chanjuan Du week6

Overt banners of criticality, as Pennycook(2004) states, contribute to the emergence of topics like critical discourse analysis, critical literacy or critical pedagogy, and critical work and theory concerning gender, race, culture etc, respective aspects that Pennycook discusses and critiques under the theme of Critical Applied Linguistics (CAL).

Focusing on language teaching, or ESL specifically, which most of us are involved in, Pennycook(2001) states several issues in the course of teaching: the language, the materials, the methods, what the students do and say. From critical perspectives, all these issues are to be viewed as "social-political and cultural political" questions. It is said that there are cultural preferences in the whole course of language teaching, allthough consciously or unconsciously being overlooked.

Still, after reading the "monkeys passage" and its bombed reaction from the students, I got shocked and confused as well. As an English teacher, did I ever notice the teaching materials I chose, might cast positive or negative influence upon students? Most of my students are from rural areas. Then would a passage about millionaire or vogue cause their interest or aversion? I got confused too because if all aspects are to be taken into consideration, I really do not know what to teach and how to teach. I can not walk on the way of teaching. Therefore, being critical, and then being smart to choose a proper way to go on, should be our concern.

References:
Norton Peirce, B. & Stein, P. (1995). Why the "Monkey Passage" bombed: Tests, genres, and teaching. Harvard Educational Review, 65(1), 50-65
Pennycook, A. (2001). Critical applied linguistics. London: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Pennycook, A. (2004). Critical applied linguistics. In A, Davis & C, Elder(Eds.), The handbook of applied linguistics. Oxford : Blackwell.