Intercultural Learning and Teaching with Children

Abstract

Intercultural learning and teaching with children is attracting increased attention as an emerging field of practice with theorists, educators, and policy practitioners. The Oxford Dictionary (2018) defines the term culture as the “beliefs, customs and arts of a particular society, group, place or time” and intercultural as “taking place between cultures or derived from different cultures.” The growing field of intercultural learning and teaching with children denotes learning and teaching that affords children the opportunity to interact and engage with different cultures. In Intercultural Teaching and Learning: Rethinking Intercultural Learning Processes (Munich: Goethe Institut, 2017) Jurgen Bolten provides a contemporary understanding of intercultural work, noting that culture and interculturality are in a state of flux, with cultures and people acquiring their identities through interactions with humans and non-human actors such as the Internet—a scenario that applies to child learners as well as to adult learners. Further, the bifurcated global context of the Global North and Global South accentuates the disparities in the digital worlds of learner (whether child or adult) and their access to learning opportunities and resources. Put simply, intercultural teaching and learning is both a conceptual approach and a set of practical strategies designed to enable learners, in this case children, to seek and to contribute to cultural diversity and to develop intercultural competence—the focus of Messner and Schafer in their Intercultural communication and collaboration appraisal (London: GloBus Research, 2012). Chlopek argues in “The Intercultural Approach to EFL Teaching and Learning” (English Teaching Forum 4 [2008], pp. 10–19) that its historical antecedents are found in the teaching and learning of foreign languages. Since the introduction of intercultural teaching in foreign language education, recent decades have seen its application in early childhood education, schooling, and teacher education, as addressed by Farrell and Pramling Samuelsson in Diversity in the early years. Intercultural teaching and learning (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2016). Gibson argues in Intercultural business communication (London: Oxford University Press, 2002) that intercultural learning and teaching have been championed, in the fields of business, human relations, and commerce. In short, the field of intercultural learning and teaching with children is international and interdisciplinary, although bounded by local and national legislative, policy, and jurisdictional requirements. This bibliography offers a suite of perspectives, resources, and strategies to open up new possibilities for researchers, practitioners, and policy personnel in the pursuit of intercultural policy and practice.