Teaching English Culture In The Empowerment-Oriented Mode

The teaching of culture has a close relationship with the teaching of language. Therefore, to conduct the teaching of culture effectively, first, a language teacher should examine his/her own way of learning as well as his/her students'. We should know that the native traditional culture and values have exerted great influence on the mode of teachers and students'thinking and action. As a result, we should never neglect traditional culture of learning when we learn new cultures. On the contrary, both teachers and students shall realize that the grasp of traditional culture of learning is the premise of carrying out the teaching of culture. Confucianism is the mainstream of Chinese culture, and gives great impact on traditional culture of learning, which vests authority in teachers and values the accumulation of knowledge, but neglects the empowerment of learners. If teachers unconditionally comply with these value orientations when conducting cultural teaching, a knowledge-oriented mode will be produced without question. The knowledge-oriented mode plays an important role in the history of Chinese culture development because it is in line with some thoughts of Confucianism; however, it has its limitations not only in dealing with the pluralistic and dynamic nature of culture but in cultivating cultural insight and cultural creativity of learners. On the basis of former studies and her own teaching practice of culture, the author puts forward an empowerment-oriented mode, which aims at developing learners'critical thinking and cultivating their cultural insight and cultural creativity. The author holds that the theoretical result of the cultural teaching should be implied in teaching practice and teachers should lay emphasis on the cultivation of learners' cultural insight and cultural creativity so as to create contexts in which their cognitive growth and personality development are initiated. Moreover, the author firmly believes that the mode would help learners handle everything in learning and in society in a more mature and rational way. In order to implement the function of the mode—cultivating learners'ability, the author uses an interaction-based dialogic pedagogy in her teaching practice and creatively puts forward a multi-level dialogic framework. Dialogues take place at three levels and they are interdependent mutually and occur simultaneously. The practice has proved that the author's mode has effectively realized the teaching aims brought forward in advance. In addition, the author also cites some facts in her cultural teaching practice to illustrate how she conducts cultural teaching with the mode and multi-level dialogic teaching, and how learners benefit from this mode. Besides, empowerment-oriented mode and dialogic pedagogy also present challenges to the traditional culture of learning, such as the value of accumulation of knowledge and teacher-student relationship. As a part of culture, the culture of learning is also dynamic and evolutes continuously so that it needs to absorb new elements to keep its life. If a teacher can develop an insight into culture of learning and creatively introduce new elements into teaching with the same critical mind he/she aims to cultivate in learners, it will be a big step forward in refreshing the traditional culture of learning.