Page 55 - BB_Textbook

INTEGRATIVE GRADE 10
The leadership of English teachers and global classrooms
can elevate the Delta’s place among ASEAN countries
and the world. Bending Bamboo combines language
and development learning through iC5—intercultural communicative competence, confidence, and collaboration. The content of every chapter is “of, by, and for” Vietnam. Still Bending Bamboo is likely to mean different things to different people. In this Integrative section, classrooms complete a “baseline survey” of their understanding of Bending Bamboo’s communicative approach to language and development learning. They watch a feature film, Akeelah and the Bee, and prepare for their own Spelling Bee among other global classrooms. This film can be part of a Library Soiree or an event on the high school campus. Finally, students are encouraged to journal about what they have learned in this chapter, based on the Guiding Questions for Grade 10 posed at the beginning of this chapter.
“The Blind Men and the Elephant”
A Fable
Step One. Listen to the recording of the ancient fable.
Step Two. Discuss as a class how the six blind men, each touching a different part of an elephant, can proclaim with such certainty that he knows what it is. They argue over
whether the elephant is a wall, fan, spear, snake, tree, or rope. Of course, they are all correct. And they are all wrong. The elephant is all six ... and more.
Step Three. Just as several adjectives describe an elephant, so too Bending Bamboo has many descriptors. For teachers and students, alike, Bending Bamboo is not a typical text. Here are five examples.
1. Bending Bamboo is created by Vietnamese teachers for use in the secondary-level schools of the Mekong Delta.
2. This project is not dependent on foreign publishers. Rather, Vietnamese teachers and in-country partners research, write, test, and revise Bending Bamboo so that it is always current for a fast-changing Delta.
3. Its iC5 communicative approach has some huge advantages: its own website with fresh recordings; global classrooms linking rural and urban Delta schools; and native-speakers of English co-teaching alongside fluently bilingual Vietnamese educators.
4. The bookends of each chapter are the stories of Delta people and students being “bilingual with purpose.”
5. Bending Bamboo smartly combines linguistic and sustainable development theory and action. And so the English Language classroom engages other disciplines (science, technology, engineering, and math – STEM), and powers STEAM education (adding the arts (A)— language, humanities, and sustainability) for a bilingual and flourishing Delta.
BENDING BAMBOO
IDENTITY | CHAPTER 1 55