Multicultural Understanding Webinar : Cross-Cultural Interpersonal Skill Building /　Monday, September 28th 2020, 9:30-12:00

CICE co-hosted a multicultural understanding webinar toward creating a society where ” No one will be left behind ” as advertised in the SDGs.

“Developing Intercultural Communicative Competence in Online Environments,” 
Lecturer: Gerald LeTendre, PhD. （Professor at Pennsylvania State University, U.S.)

            As schools and universities around the world increasingly support a diverse student body, intercultural communication skills are becoming essential for students and teachers. Intercultural communicative competence (ICC) has long been emphasized in business and international relations and in the field of education, it offers significant promise in helping teachers deal with diverse classrooms. In this talk, He discussed  some of the basic theories of how one develops intercultural competence, provide some examples of articles at the college level employing intercultural communication strategies with international students and discuss how ICC theories and techniques are being modified to work in online environments. He ended by discussing recent work on developing intercultural competence in online teacher education programs and the promise it holds for more egalitarian access to schooling for all.

(PDF) Developing Intercultural Communicative Competence in Online Environments

”Roles of Language in Education,” 
Lecturer: Miki Sugimura, PhD. （Vice President for Global Academic Affairs, Sophia University)

           What are the roles of medium of instruction and language education? Earlier studies have claimed that there are two roles of language in a diversified society. Firstly, their national integration policy by designating national language(s) as the medium of instruction in the national education system. Secondly, people try to preserve their own mother tongue as a symbol of their cultural identity and background. Along with these elements, language can be chosen as a strategy depending on people’s political, economic and social demands.
People try to acquire better opportunities for study, work and life. In particular, in this era of migration, the changing roles of language should be considered as new functions in multicultural education to meet people’s educational needs. This presentation clarifies the compatible relationship among three roles of language by focusing on the education for Chinese people in Malaysia and Japan.

(PDF) Roles of language in Education