The Language Teacher
03 - 2003

The Potential of Language Education:
A Global Issues Perspective

John Small

Kumamoto Gakuen University



[T]hinking that "the way things are" is somehow neutral or safe is a dangerous assumption.

--Global Educator Brian Teaman

A Global Educator's Success Story

In January 1977, a man named Mohammed Yunus started the Grameen Bank. Yunus had recently returned from the United States to Bangladesh to help rebuilding efforts after the war for independence. Inspired by Vietnam War protesters and other reformists, he felt unsatisfied as an Economics Professor at Chittagong University. He questioned how much his students knew about the reality of the 90 percent of Bangladeshis living in poverty.

Yunus' reflections on his role as an educator led him to some troubling conclusions. "It [economics] was all fairy tales. All make believe," he concluded (Bornstein, 1996, p. 34). What good is economic understanding if it doesn't relieve suffering or bring justice to the world?

What Yunus proceeded to do was revolutionary. After listening to impoverished villagers for countless hours, he enlisted the help of his students and together they started a program of lending money to some of Bangladesh's most impoverished people. His actions challenged and indeed refuted many basic assumptions about: economics (it's not about relieving poverty); the nature of banking (its aim is to make a profit, not relieve suffering in the world); women (that they couldn't run businesses well) and about the poor (that they are lazy and would never repay loans). Since Yunus dared to challenge these basic assumptions, his program, known as microfinancing, has raised the standard of living of millions of the world's most impoverished people. Yunus could be called a radical for the way he envisioned both education and economics. Whether there is anything inherently wrong with a typical bank is arguable. However, there is one thing that can be said: by refusing to lend to those with the greatest need, banks help to create and support gross inequalities in the world. If relieving suffering and bringing greater justice to the world are measures of success, then the example that Yunus provides is one for educators, and indeed all individuals, to consider carefully. What do we see when we look at the suffering of humanity or the earth? Do we quell unease with rationalizations? Do we truly see the connections and causal relationships between our world and the world of those living in dire poverty? If so, are we willing to take risks in our teaching to bring about change?

Global Educator's Vision of Language Learning

The global educator seeks to articulate alternatives to the views that the purpose of learning English is success in the business world (as measured by moneymaking and consuming), being a tourist, and having fun. According to the educational philosopher Krishnamurti, the world crisis is "the result of wrong values in our relationship to people, to property and to ideas" (Krishnamurti, 1981, p. 67). Indeed, it is often said that for humanity to truly progress--perhaps to simply survive--we must change our thinking in fundamental ways: "It is apparent that we live in an age of a transition, one leading either to self-destruction or perhaps into a new age of human freedom and growth" (Combs, 1995, p. 114). Looking at banking as a way to alleviate suffering and language learning as a way to promote peace and understanding might help bring about the sort of fundamental changes needed. An educator can start by striving to attain UNESCO's objective of education: "to promote qualitative values, attitudes and behaviors of a culture of peace..." Such an educator can, without compromising English education, contribute to creating such a culture of peace. As educators who may sometimes have been frustrated by our students' reluctance to offer opinions, we might consider Japan's Buddhist heritage. It is said in Buddhism that before one speaks, the message should pass through three gates: Does this need to be said? Will it bring harmony and wisdom? Are my words true? At some point, talking about hobbies or Titanic will fail this test.

The Ideology of Language Teaching

Some educators are uncomfortable with a global issues focus because it has an agenda, or takes positions that are supposedly political. The danger of a global educator indoctrinating students to reject war in an uncritical fashion, or to feel guilty about shopping, exists, but (1) any sort of coercion, censoring of a student's viewpoint, or judgmental preaching is an aberration of global education, and (2) any classroom content constitutes a presentation of a world view--a slice of reality--which can (not always fairly) be labeled indoctrination. The textbook Passport (2000) communicates that the focus of language learning is doing a homestay in America. While this is a perfectly reasonable scenario, it is no more or less indoctrination than if we followed Koji to Cambodia where he did work with a group of volunteers building homes for the needy. On the surface, students undoubtedly have greater interest in the homestay in America, but gauging interest in volunteering is difficult because teaching materials ignore that option. An educator presenting topics about environmental degradation, volunteer opportunities, or social injustice is simply providing a different slice of reality with the hope that the knowledge and empathy gained will inspire the student and give them the tools to help create a better world.

Being a global issues educator does not begin in the classroom but with a worldview that refuses to accept the status quo. Bickerton (1990) explains how most people's worldviews are formed:

We sooner or later settle for what (worldview) we can get: We negotiate a model of the world that fulfills some of our goals, satisfies some of our needs, and reconciles us to at least some of those with whom we must spend our lives. That becomes reality for us. (p. 250)

This helps explain how individuals can so easily accept a world of gross injustices: villagers handicapped by landmines, street children forced to scavenge for food, arms proliferation and warmongering of aggressive governments, and indeed the homeless in Osaka or Tokyo--none seem to be part of our world, nor of our students' worlds. To many teachers, these injustices are more or less invisible and/or irrelevant to their lives and to language teaching, and are thus ignored in favor of "safe" topics like shopping, homestays in America, and movies.

In A People's History of the United States, Zinn (1995) traces apathy or ambivalence towards global problems to problems of representation. He forcefully tears down the notion that topics that academics typically choose for emphasis are neutral. He speaks of the historian, but his words are equally true for any materials writer or educator deciding classroom topics and materials.

It is not that the historians can avoid emphasis of some facts and not of others. This is as natural to them as to the mapmakers, who, in order to produce a usable drawing for practical purposes, must first flatten and distort the shape of the earth, then choose from the bewildering mass of geographic information those things needed for the purpose of this or that particular map.

My argument cannot be against selection, simplification or emphasis, which are inevitable for both cartographers and historians. The historian's distortion is more than technical, it is ideological; it is released into a world of contending interests where any chosen emphasis supports some kind of interest, whether economic, political, racial, national or sexual. One reason that atrocities (wars, nuclear proliferation) are still with us is that we have learned to bury them in a mass of other facts, as radioactive wastes are buried in containers in the earth. This learned sense of moral proportion, coming from the apparent objectivity of the scholar, is accepted more easily than when it comes from politicians at press conferences. It is therefore more deadly.

Cummins (2003, p. 1) expresses this in regard to the language teacher: "We can no longer conceptualize language as some kind of neutral code that can be taught in classrooms in splendid isolation from its intersection with issues of power, identity, and spirituality."

The World of English Teaching and Texts

Although Yunus demonstrated that an alternative--perhaps higher--aim of banking can bring greater equity and justice in the world, what about language teaching? However, if teaching materials implicitly send the message that: material wealth equals happiness; working in the business world is the key to success in life; the main purpose for learning English (and indeed life) is sightseeing and entertainment; and we live in a just, peaceful world, is teaching neutral? Is it fulfilling its greatest potential?

A survey of the catalog of a major publisher shows how they view the function of language: There are seven pages of business text offerings including, "a wealth of original texts from The Godfather and Wall Street to teach key business skills." The same catalog has several pages of text dedicated to TOEIC (an exam which prepares students for the business world) and pages of business-related online learning. There are a few literature texts and several "culture" texts about the U.S. and the U.K. Another major publisher's catalog is very similar. To a global educator, the omission of global issues topics seems as conspicuous as it is troubling.

A survey of individual textbooks shows that many aim to entertain students. In New American Headway Pre-Intermediate (2002), an immigrant who found material success in America explains, "I started to feel happy when I bought a car. Now I go everywhere by car…" (p. 19). The "Let's Go Shopping" pages list cities, stores and brands; in addition to a "Tale of Two Millionaires" and chewing gum ads, students get three full pages of ads and facts for Coca-Cola and hamburgers. The only exercise to balance this onslaught of commercialism is an exercise about a homeless man. Certainly, not all textbooks are that superficial; Cambridge textbooks such as Cambridge English Worldwide (1998) are more international and focused on education--topics dealing with nature, for example, rather than sensationalism. Small publishers such as Kinseido are likewise starting to offer good global issues related materials.

Implementing a Global Issues Curriculum

Teaching global issues involves risk taking. Even if an educator finds the rationale for global issues appealing, doubts as to whether students will respond positively and whether the material will be presented at an appropriate level, still remain.

Murphey, Sato and Chen (2001, p. 20) have pointed out that, "Classrooms present wonderful opportunities for modeling and learning open communication and appropriate risk-taking." A willingness to take risks, passion for a topic, and a healthy attitude towards mistakes will all be communicated to the student in the best possible way, by example. Global educators consistently find students willing and eager to learn about otherwise taboo topics: AIDS, war and poverty, etc. Over the course of the past year I used content involving landmines and poverty in several classes, and informal surveys of approximately eighty students showed an overwhelmingly positive reaction, with typical comments expressing gratitude for the chance to learn about something meaningful while studying English.

Given the lack of global issues textbooks, one route an educator could take would be eschewing a textbook altogether. A classroom textbook, for all its obvious benefits, is a huge constraint on the teacher's freedom to implement a global issues curriculum. Abandoning a classroom text will at first feel simultaneously frightening and liberating. A textbook provides structure and an apparently logical curriculum. With no textbook, however, a teacher could implement methods particularly conducive to global issues.

Content-Based Instruction (CBI) is one example. CBI gives students the chance to use English to learn content as opposed to studying English. The value of CBI stems from the fact that, "teachers and students are able to see the practicality of language that is meaningful beyond grammatical viability" (Freiermuth, 2001, p. 855). Global educators have utilized content-based instruction to present a wide range of issues such as drug abuse, family violence, nuclear weapons, etc.

Creating suitable materials, presenting them in an appropriate manner and having students speak in English are the main challenges. One way to present content-based learning is to find an appropriate-level article, (or rewrite/simplify it using a word level check such as the free program found at www.edict.com.hk/textanalyser), and prepare discussion questions. This simple method of read/discuss is the format for many text exercises as well.

Video can also be used for a wide range of levels. While application with higher level students is obvious, lower level students present more of a challenge. Short, understandable scenes from thought-provoking movies such as Patch Adams (human well-being) or The Saint of Fort Washington (homelessness) can be shown more than once. A transcript can then be provided to students and explained in detail. Students can then memorize a few lines and play-act the scene. With careful planning and presentation, videos can be accessible to most teen and adult language learners. Presenting songs such as John Lennon's Happy Christmas via cloze exercises provides a similar opportunity for global issues language learning.

Dictogloss, or grammar dictation, is another way to achieve global issues aims. With dictogloss, a short narrative is prepared by the teacher and read to students who take notes on the spoken narrative, confer with partners to recreate the meaning, then check with the actual spoken sentence as a whole class activity. The facts that the teacher prepares the narrative, and that dictogloss is appropriate for every possible level, makes it an excellent resource for global issues educators in particular (Jacobs and Small, 2003).

Field trips are another type of content-based instruction. In Designing Environmental Field Trips, Goodmacher (1998) explains how he invited his students to take a short trip to a nearby island, play games (such as a scavenger hunt for litter), then do a beach cleanup. Similarly, Haynes (2001) has successfully organized an AIDS Awareness march in Nagoya for eight consecutive years. Such field trips involve awareness raising and learning through action. There are undoubtedly worthwhile points of interest in every city.

At some universities, programs are designed to give students and teachers-in-training knowledge to become good global citizens. One example is Vermont's School for International Training's World Learning program (2002). They offer a wide range of programs to give students and teachers in training a global education which includes "Experiments in International Living" and "Centers for Change", the latter offering courses involving Intercultural Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding. Another successful global education program, at Transpacific University (2002), features as a mission statement goal: To cultivate socially responsible, self-realized individuals who will both prosper and enrich the global community of the 21st century. The potential for a meaningful global education becomes so much greater when implemented at the institution, rather than individual teacher, level.

If an educator would rather (or is forced to) have the structure of a text, they can apply some global issues criteria, asking themselves:

Finally, if a teacher is handed a book by their department, they can (in addition to petitioning for materials suitable to their aims) ask the right questions at the right times. Teaman (2000) has pointed out that text questions such as, "What kind of car do you want?" and "Do you like going fast?" can be supplemented with questions about the impact that driving has on the planet. Indeed, simply inviting students to think critically about exercises that display mass advertising propaganda can be an important first step.

Conclusion

How many young people in EFL classrooms have the latent capability of creating significant change in the world? How can educators help students (and themselves) to realize their greatest potential? To what extent can ESL instructors and materials take Yunus' approach by teaching global issues? The answers largely depend on the educator's worldview about the reasons for global problems and our responsibility as educators to seek solutions, the program within which the educator is working, and the willingness of the educator to take risks. The global issues perspective considers language learning an opportunity to not only raise students' awareness about issues of peace and justice, but also point the way towards solutions.

References

Bickerton, D. (1990). Language & species. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Buckingham, A., & Whitney, N. (2000) Passport. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Bornstein, D. (1996). The price of a dream: The story of Grameen Bank. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Cummins, J. (2003). Language and the human spirit. TESOL Matters, 13, No. 1.
Combs, A. (1995). The radiance of being: Complexity, chaos and the evolution of consciousness. Edinburgh: Floris Books.
Freiermuth, M. (2001). Influences of content-based instruction in the ESP classroom. Towards the New Millennium: Proceedings of the 26th Annual International Conference of JALT, 855-860.
Goodmacher, G. (1998). Designing environmental field trips [electronic version]. Global Issues in Language Education, 33, 12-13. Retrieved November 1, 2002, from jalt.org/global/33Des.htm.
Haynes, L. (2001). Dealing with social issues: Helping teachers overcome emotional barriers. Towards the New Millennium: Proceedings of the 26th Annual International conference of JALT, 83-87.
Jacobs, G., & Small, J. (2003) Combining cooperative learning and dictogloss. Reading Matrix online. Retrieved November 1, 2002, from www.readingmatrix.com/articles/jacobs_small/index.html.
Krishnamurti, J. (1981). Education and the significance of life. New York: Harper & Row.
Littlejohn, A., & Hicks, D. (1998) Cambridge English Worldwide. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Murphey, T., Sato, K., & Chen, Hsin-Hwa. (2001). Fractals of educational change: Open communication and risk taking. PAC 3 at JALT 2001 Proceedings, 19-24.
School for International Training. (2002) World learning program. Retrieved November 1, 2002, from www.world learning.org/about.html.
Soars, J., & Soars, L. (2000) New American Headway pre-intermediate. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Teaman, B. (2000). The global issues language classroom. Towards the New Millennium: Proceedings of the 26th Annual International conference of JALT, 153-155.
Trans Pacific University. (2002). Mission statement. Retrieved November 1, 2002, from www.transpacific.org/english/about_04.html.
Zinn, H. (1995). A people's history of the United States. New York: Harper Collins.


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