Abstract
A Pedagogy of the Outlandish: Culture Shock as Experiential Learning
Proceedings of the 8th International Outdoor Education Research Conference, pp.13-14
International Outdoor Education Research Conference, 8th (Sunshine Coast, Australia, 19-Nov-2018–23-Nov-2018)
2018
Abstract
Middletone (2003, p. 6) argues that the ethnocentric view that one's own way of life is "best, the most natural and right" lurks hidden in our subconscious minds. This viewpoint, he contends, can be challenged "only by the contradictions we observe in another culture." Taking Middletone's contention as a starting point, this presentation reports on an Australian Government-funded research project that explored secondary students' self-reported effects of culture shock while travelling in a foreign country markedly different from their own. The study was founded on the hypothesis that students' immersion in a foreign culture (and its expectant culture shock) could lead to powerful experiential learning opportunities for students; opportunities that are more closely seen in traditional outdoor education environments. These opportunities - of the student as outlander - may prove particularly useful for building students' cross-cultural understanding. As a humanities teacher working in a culturally homogenous secondary school, I have seen how difficult it is to build students' cross-cultural empathy. Cross-cultural empathy is considered a foundational disposition or skill in the humanities (ACARA, 2015, p. 4) and yet inevitably students encounter other cultures vicariously at best, from the comforts of their homogenous classrooms. This qualitative research study draws on students' personal reflective journals, completed in situ, as the key data collection method to explore their own conceptions of culture shock. The research suggests further investigation into the benefits of a pedagogy of the outlandish, where international travel and culture shock prove powerful catalysts for students' reflexive thinking about values, beliefs and attitudes of cultures other than their own.
Details
- Title
- A Pedagogy of the Outlandish: Culture Shock as Experiential Learning
- Authors
- Clayton Barry (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Science, Health, Education and Engineering
- Publication details
- Proceedings of the 8th International Outdoor Education Research Conference, pp.13-14
- Conference details
- International Outdoor Education Research Conference, 8th (Sunshine Coast, Australia, 19-Nov-2018–23-Nov-2018)
- Publisher
- University of the Sunshine Coast
- Date published
- 2018
- Organisation Unit
- School of Education - Legacy; School of Education and Tertiary Access; University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99451256402621
- Output Type
- Abstract
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