A Practical Guideline to Teaching Culture in Ethical Framework: An Application of the Socratic Method in Discussion Tasks

Leila Kamelifar
(Sama Technical and Vocational Training College, Islamic Azad University, Iran)

Abstract: This article tries to review the different types of discussions worth using when trying to teach culture aiming at raising cultural awareness of EFL/ESL learners within a moral framework, if topics, questions and answers are thoughtfully, authentically and, in particular, communicatively designed. Also, since the implementation of the present model is assumed to be process oriented, learners have to engage their cognitive abilities as analyzing, synthesizing, generalizing and reasoning, while being interactively involved. Moreover, they can engage their meta-cognitive abilities (Oxford) as planning how to learn and goal setting, if they are oriented and guided properly. Inspired with the Socratic model of genuine, creative, and interactive discussions, English instructors can also benefit from task-based instruction by prompting learners to look through culturally-rich charts and tables and obtain information by observing, comparing, and mediating between cultures then initiate to discuss. Besides, multiple intelligences like verbal, visual, interpersonal, intrapersonal and kinesthetic can be tapped to some extent as well as proposed by the researcher. Therefore, the purpose of the present study is to zero in on the crucial role of discussion and its efficacies in application of some of the mental and strategic procedures mentioned above to teach culture besides improving learner’s behavioral patterns which should be an indispensible part of any learning environment to assist learners to discover and construct their own ideas and linguistic patterns.

Key words: discussions, cultural awareness, critical thinking, cognitive and meta-cognitive abilities, multiple intelligences, process oriented, task-based instruction, ethical framework, construct, discover