Presentation at California TESOL 2003
Jill Robbins*
November 1, 2003
Culture Bumps: read the description of your country on the
paper, and interact with other participants ACCORDING TO THE
CHARACTERISTICS OF ‘YOUR’ COUNTRY (handout p. 19)
Overview of session
Schema Activation – Pre-Listening Activities: Activities to be
used before listening should help students to activate their background
knowledge of the topic (here, the topic is the problems of foreign
travel) One example is a research assignment on gestures. (handout
p. 4)
Listening and Speaking Strategies – a simplified set of
listening and speaking strategies was used in a listening textbook
written by Robbins & MacNeill, Impact Listening 2. (handout p.5)
Authentic Listening Extract – This is a transcript of a recorded
conversation between two college students. They are discussing their
language studies and a trip to Thailand. This conversation shows their
attitudes about studying languages and was used to develop the material
in this unit. It was scripted and re-recorded to become part of the
listening textbook. (handout p. 6)
Practice Activity for Low Intermediate students:
Text p. 16: Listening Task – (handout p. 8)
- Predict reasons for studying
- Focus
- a) on the language
- b) on the reason for studying it.
- Respond by saying what you think are good
reasons for studying a language
- Text p. 17 Real World Listening – (handout
p. 9)
- Predict what Dave will say about his
study of Thai
- Focus to hear main ideas about Dave’s
experience
- Respond to Dave’s statement with your own
opinion on English
- Review by discussing topic in Interaction
Link (text p. 53, handout p.10)
Practice Activity for High Intermediate students:
Students were asked to do a survey project. This gave them the
chance to talk more in depth about a topic of their choice and to
practice listening and other academic skills while gathering data,
analyzing, organizing and presenting it. (handout p. 14)Practice for Advanced students: Students prepare a speech on
a topic of their choice, or on “My life in ten years.” The Strategies
Based Instruction Approach is used (developed at University of
Minnesota under Andrew Cohen) to provide strategic support. (handout
p. 10, references p. 17)Evaluation activity: after using particular strategies,
students are asked which were helpful in their listening or speaking
activities. (handout p. 13)Q & A
Contact information: jill@jillrobbins.com
* This presentation is adapted from a joint presentation with Andrew J.
MacNeill at TESOL 2001, St. Louis, MO on March 3, 2001
Web resources:
Peter Snashall’s gestures/intercultural communication pages:
http://www.eslflow.com/customsliesgest.html
http://www.eslflow.com/interculturalcommunication.htmlImpact Listening Web Site
http://www.impactseries.comNationality Quizzes:
http://a4esl.org/q/j/ck/fb2-nationalities.html
http://a4esl.org/q/h/9704/ow-nationalty.htmlRandall’s Listening Lab – great resource for listening materials for
ESL, with quizzes and activities.
http://www.esl-lab.comStrategic Learning Unlimited (strategies resources)
http://jillrobbins.comNationality Quizzes: useful for students when talking about other
countries and languages –
http://a4esl.org/q/j/ck/fb2-nationalities.htmlSample
Research assignment on gestures
Gestures Around the World
(Worksheet for pre-listening schema building)
I. Go to the web site:
http://www.webofculture.com/previews/gestures_preview.asp
or read the book: Gestures : The Do’s and Taboos of Body Language
Around the World by Roger E. AxtellTry to find the answers to the following questions:
1. Which of the following are not rude in Belgium?
a. When you are talking with someone, place your hand
or hands in your pockets.
b. Slap someone on the back.
c. Shake hands with someone.2. How do you signal a waiter for a bill in England?
3. What should you do before you enter a mosque in Iran?
4. Do men and women shake hands in Mali?
5. Which hand should you use to pour wine in Chile?
6. If you visit Costa Rica, how often should you take a shower or bath?
7. What is the national drink of Mexico, and how do you drink it?
8. What should you do before entering a Korean home?
9. What is considered a sign of politeness and a good business skill in
Japan?10. What is the standard greeting in the United States?
II. Choose a country. What are the gestures used in that country? Write
down the interesting gestures and bring them to class tomorrow to
discuss with your classmates.
What country did you choose?
What are the interesting gestures or customs from that country?Transcript
of a conversation used to develop listening materialsN: Yeah. I’ve been to Thailand for a month, though.
P: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
N: That was cool.
P: They eat dogs in Thailand!
N: Do they? They don’t eat dogs in Thailand! Maybe Vietnam or
something. I stayed with a friend, so I got kinda like to see the not
the tourist I went to see tourist stuff, but I also got to see like his
life, too. And they spoke Thai at home, so I learned a little Thai.
P Yeah.
N: And that was good, ’cause I was with him for five weeks. And my
first impression was not like, Thailand is wrecked, but that people
were, I mean Thailand is known as the land of smiles, and it’s totally
true. People are so nice there. And of course, everyone knows I’m a
foreigner, just like they know I’m a foreigner sitting here in Japan.
No one cared. Everyone was so nice. When I was in Thailand, and here
I’ve never gotten so many stares in my entire life. It’s just like,
comparing the two, well, I love Japan, but Thailand was just a cool
place to visit. It was really hot. Everything was beautiful. The people
were beautiful. I learned a little Thai because I –
P: Particularly the women?
N: Particularly the women. So, that was a good experience. Then Japan.
P: That’s right, Japan.
N: What languages do you speak?
P: Japanese, sort of, and that’s about it.
N: Yeah, but you’re studying French., though! ,
P Well I was studying French but in about an hour I’m going to drop it.
N: Well, let’s see, I can pretend to speak Japanese, and
P: Spanish?
N: Yeah, Spanish was a required subject in high school, but I
can’t really remember it.
P: Oh, you’ll get right back into it if you go back to Spain, or
N: If I go back to study it.
P: Or, some espanol American town.
N: So, Japan. What were your first impressions of Japan?
P: Am I on the right planet? Totally, I’ve probably told you I’ve
never, before coming here, not only had I never gone anywhere on my
own, to another country on my own. I never lived in another country on
my own.
N: Me too.
P: And specific to Japan, I’d never tried any of the food. I’d barely
tried sake, there weren’t really many Japanese people in Manchester to
talk with. I didn’t really have any friends apart from the Japanese
senseis. When I came here the landscape was completely alien to me. The
way of life.
N: Yeah.
P: The heat. The first two weeks I came I thought, ‘”Oh God I wanna go
back!”
N: Yeah that’s kinda like, I had the same impression as you.
P: When did you go to Thailand?
N: When I was in high school.
P: What age?
N: Oh, gosh eight, seventeen maybe.
P: Well, yeah the last time I went on holiday was five or six years
ago. And it was with my family, and I only stayed there for two weeks,
and it was as a tourist. So, I’ve never had a chance like in the past
few years, to live closer to a native of that country.
N: Well I have the same impressions, when I got here, before I got here
I thought, oh Japan’s cool, Japan’s cool, and tried to get anything I
could get my hands on about Japan. And study it.
P: Hmm.
N: And I thought I knew everything that was goin’ on and I had Japanese
friends at school, and I loved: Japanese food before I came here. I
thought I’d have no problems, no culture shock, nothing. And I get
here, and boy was I shocked. Everything was as I pictured it, but ten
times more than that. And everything was so much different than what I
thought.
P: Can you go into any more depth? Like
N: Well, just everything, just little things, the streets, the trains,
the busses. You know, where’s my car you know.
P: Yeah.
N: And I never, and everybody told me that Japanese people are so
friendly, so nice, and they are, but I’ve never been stared at so
much.
P: Is that still a problem with you?
N: Yeah, it still really bothers me.
Impact Listening excerpt: It changed my life
Student Handout: Preparing to give a speech
1. What will you say to yourself before you give your
speech in our next class?My self-talk:
2. Draw a picture of what you will imagine before and during
your speech.(complete after delivering the speech)
3. What did you think about during your speech? Did you have
any images in mind? Did you do anything special right before you began
speaking?4. What did you think after seeing or hearing your speech?
Are there any problems you observed? What are they?
How will you try to avoid them next time?
Before speaking
Set a goal
Plan
Self-talk
Use imagery
RehearseWhile speaking
Use imagery
Monitor
Problem-solve
(self-correct)
Take risksAfter speaking
Check goal
Self-evaluate
Plan for
improvement
Before listening
Set a goal
Activate
background
knowledge
PredictWhile listening
Selectively attend
Make inferences
Use imageryAfter listening
Clarify
Summarize
Elaborate
Personalize
Check goal
Learning
Strategy Evaluation
Feedback sheet
Strategy
When I used it Helped Didn’t help predicting I listened to the traffic
reportyes
Developed by Andrew J. MacNeill,
Southwestern College, Chula Vista, CAListening & Speaking — MacNeill — Southwestern College
The Survey Project: Overview
For this project, you will work as a member of a team to conduct a
survey about an issue of your choice.
First, with your team members,
you will write questions to find out about the behaviors and opinions
of your classmates regarding this topic.Next, your team will ask your classmates and students
on campus these questions; you will ask them orally so that you can
develop your speaking and listening skills in English.
Then, your group will present
your findings to the next week in class. The presentation will be 8-10
minutes. This presentation is worth 30 points.Evaluation of the Survey
Presentation
The grade for your survey project is a combination of a
group grade and an individual score; everyone in the group might not
get the same grade. Your presentation will be evaluated using the
following criteria:
• Did each group member do an equal share of the team’s
work?
• Was the topic and information interesting?
• Was your presentation complete?
• Was it clearly presented and easy to follow?
• Did each group member speak loudly enough for your classmates to hear
you?
• Did each group member make eye contact with the audience and show
enthusiasm?
• Did your group stay within the time limit allowed?
Grading Scale – 30
points possible5 points issue/questionnaire construction –
group score5 points interviewing/data analysis – group
score10 points presentation – group and
individual score5 points visual – group score 5 points participation points – individual
score
The Survey Presentation
Length: 8-10 Minutes
What to include:
1. INTRODUCTION
Introduce yourself and your co-presenters.
Introduce the topic.
Tell us why the topic was interesting to you.2. QUESTIONS and RESULTS
Tell what questions you asked.
Tell / show us the answers you got for each question.
(Use a visual aid here. You should use a graph or chart to show
the answers for at least 2 of the questions.)
Compare the answers of women and men. Compare the answers of people
with different majors. Are there any differences in the answers of
these smaller groups from the group as a whole? Tell us about them.3. REASONS
Give some reasons why you think you got the answers you got.
Explain what you think this information tells us about some or all of
your classmates.4. CONCLUSION
Talk about some of the most interesting information and why you
think it is interesting. Make some general comments about the
experience of doing the survey. Were there any problems with the
question you asked? Are there any questions you wished you had
asked that you didn’t? Etc. Thank the audience for listening.
Choosing the Topic
After you find your group members, your group needs to choose a
topic to interview the class about. You can ask questions about any
topic you like. For example, you might be interested in your classmates
ideas and activities related to music, sports, art, or other “free
time” activities or hobbies. Or you may want to find out about their
everyday activities, such as eating at restaurants or using telephones.
Or you may want to know about your classmates involvement and opinions
regarding different issues – for example, environmental issues such as
recycling or nuclear energy. Hopefully, it will be an area you are
interested in and the questions will give you interesting information
about your classmates to present to the class.Below are some example topics and questions:
Topic: Telephone Use
1. How many hours a week do you spend talking on the telephone?
2. Do you own a pager or a cellular phone? If yes, who calls you the
most
often on the pager or cellular phone?
a) Family members
b) Friends
c) Girlfriend/Boyfriend
d) work / part-time job
e) other
3. Where do you usually make your phone calls?
a) At home
b) Pay phone
c) Cellular phone
d) Other
Why?
4. If you own a pager or cellular phone, why did you buy it?
or
If you don’t own a pager or cellular phone, why don’t you have one?Topic: Magazines
1. How many magazines do you read per month?
2. What kind of magazines do you read the most?
a) News
b) Sports
c) Fashion
d) Music
e) Other
3. How much money do you spend on magazines every month?
4. What is your favorite magazine? Why?
REFERENCES
Chamot, A. U., & O’Malley, J.M. (1994) The CALLA Handbook.
White Plains, NY:
Longman.Chamot, A. U., S. Barnhardt, P.B. El-Dinary, J. Robbins. (1999). The
Learning Strategies Handbook. White Plains, NY: Longman.Cohen, A. (1998). Strategies in Learning and Using a Second Language.
New York: Addison Wesley Longman.El-Dinary, P. B. 1993. Teachers Learning, Adapting and Implementing
Strategies-Based Instruction in Reading. Ph.D. dissertation, University
of Maryland, College Park, Maryland.Robbins, J. and A. J. MacNeill. (2000) IMPACT Listening 2 . Singapore:
Pearson.Robbins, J. 1999. “East meets West – Approaches to Learner Autonomy” In
Proceedings of JALT 98, Japan Association for Language Teaching
International Conference, Omiya, Japan, November 21-23, 1998.Robbins, J. 1996. Between ‘Hello’ and ‘See you Later:’ Development of
Strategies for Interpersonal Communication in English by Japanese EFL
Students. Published Ph.D. dissertation, University Microfilms,
International. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan.Robbins, J. 1996. Language Learning Strategies Instruction in Asia:
Cooperative Autonomy? In Proceedings of Autonomy 2000 – The Development
of Learning Independence in Language Learning. King Mongkut’s Institute
of Technology, Thonburi, in association with the British Council,
Bangkok, Thailand. November 21, 1996. Available as an ERIC document:
ED409728 p/d 1996Robbins, J. and E. S. Dadour. 1996. University-level strategy
instruction to improve speaking ability in Egypt and Japan. In R.
Oxford (Ed.) Language Learning Strategies Around the World:
Cross-cultural perspectives. Manoa: University of Hawaii Second
Language Teaching and Learning Center, Technical Report #13.Web resources:
National Capital Language Resource Center:
http://www.nclrc.org/
The Language Resource Newsletter:
September issue: http://www.nclrc.org/caidlr75.htm
University of Minnesota’s
Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition
http://carla.acad.umn.edu/strategies-bib.htmlJill’s website, with links to strategies sites, articles, etc.
http://jillrobbins.comContact info: jill@jillrobbins.com
Participants were given slip of paper with characteristics of a
person from a particular culture. They were asked to mingle for a few
minutes, while exhibiting the conflicting cultural characteristics.Country X
In your country:1. You like to look at people in the eyes when you talk to them.
2. You touch people on the right shoulder when you greet them.
3. When someone talks about the weather you break out laughing.
4. When you hear the word “we” you say, “that’s nice.”
Country Y
In your country:1. You don’t like people to touch you.
2. You always say, “Stop that!” when people touch you anywhere.
3. You look people in the eyes when you talk to them.
4. You leave when people say the pronoun “I.”
Country Z
In your country:1. You like 3 feet of space between you and the person you are talking
to.2. You say, “Goodbye” instead of, “Hello,” when you meet someone.
3. You don’t look people in the eyes when you talk to them.
4. You always use the pronoun “we” and never say, “I.”
Country W
In your country:1. You shake hands when you meet someone and talk about the weather.
2. You like to talk about yourself so you always use the pronoun, “I.”
3. You cry when people say goodbye, and you don’t like it when people
laugh at you.4. You like to stand very close to someone when you talk to them.
#
- Predict what Dave will say about his