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Abstract：It is recognized that language is an essential part of culture. It reflects the cultural contents and connotation. Namely, language is the carrier of culture. And the impact of culture upon language is something intrinsic and indispensable. While, at middle schools, it is the basic and important stage to learn a foreign language. Therefore it is a key point to teach English cultural background knowledge. This paper aims at introducing four methods of cultural background teaching: strenghtening cultural education by comparison; introducing the cultural meaning and connotation of vocabulary; communication in class; extracurricular activities. I hope this paper can help students increase interests in English learning, know more about English cultures and improve communication abolity of cross-culture.
Key Words：English education in middle schools; cultural background teaching; cross-cultural communication; 4 methods
1.Introduction
According to the editors’ arrangement of new JEFC from People Education Press, English
cultural introduction and topics of English daily life have increased by 10.2% and 36.2% respectively compared with the old JEFC textbooks. This indicates that teachers should keep students informed of culrural background knowledge and social circumstances from English-speaking countries through their ordinary teaching, which will become a special factor of English class. So, it’s easy to see English cultural education is the important content of English education in middle schools. The means of English cultural education are variuos and English teachers’ chief duty is applying these ways to achieve the cultural teaching.
2.the Relationship Between Culture and Language
Culture consists of tools, implements, utensils, clothing, ornaments, customs, institutions, beliefs, rituals, games, works of art, language, etc. Thereby it is recognized that language is an essential part of culture. It reflects the cultural contents and connotation. Namely, language is the carrier of culture. And the impact of culture upon language is something intrinsic and indispensable. A language doesn’t exist without particular cultural background and atmosphere. Thus for language learners, if they don’t understand the rules of the target cultures, actually, it will be difficult to master the language. Sometimes, they only study language knowledge itself, but not or little involve the culture to which the language attaches. Therefore when they meet native speakers, cultural clash occurs. There is a special example to illustrate it. It’s a talk between an American businessman and a rabbi Jerusalem. Culture have strikingly different standards of personal space, for instance how far apart people should stand in normal encounters and interaction. For Americans, it is important to keep a distance from each other when they are talking, which shows respect for each other. Arabian people think they should come closer when talking. Let’s imagine the situation and contrast the distance between them. Both of them would feel embarrassed. Hense to know the cultural knowledge is the premise to learn a language.
3.the Necessity and Significance of Teaching English Cultural Background Knowledge in Middle Schools
Firstly, English is an international language and it has been used in most areas of the world. In China, it has been listed as a main subject in the courses of middle schools. It is the basic stage to learn a foreign language. And because of the fact that culture and language are closely related to each other, it is necessary and essential for teachers to make students know about English culture while teaching them English.
Secondly, teaching English culture helps students maintain interests in English learning. Clay P. Bedford once said, “You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.” Any language bears rich, profound and colorful cultural connotation. If we don’t know its culture, we can not really understand, master and appreciate the language. Whereas language learning involves hard-work and persistence, how to make students continue learning English is the main task of English teachers in middle schools, and the key to it is to create students’curiosity and maintain their interests in English language through introducing its culture.
Furthermore, the purpose of learning English is for cultivating students’ consciousness of cultural differeces, then improving their ability of communication. And it is pointed out clearly, “English teaching aim in junior middle schools is making students gain basic language knowledge and have a great facultry for communication in English by practising listening, speaking, reading and writing from the English Syllabus fo Full-time Secondary Schools in the Nine-year Compulsory Education System. Thereby the chief target of language teaching is developing the cross-cultural communication ability that includes five skills: listening, speaking, reading, writing and social ability(namely, the proper communication ablity with people from the countries of different cultural backgrounds). Here we can find cultural knowledge is a key constituent to build up the communication ability, which is the principal teaching content to achieve the target language learning. And in recent years, more and more people have studied cross-cultural communication. Therefore at the beginning of learning English, not only teachers, but also students in middle schools should pay more attention to English cultural background knowledge.
4.Four Methods for Teaching Cultural Background Knowledge
4.1Strengthening cultural education by comparing English culture and Chinese culture
For Chinese middle school students, Chinese is the mother tongue, and it is the first time for them to learn English. So they always compare English with Chinese, or translate English into Chinese word by word, which becomes the potential barrier for English learning. When a teacher asks the students to write a passage about their family, they ususlly think about it in Chinese and express them according to the Chinese writing habits and rules they have accumulated. As ststed in this features, English teachers can teach the culture in the process of comparison. In reality, this way is not only good for increasing the students’ sensitivity of different cultures, but helping them understand Chinese culture better. Before they compare them, they ponder over them. Then they can know more about our own culture.
On the basis of the character of textbooks, teachers can divide the contents of textbooks into two by comparison. The first one refers to basic necessity of life, including closing, food, housing and transportation, such as introducing families, schools, shopping, churches, festivals etc., which is all about daily life. This part covers English education, economy, religion and medical care. The second one mentions communication in common life, including meeting, address, farewell, thanks, suggestion, apologies, admiration and visit, which involves in the usage of English language in various situation.
As Unit 1, from JEFC, Book 1, for instance: the students often greet teachers by “Good morning, teachers!” In English countries, they can say “Good morning” all day, and even say it at farewell, however, in China, we just use it before nine o’clock a.m.. Another point is about the “teacher”. English or American people consider “teacher” as a profession, not an address. They call teachers as “Sir, Madam, Mr, Mrs or Miss”. Even in ordinary life, between teachers and students or parents and children, they can directly call their names. Thus it’s necessary to tell students these two rules. This is the cultural difference. And there is a dialogue from textbook:
A:Hello, you look very tired today.
B:Yes, I went to bed too late last night.
A:You’d better go to bed earlier tonight if you can.
As we know, this situation is so common in China, but in English, one only says, “ I hope you’ll feel better soon.” Or “Take care of yourself.” That’s enough. If you say more like that in Chinese ways, which would hurt the audience.
At the same time, we should distinguish the cultural differences between America and Britain, for instance, suggestions like “Shall we leave?” from American English and “Let’s go!” from British English. The former, in American way, is more polite than the latter one that is an order, not a suggestion. Hence teachers should remind students of the two different means to express themselves correctly.
China is an ancient and civilized country in the East. Most Chinese people follow the doctrines of Confucius that are kindness, modesty, humility and courtesy. When receiving other’s admiration, they often answer “ No, no, I’m not as good as you say.” Or even say nothing with shameful smile. Of course, this will be difficult for people from the United States, a culture that stresses individualism heavily. While you say “Your shoes are so nice!” to an American girl, a happy “Thank you.”must be her certain reply. As American people are bold, confident and uphold freedom.
4.2Introducing the cultural meaning and connotation of vacabulary
English vocabulary is endued with rich cultural meaning and connotation during its long history and usage and development. So teachers should also take care of their cultural meaning. What’s more, some students are used to judging the words subjectively. Then it’s indispensable to intrduce them.
From JEFC, so many words, such as dog, pork, red, breakfast, Christmas etc., have their owm cultural meaning and connotation. For example, when learning the word, “breakfast”, students may concern with porridge and steamed buns according to their habits, while for western people, it indicates milk, bread and coffee. And “breakfast” is composed of “break” and “fast”. The former one means cutting or interrupting; the latter has the meaning of going without food. Hence the word can be explained as stopping going without food, namely, the first meal of one day. Another particular word is “dog”. So many words and phrases about dogs in Chinese bear derogatory sense, such as, “be a bully under the protection of a powerful person”(狗仗人势)；“act as a snob”(狗眼看人低); “a filthy mouth can not utter decent language”(狗嘴吐不出象牙); “going to the dogs”(一蹶不振); “dog eats dog”(狗咬狗). Yet in English, people regard dogs as their best friends for they’re honest and brave, such as, “a lucky dog”(幸运儿); “love me, love my dog”(爱屋及乌). The word “red”, wherever in China, or English-speaking countries, it stands for celebration, happiness or festival. Especially in China, it indicates revolutionary sporit, socialism, and other things with active meaning. On the other hand, in Emglish, it stands for the evil things or angry condition. For example, “red flag”(引人生气的事); “in the red”(亏损); “see red”(大怒). Thus with learning new words, phrases or expressions, teachers should tell the differences, which can help students understand and remember them quickly and correctly.
4.3Communication in class
There are two points in this aspect. One is intuitional instruction and the other is performance as roles.
4.3.1Intuitional instruction
The vital part of intuitional instruction is its intuition. That means teachers use some intuitional means, such as pictures, magazines, films, practical things, and other intuitional teaching aids to illustrate the English arts, life styles, local conditions and customs. Here culture is transmitted through observation. Students pay attention to the things that go on around them. In the process, students have different cultural observance, values, and aesthetic standards in their minds. At this moment cultural knowledge is absorbed consciously and unconsciously. From these materials, they directly observe almost everything about social life in English countries, including something to eat, something to wear, something to live, and how to make friends, how to celebrate festivals, even how to speak. At the same time, teachers can provide questions for them and after that utter ideas of their own.
However, there are still some students who have no or little interests in these materials. At this moment, teachers can play films to attract them, especially many cartoon pictures and films on children’s topics. Since students in middle schools keep childish hearts more or less. And in recent years, a large number of famous films have been accepted by children all over the world, such as the series of Harry Potter, pictures from Disney Company, including the series of SHREK, NANIA,, MULAN,, TARZAN, THE INCREDIBLES and so on. Actually speaking, it’s good for students to watch these films: practicing listening and oral English from native speakers, learning cultural information from native land. Besides, the best point is attracting them to strengthen communication in English.
4.3.2Performance as roles
As stated in JEFC, afer students are familiar with a text, teachers can arrange them to play the roles in the text. Of course, teachers also allow them to use other materials outside the text.
For example, according to the , it shows the circumstance of Ann’s birthday party. Teachers can choose seven students to play the whole process, which make them not only review the text, but realize the expressions and background knowledge of birthday party.
4.4Extracurricular activities
The style of extracurricular activities are diversified.
The first one is learning to sing English songs. As we know a song can reflect a nation’s spirit, people’s loving, anger, sadness and happiness, also the cultural styles in different times and different areas. Therefore, a song carries the characteristics of a culture. The process to learn an English song is the way to learn a culture. The famous English song, JINGLE BELL, describes the Christmas sleigh and Santa Clause. When learning it, they can tell more about Christmas Day, such as its origin, Christmas tree, Christmas Eve, Christmas card, Christmas wait, Christmas carol and Christmas party.
The second one is holding English parties, which can make students feel the atmosphere of English culture, just like being in the life of an exotic culture.
The last one is that schools can invite native speakers with teaching qualification from English-speaking countries to join. Overseas teachers can tell students their problems and experiences of communication in China face to face. And students have opportunities to talk with them. And some foreign experts and exchange students can be also invited to give students speeches about English culture.
Of course, there are still other styles of extracurricular activities. Once they are good for students, teachers can adopt them.
5.Conclusion
In English teaching, teachers should take care of students’ learning of language knowledge and practicing of communication ability. All of these points need cultural background knowledge. The aim is clear. That is increasing students’ interests in learning English; cultivating their consciousness and ablility of cross-cultural communication; paying more attention to the cultural differences between China and English countries.
On the other hand, teachers should gradually improve their professional levels, broaden experience, try their best to gain the latest information about English countries, and then combine them with teaching.
References：
[1]Allan, C. Ornstein & Thomas, J. Lasley． Effective Teaching[M]．New York: McGraw-Hill Higher Education. 2000.
[2]David, Nunan． 2001. Second Language Teaching and learning[M]．Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press
[3]Marvin, Harris．1987. Cultural Anthropology(2nd Ediition)[M]．New York: Harper & Row, Inc
[4]Roland, S. Barth．1980. Run School Run[M]．Harvard University Press
Key Words：English education in middle schools; cultural background teaching; cross-cultural communication; 4 methods
1.Introduction
According to the editors’ arrangement of new JEFC from People Education Press, English
cultural introduction and topics of English daily life have increased by 10.2% and 36.2% respectively compared with the old JEFC textbooks. This indicates that teachers should keep students informed of culrural background knowledge and social circumstances from English-speaking countries through their ordinary teaching, which will become a special factor of English class. So, it’s easy to see English cultural education is the important content of English education in middle schools. The means of English cultural education are variuos and English teachers’ chief duty is applying these ways to achieve the cultural teaching.
2.the Relationship Between Culture and Language
Culture consists of tools, implements, utensils, clothing, ornaments, customs, institutions, beliefs, rituals, games, works of art, language, etc. Thereby it is recognized that language is an essential part of culture. It reflects the cultural contents and connotation. Namely, language is the carrier of culture. And the impact of culture upon language is something intrinsic and indispensable. A language doesn’t exist without particular cultural background and atmosphere. Thus for language learners, if they don’t understand the rules of the target cultures, actually, it will be difficult to master the language. Sometimes, they only study language knowledge itself, but not or little involve the culture to which the language attaches. Therefore when they meet native speakers, cultural clash occurs. There is a special example to illustrate it. It’s a talk between an American businessman and a rabbi Jerusalem. Culture have strikingly different standards of personal space, for instance how far apart people should stand in normal encounters and interaction. For Americans, it is important to keep a distance from each other when they are talking, which shows respect for each other. Arabian people think they should come closer when talking. Let’s imagine the situation and contrast the distance between them. Both of them would feel embarrassed. Hense to know the cultural knowledge is the premise to learn a language.
3.the Necessity and Significance of Teaching English Cultural Background Knowledge in Middle Schools
Firstly, English is an international language and it has been used in most areas of the world. In China, it has been listed as a main subject in the courses of middle schools. It is the basic stage to learn a foreign language. And because of the fact that culture and language are closely related to each other, it is necessary and essential for teachers to make students know about English culture while teaching them English.
Secondly, teaching English culture helps students maintain interests in English learning. Clay P. Bedford once said, “You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.” Any language bears rich, profound and colorful cultural connotation. If we don’t know its culture, we can not really understand, master and appreciate the language. Whereas language learning involves hard-work and persistence, how to make students continue learning English is the main task of English teachers in middle schools, and the key to it is to create students’curiosity and maintain their interests in English language through introducing its culture.
Furthermore, the purpose of learning English is for cultivating students’ consciousness of cultural differeces, then improving their ability of communication. And it is pointed out clearly, “English teaching aim in junior middle schools is making students gain basic language knowledge and have a great facultry for communication in English by practising listening, speaking, reading and writing from the English Syllabus fo Full-time Secondary Schools in the Nine-year Compulsory Education System. Thereby the chief target of language teaching is developing the cross-cultural communication ability that includes five skills: listening, speaking, reading, writing and social ability(namely, the proper communication ablity with people from the countries of different cultural backgrounds). Here we can find cultural knowledge is a key constituent to build up the communication ability, which is the principal teaching content to achieve the target language learning. And in recent years, more and more people have studied cross-cultural communication. Therefore at the beginning of learning English, not only teachers, but also students in middle schools should pay more attention to English cultural background knowledge.
4.Four Methods for Teaching Cultural Background Knowledge
4.1Strengthening cultural education by comparing English culture and Chinese culture
For Chinese middle school students, Chinese is the mother tongue, and it is the first time for them to learn English. So they always compare English with Chinese, or translate English into Chinese word by word, which becomes the potential barrier for English learning. When a teacher asks the students to write a passage about their family, they ususlly think about it in Chinese and express them according to the Chinese writing habits and rules they have accumulated. As ststed in this features, English teachers can teach the culture in the process of comparison. In reality, this way is not only good for increasing the students’ sensitivity of different cultures, but helping them understand Chinese culture better. Before they compare them, they ponder over them. Then they can know more about our own culture.
On the basis of the character of textbooks, teachers can divide the contents of textbooks into two by comparison. The first one refers to basic necessity of life, including closing, food, housing and transportation, such as introducing families, schools, shopping, churches, festivals etc., which is all about daily life. This part covers English education, economy, religion and medical care. The second one mentions communication in common life, including meeting, address, farewell, thanks, suggestion, apologies, admiration and visit, which involves in the usage of English language in various situation.
As Unit 1, from JEFC, Book 1, for instance: the students often greet teachers by “Good morning, teachers!” In English countries, they can say “Good morning” all day, and even say it at farewell, however, in China, we just use it before nine o’clock a.m.. Another point is about the “teacher”. English or American people consider “teacher” as a profession, not an address. They call teachers as “Sir, Madam, Mr, Mrs or Miss”. Even in ordinary life, between teachers and students or parents and children, they can directly call their names. Thus it’s necessary to tell students these two rules. This is the cultural difference. And there is a dialogue from textbook:
A:Hello, you look very tired today.
B:Yes, I went to bed too late last night.
A:You’d better go to bed earlier tonight if you can.
As we know, this situation is so common in China, but in English, one only says, “ I hope you’ll feel better soon.” Or “Take care of yourself.” That’s enough. If you say more like that in Chinese ways, which would hurt the audience.
At the same time, we should distinguish the cultural differences between America and Britain, for instance, suggestions like “Shall we leave?” from American English and “Let’s go!” from British English. The former, in American way, is more polite than the latter one that is an order, not a suggestion. Hence teachers should remind students of the two different means to express themselves correctly.
China is an ancient and civilized country in the East. Most Chinese people follow the doctrines of Confucius that are kindness, modesty, humility and courtesy. When receiving other’s admiration, they often answer “ No, no, I’m not as good as you say.” Or even say nothing with shameful smile. Of course, this will be difficult for people from the United States, a culture that stresses individualism heavily. While you say “Your shoes are so nice!” to an American girl, a happy “Thank you.”must be her certain reply. As American people are bold, confident and uphold freedom.
4.2Introducing the cultural meaning and connotation of vacabulary
English vocabulary is endued with rich cultural meaning and connotation during its long history and usage and development. So teachers should also take care of their cultural meaning. What’s more, some students are used to judging the words subjectively. Then it’s indispensable to intrduce them.
From JEFC, so many words, such as dog, pork, red, breakfast, Christmas etc., have their owm cultural meaning and connotation. For example, when learning the word, “breakfast”, students may concern with porridge and steamed buns according to their habits, while for western people, it indicates milk, bread and coffee. And “breakfast” is composed of “break” and “fast”. The former one means cutting or interrupting; the latter has the meaning of going without food. Hence the word can be explained as stopping going without food, namely, the first meal of one day. Another particular word is “dog”. So many words and phrases about dogs in Chinese bear derogatory sense, such as, “be a bully under the protection of a powerful person”(狗仗人势)；“act as a snob”(狗眼看人低); “a filthy mouth can not utter decent language”(狗嘴吐不出象牙); “going to the dogs”(一蹶不振); “dog eats dog”(狗咬狗). Yet in English, people regard dogs as their best friends for they’re honest and brave, such as, “a lucky dog”(幸运儿); “love me, love my dog”(爱屋及乌). The word “red”, wherever in China, or English-speaking countries, it stands for celebration, happiness or festival. Especially in China, it indicates revolutionary sporit, socialism, and other things with active meaning. On the other hand, in Emglish, it stands for the evil things or angry condition. For example, “red flag”(引人生气的事); “in the red”(亏损); “see red”(大怒). Thus with learning new words, phrases or expressions, teachers should tell the differences, which can help students understand and remember them quickly and correctly.
4.3Communication in class
There are two points in this aspect. One is intuitional instruction and the other is performance as roles.
4.3.1Intuitional instruction
The vital part of intuitional instruction is its intuition. That means teachers use some intuitional means, such as pictures, magazines, films, practical things, and other intuitional teaching aids to illustrate the English arts, life styles, local conditions and customs. Here culture is transmitted through observation. Students pay attention to the things that go on around them. In the process, students have different cultural observance, values, and aesthetic standards in their minds. At this moment cultural knowledge is absorbed consciously and unconsciously. From these materials, they directly observe almost everything about social life in English countries, including something to eat, something to wear, something to live, and how to make friends, how to celebrate festivals, even how to speak. At the same time, teachers can provide questions for them and after that utter ideas of their own.
However, there are still some students who have no or little interests in these materials. At this moment, teachers can play films to attract them, especially many cartoon pictures and films on children’s topics. Since students in middle schools keep childish hearts more or less. And in recent years, a large number of famous films have been accepted by children all over the world, such as the series of Harry Potter, pictures from Disney Company, including the series of SHREK, NANIA,, MULAN,, TARZAN, THE INCREDIBLES and so on. Actually speaking, it’s good for students to watch these films: practicing listening and oral English from native speakers, learning cultural information from native land. Besides, the best point is attracting them to strengthen communication in English.
4.3.2Performance as roles
As stated in JEFC, afer students are familiar with a text, teachers can arrange them to play the roles in the text. Of course, teachers also allow them to use other materials outside the text.
For example, according to the , it shows the circumstance of Ann’s birthday party. Teachers can choose seven students to play the whole process, which make them not only review the text, but realize the expressions and background knowledge of birthday party.
4.4Extracurricular activities
The style of extracurricular activities are diversified.
The first one is learning to sing English songs. As we know a song can reflect a nation’s spirit, people’s loving, anger, sadness and happiness, also the cultural styles in different times and different areas. Therefore, a song carries the characteristics of a culture. The process to learn an English song is the way to learn a culture. The famous English song, JINGLE BELL, describes the Christmas sleigh and Santa Clause. When learning it, they can tell more about Christmas Day, such as its origin, Christmas tree, Christmas Eve, Christmas card, Christmas wait, Christmas carol and Christmas party.
The second one is holding English parties, which can make students feel the atmosphere of English culture, just like being in the life of an exotic culture.
The last one is that schools can invite native speakers with teaching qualification from English-speaking countries to join. Overseas teachers can tell students their problems and experiences of communication in China face to face. And students have opportunities to talk with them. And some foreign experts and exchange students can be also invited to give students speeches about English culture.
Of course, there are still other styles of extracurricular activities. Once they are good for students, teachers can adopt them.
5.Conclusion
In English teaching, teachers should take care of students’ learning of language knowledge and practicing of communication ability. All of these points need cultural background knowledge. The aim is clear. That is increasing students’ interests in learning English; cultivating their consciousness and ablility of cross-cultural communication; paying more attention to the cultural differences between China and English countries.
On the other hand, teachers should gradually improve their professional levels, broaden experience, try their best to gain the latest information about English countries, and then combine them with teaching.
References：
[1]Allan, C. Ornstein & Thomas, J. Lasley． Effective Teaching[M]．New York: McGraw-Hill Higher Education. 2000.
[2]David, Nunan． 2001. Second Language Teaching and learning[M]．Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press
[3]Marvin, Harris．1987. Cultural Anthropology(2nd Ediition)[M]．New York: Harper & Row, Inc
[4]Roland, S. Barth．1980. Run School Run[M]．Harvard University Press