10.1: Chapter Resources

Activities

Test Your Competence

“Intercultural communication competence is the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in various cultural contexts” (section 10.1). We hope that after a semester of studying intercultural communication students feel more competent and equipped for intercultural communication encounters. This activity is one way to measure students' competence levels.

Student Activity: Have students complete this Test your Intercultural Competence Quiz from the London School International Communication.

Investigation:

1. What were your perceptions of the quiz? How did you do?

2. This quiz focuses on specific cultural practices, do you think it is important to just know these things, why or why not?

3. If you were planning to travel to a specific country would you make sure you knew this information?

4. How would you go about finding the answers to this specific knowledge?

5. How does your willingness to learn and knowledge of how to find out demonstrate your competence?

Concept Map

Improving our intercultural competence requires knowledge. “Knowledge includes self- and other-awareness, mindfulness, and cognitive flexibility. Building knowledge of our own cultures, identities, and communication patterns takes more than passive experience” (section 10.1:Cultivating Intercultural Communication Competence). Over the course of this semester, students have built a great deal of knowledge.

One way to help them retain this information is by having them construct concept maps focusing on the full range of the course material. In order to do so, students will have to make choices about what is important enough to include and think about how to organize the material to make meaningful connections between topics.

Student Activity: Ask students to make concept maps for the knowledge and skills developed in the course. This activity is best done by having them work in small groups so they can recall as much information as possible and talk through the connections. Students can draw the maps by hand or use any number of online concept map construction tools.

Concept Maps The Learning Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Course Reflection

“Reflective practices can also help us process through rewards and challenges associated with developing intercultural communication competence” (section 10.1: Cultivating Intercultural Communication Competence). Now that students have reached the end of the course, it is a great opportunity for them to reflect on their experiences and what they have learned. Here are several questions you could consider asking:

● What was the most significant idea you learned in this class, or what was the most significant moment of your learning? Why?

● What was your biggest accomplishment in the course? What course elements helped you reach it?

● What risks did you take in this course?

● How has your perspective or understanding of intercultural communication changed, challenged, reinforced, or deepened after this course?

● What is one way you intend to use or apply your learning in your future endeavors?

● Did you have any “Aha” moments during the semester? Why do these events and “Aha” moments stand out?

● What challenges did you encounter during the course? Were you able to overcome them? Why or why not?

● What did your instructor do to support your academic journey through intercultural communication? What would have liked them to do differently?

Discussion Questions

1. Identify an intercultural encounter in which you did not communicate as competently as you would have liked. What concept(s) from the chapter (section 10.1: Cultivating Intercultural Communication Competence) would have helped you in this situation and how? Which of the following components of ICC—motivation, mindfulness, cognitive flexibility, and tolerance for uncertainty—do you think you are most competent at, and which one needs the most work? Identify how you became so competent at the first one and some ways that you can improve the second one. Choose one of the three ways discussed to cultivate ICC and make a list of five steps you can take to enhance this part of your competence.

2. Section 10.1: Intercultural Communication Competence lays out The National Communication Association’s guidelines for what it means to be a competent communicator (1999). They include:

○ State ideas clearly.

○ Communicate ethically.

○ Recognize when it is appropriate to communicate.

○ Identify their communication goals.

○ Select the most appropriate and effective medium for communicating.

○ Demonstrate credibility.

○ Identify and manage misunderstandings.

○ Manage conflict.

○ Be open-minded about another’s point of view.

○ Listen attentively.

These guidelines were meant to be applied in a variety of communication situations, not specifically for intercultural communication. Now that you have a better sense of what it takes to be an effective intercultural communicator you should be able to apply them to intercultural encounters. Choose three of the guidelines above and explain what they would look like coming from someone who is an effective intercultural communicator.

Supplemental Materials

Bridging Cultural Differences - Ted Talk Playlist

It’s all about understanding. These talks explore perspective -- looking past the stereotype and learning who people are, what they do and why they do it to build new cultural understandings.