Teaching Culture Online

Abstract

This chapter explores the ways in which the language educator can be successful teaching culture together with language specifically in an asynchronous online environment. It provides examples of content, activities, and assessments that are meaningful, collaborative, and learner-centered, and that employ mobile technology familiar to the average instructor. In addition, it discusses the new role of the language professor in facilitating an integrated language and culture curriculum in a fully online setting. Through shifting the responsibilities and roles of the instructor, emphasizing social and teacher presence, and employing flexible learner-centered content and activities, previously face-to-face language classes can be successfully transformed to foster cultural competency asynchronously.