light of theories of language and culture while using as the site of investigation the culture standards that have been developed within the framework of the Standards for Foreign Language Learning, a key document for L2 education in the United States, particularly at the K-12 level. Taking four perspectives, it suggests ways in which simultaneous content and language teaching might be tackled through a genre-based way of constructing extended curricula and by using genre-based tasks for informing pedagogical decisions. In this fashion, learners might be able to progress toward a competent cultural literacy that is language-based.

Type
Plenary Speeches
Information
Language Teaching , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , January 2008 , pp. 103 - 118
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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