Culture as fifth skills Abstract
CULTURE AS FIFTH SKILLS 3
Cultureas fifth skills
Abstract
Thispaper summarizes a presentation on culture as fifth skills. Theintroductory part comprises of the objectives of the presentation andthe target audience. I have justified the importance of my style ofteaching the B1 students and its efficiency in improving speaking andlistening skills. The various sessions of the presentation areexplained chronologically taking into consideration the primary aimof the Pride and Prejudice novel presentation. In conclusion, I havecompared the past and current marriages to identify any changes.
Thepurpose of this presentation was to train B1 English level students.The target audience were 60 Chinese origin students aged between15-16 years. Two sessions were complete by the end of thepresentation. The interactive program was aimed to improve thestudents’ speaking and listening skills. To efficiently train thestudents, I gave the students a part of the novel, Pride, andPrejudice to act the role of the main characters written by JaneAusten. The major discussion focused on the English culture ofbetween the 18thand the 19thcentury.
Pre-research presentation
Thestudents were expected to conduct research on Jane Austen before thepresentation. The research entailed all the six books written betweenby Jane between 1811 and 1818. The six novels are Sense andSensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, NorthangerAbbey, and Persuasion. The students were supposed to research ontime between 18thand the 19thcentury and presented their findings in class. Jane’s six novelsdealt with the transition of realism from perception where women weremarried for financial security and social standing toself-dependence. The vocabularies were highlighted to makes aid easyspotting during the presentation. The students were expected to checktheir meanings to improve their English fluency. By looking intotheir meanings, the B1 students got more exposure to the language.Some of the highlighted words are transition, realism, and critique.
TheNovel Summary
Thepride and prejudice book consists of two main characters ElizabethDarcy and Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. In the 18thcentury, there existed British Landed Gentry. The landed gentryconsisted of the upper class in the society who were landlords andgot their livelihood from rental income. The plot of the novelrelates to the landed gentry situation. Elizabeth is portrayed as aprotagonist who had haste in decision making. Within the book, shelearns to appreciate the essential and superficial things. The mainideas tackled in the book are money, marriage, education and mannersin the British Regency. Mr. Bennet is one of the landed gentries whoowns Long Bourne estate, but the problem is that he only had fivedaughters and no son. This means at least one of the daughters hadthe responsibility to marry well to take care of the family. Janediffers with this perception to show the importance of marrying outof love and not security reasons. On initially meeting Darcy,Elizabeth was full of prejudice despising him of being insensitive toher sister’s feelings. On the other hand, Darcy was quick to judge.Frequent interactions with Darcy and Elizabeth bore fruits of lovedespite their pride and prejudice. The story brings out the beauty ofletting people marry out of love. (Austen,2014)
Groupdiscussion
Beforethe next activity which was watching the movie, the students wereasked to compare the teacher’s notes and the pre- research notes.Comparison of the records was aimed to measure whether the studentshad captured the important aspects of the 18thand the 19thcentury. It also helped to enrich them more on the English culturethey might have omitted during their presentation. The students wereasked to identify aspects of pride and prejudice in the novel. It wasexpected that on answering that question, they would concentrate onthe two main characters, Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy. Elizabeth’simpatience and coming to quick judgment on the first impressiondepicts her pride. Aloof decorum and rectitude reveals Mr. Darcypride in his conversation with Elizabeth. Ability to identify thecharacter traits in the novel and presentation was a way to sharpenthe Chinese students’ comprehension of the English language. Afterwatching the movie on Pride and Prejudice, I asked the students toact the major roles according to their ability. Giving the studentsthe platform to present helped to improve their speaking skills.Since English was their second language, speaking in a formal set-upoffered an avenue to perfect their fluency. The level of consistencyduring presentation measured the students’ listening skills.
Groupwork
Thelast activity in the presentation was group work assignment. Thestudents were supposed to identify the characters they liked ordisliked in Pride and Prejudice, the role of wealth in the past inthe society in regarding influencing people and the social roles ofwomen in the society between the 18thand 19thcentury. Some of the expected answers in the change of role of womenare expected to be late marriages and people marrying out of lovenowadays other than for security reasons. Women empowerment hascontributed to the change of roles of woman in the society. Womenhead many corporate functions unlike in the past and parents withfemale children has no worry who shall take care of their young oneson their demise. Women have proved to be responsible for runningfamilies even on sad occasions when their spouses pass on. (Truman,2016)
Conclusion
Usingmovies, discussions, and presentations is an effective way ofteaching the English language. Interactive programs build a relaxedatmosphere for the B1 learners since it helps to boost theirconfidence. The programs ultimately improve their speaking andlistening skills. The Pride and Prejudice novel gave an excellentdiscussion material with its English culture between the 18thand the 19thcentury. Comparison of the past and current society brings realismand appreciate the dynamism of the culture especially on the role ofwealth and the role of women in the society.
References
Austen,J. (2014). SparkNotes: Pride and Prejudice: Plot Overview.Sparknotes.com.
Retrieved1 April 2017, from http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/pride/summary.html
Truman,N. (2016). Womenin 1900 – History Learning Site.HistoryLearning Site.Retrieved
1April 2017, fromhttp://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/the-role-of-british-women-
in-the-twentieth-century/women-in-1900/
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