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Teaching Cross-Culturally: An Incarnational Model for Learning and Teaching

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There's lots of books out there on teaching, and lots of books on multiculturalism, but FINALLY a book that addresses each area from the other's perspective! This book deals with the nuts and bolts of different cultures, but it also comes from an academic perspective, including the research and citations to back it up. Written by two PhDs with the practical knowledge to back up the scholarship, this gave me the answers I needed for working with my inner city/multicultural church groups. It's very readable, and reasonably priced. I'm delighted with it and recommend it highly.

Judith and Sherwood Lingenfelter's work Teaching Cross-Culturally seeks to accomplish four goals. The first is to help teachers understand their own culture of teaching and learning. The second is to help teachers become effective teachers in another culture by becoming good learners. The third goal is to help teachers reflect on cultural differences and conflicts with others by considering perspectives taught in Scripture and faith in Christ. The final goal reflects the others in that the Lingenfelter's want teachers to have fun and enjoy teaching in other cultures and feel like they are taking part in fulfilling the Great Commission.

One of the more helpful aspects of this book is it helps teachers to consider their own cultural biases and how those biases affect their teaching style in cultural settings different from their own. These cultural biases reflect not only one's family background but also one's own educational background. Cultural differences can be seen in a variety of settings ranging from the difference between an inner city school and a rural school to the difference between an American International School and a native school setting. This issue is important because many teachers don't fully realize how much their teaching styles are influenced by their own cultural backgrounds.

This book also helps the potential cross-cultural teacher to consider different learning styles and settings in non-western settings. One is reminded that in many non-western settings learning is often more of a community event than an individual pursuit. So, one needs to understand the role of a teacher in these kinds of setting will differ based on where they are. The Lingenfelter's also help teachers re-evaluate their expectations and consider which may be valid and which are false. Too many false expectations lead to negative teaching experiences.

To teach effectively in a cross-cultural situation then is to learn about the culture one is in and then adapt one's teaching style to that culture. This is reflected in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ who set the ultimate example of adapting to different cultural situations to most effectively reach those around him. The potential cross-cultural teacher needs to follow the example Christ set before them.

Teaching Cross-Culturally was written for people like me who enjoy lecture style learning and teaching. As a graduate student in Moody Bible Institute's MDiv program, I certainly understand the missiological concept of "incarnation". However, incarnational teaching is not limited to transcontinental missions; it can take place right on the South Side of Chicago.

The Lingenfelter's create disequilibrium for traditional forms of teaching that keep the instructor glued behind the lectern. Becoming an incarnational teacher may actually place you at the kitchen table of your student's home. At the least, it is certainly a relational model that allows teachers to develop curricula that is tailored to the culture in which he/she ministers.

Furthermore, the goal of becoming a "150-percent person" strikes a delicate balance in stretching the teacher and students without having either relinquishing their cultural identities.

I would strongly recommend you read this book if you are interested in teaching diverse groups of people. It will help you delve into the culture outside of the stated curriculum as you examine the social types and teacher roles that transpire within the classroom.

This resource is invaluable for anyone who is either is teaching or who will teach cross culturally. While many people speak of the importance of being able to immerse them in the culture, this book provides an effective discussion on how to do this. This book makes anyone going into another culture aware of the specific challenges that they are going up against and equips them very well for this task. The book underscores the important point that teaching takes place in an overall larger social context. Teaching without taking this into consideration this important point would be strongly misguided. Another significant contribution from this book comes from the chart on 78 which discusses the 4 prototype leaders and how they might affect learning in different cultural environments. For the only significant critique the book does have a Western bias. This is not a minor point, for many non- Western missionaries are at work with many working to bring the good news of Christ to the West itself! Overall excellent book that every teacher in a cross cultural setting should own.

This book has opened my eye and has taught me powerfully. It challenges me to get out of my cultural zone. When I teach in a multicultural church or cross-cultural place, don't pour my own cultural teaching style on those students; rather take time to learn their cultures and learning styles so that I can teach them in the ways that they can learn much much more effectively. As a learner to become a teacher, I need to be transformed to be less of my cultural self, and to become more of others. This does not mean that I am not "be myself"; it means that I need to expand myself. This book explains clearly why we must be an incarnational teacher and how to achieve that goal practically. I strongly recommend this book to everyone who is called to be a teacher of the truth. If we do not grasp this truth and practice the truth, we will never be a true teacher that He has called us to be.

If you are in education today is unavoidable that you will be or already are in a multicultural setting in your classroom and community. This book will help all people involved in education to be more effective in the classroom, and primarily could help western educators many head aches in unfamiliar settings. The Lingenfelter's speak not only speak from a vast personal experience but through consulting many other educators around the world for thirty years.
The Lingenfelter's combine resources from the psychological and anthropological world to enhance their credibility they present together with their personal experience. Please no matter how long you been teaching abroad or how well you think your educational system works please come humbly to this book and apply it to your context. I assure you that in every chapter you will find a nugget of insight for your educational methods and goals.
Personally speaking being a "non western" student gives me many insightful principals of how this country operates in the education system and helps me now finally understand many of the teaching concepts that simply did not make sense.
If I had to critique anything I would say that this book is still written from a "western" mind set primarily for other westerns to learn from and could use a little tweaking to be even broader for all.

Teaching Cross-Culturally: An Incarnational Model for Learning and Teaching is a book written by a couple who have thought in different cultural context. The authors picked on lessons garnered from teaching in different geographical locations. It was interesting to read a book that finally looked at the issue of learning from a cultural perspective. Being an international student in the West, I discovered that most of the teaching material, which sometimes finds their way to other parts of the world, is geared toward the classroom conditions found in the West.

The Hidden Curriculum as opined by the Lingenfelters may be the missing link in many cross cultural teaching environment. Education, they say, is cultural transmission. The teacher in this context has to include the culture as part of the curriculum. The best way to do this according to the Lingenfelters is for the teacher to become a 150 percent person. This means bringing in 75 percent from the teacher's culture and 75 percent from the student's culture.

The authors dedicate a chapter to the role of a teacher in a cross cultural context which I found very useful. The teacher is expected to be a learner of the new culture in order to effectively teach the students. For incarnational teaching, a model Jesus used, the teacher has to build relationship with the students before they can teach effectively.

In addition to learning the new culture, the teacher is expected to be self-aware. This is learning who he/she is, what he/she values, and what social game preferences he/she holds. The teacher should also be willing to give up aspects of the teacher role that fits his or her cultural background and to take on the role that fits the social and cultural world of the students.
The authors recognize that there are limitations to some of these suggestions and advice that in such cases teachers may need to find a middle ground of connection.
I recommend the book to anyone considering Bible teaching in any country as most classrooms, even the ones in the West, are multi-cultural in nature due to urban migration.

This is the first book I have read on teaching in a cross-cultural context. As a citizen in the West, there are many issues of communication and engagement with different cultures which I found extremely helpful.

The first benefit I gleaned in cross-cultural communication is the importance of the "hidden curriculum" (Ligenfelter 28). This is also known as the cultural environment in which the teacher educates. In order for a teacher to effectively teach his/her students in a cross-cultural setting, much more emphasis and investment needs to be made in learning the cultural traits of one's students. For a teacher to teach effectively, he must understand the ways in which his students value, process, and understand the material. The teacher will be more effective and communicate more clearly to students if time is given to learn and incorporate the cultural factors of the teaching context.

Another benefit I received from this book on cross-cultural communication was the posture of a teacher. Though this book was written from authors who taught in cross-cultural settings over seas; the principle of learning your student's culture is transferable to any culture in teaching. One experience the author shared about learning to buy produce from a grocery store in France (Ligenfelter 91,92). The teacher was able to redeem her mistakes and use it as an opportunity to be taught by her students. An effective teacher in a cross-cultural context is one who puts themselves in the shoes and the lives of their students. For a teacher to be a learner in a cross-cultural setting requires time, patience, and humility. But the benefits of this investment will provide a doorway into student's lives in which other teachers may not be able to open.

The last benefit I found helpful in communicating cross-culturally was the role of the teacher. Depending on the culture, the role of the teacher plays an enormous role in communicating to students. The authors list four "prototype teacher roles as Authority, Facilitator, Patron/Parent, and Outsider" (Ligenfelter 72). Corresponding to the perceived role of the teacher by one's students are four roles of the student. Failing to understand the role of the teacher from the student's perspective is one major factor which can disrupt the teaching process between a student and teacher in a cross-cultural setting.

This is the most practical book I have read on being an effective teacher. While I realize that the author's intent was to write this book for "a western trained educator who is planning to work in a non-western school setting or in a multi-cultural school or university in a major city of North America" (pg. 9), most chapters of the book are effective for any teacher that has students which are not overtly homogenous in culture and life experience and/or for teachers whom themselves originate from a different culture than their learners. The only shortfall of this book is the fact that it does not give itself enough credit for how useful it is. The chapters include an excellent intersection of theory, practical anecdotes, applicable tutorials, and reflection questions on how to teach effectively.
There were two ideas that were the most important for me. One idea was treating others (students in particular) as more important than me (pg. 33). I have always worked to treat my students in a special way, but I have not taken time to learn them, listen to them, observe them, and value them as though their learning styles and cultures are more important than my own in terms of how I perceive them. I do not think this requires a devaluing of the teacher but simply a higher value placed on the student, especially since they are not simply the recipient of data but instruments of transformation and as a teacher I need to know what kind of instrument they are and how to help them play beautiful music. The other idea that was central for me was considering my own learned "hidden curriculum" preferences as it relates to cultural or learning styles, in order to avoid creating learning barriers for students due to my own preferences (pg. 25). I recommend this book to anyone looking to become a better teacher.

After ministering cross-culturally for 6 years and returning back to America for MDiv training, I found the Lingenfelters' book to offer insights in teaching that I have not seen in the US or abroad. There are concepts here in this book that is omitted by modern educational psychology predominantly because the western educational system is confined in the prison (pg 19) of an anglo-western worldview. A broader scope is required not only abroad, but even more so at home, when our schools are filling with young students from a vast array of cultures, economic backgrounds, and so forth.

The premise of the book is for teachers to learn to be incarnational in their multiethnic classrooms. What this means is essentially learning to recognize our standard western method and to let go of it by adopting an `other-culture' perspective. Biblically, this concept follows the Apostle Paul's example in becoming weak for the weak, Jews for the Jews, etc (I Cor 9:18-25).

Something fresh that the Linderfelters added to their teaching was 4 types of teachers around the globe (chpt 6). As I ministered cross culturally in Asia and Africa, I found the style of teaching so different from my western method, but accurately reflecting their cultural setting. Thus, the role of a teacher will vary as one travels abroad, or the expectations of the student regarding the teachers role will vary in a multiethnic classroom. This is why the description of 4-types of teachers the Lingerfelters incorporate into their book makes the book worth buying!

In conclusion, I would add that I found insights in almost every chapter. I am challenged now to think, as a teacher, how I can recognize the needs in my classroom better and how I can be an incarnational teacher to a multiethnic class room.