PanSIG 2026 - Building Language Competencies through Community

Building Intercultural Community: A Project with Seven Nationalities

23 May 2026, 12:20

25m

0号building/8-809 (Chukyo University)

B. Practice-oriented Presentation (25 minutes) ICLE: Intercultural Communication in Language Education 809

Speaker

Mariko Yamada (Rikkyo University)

Keywords

Intercultural Communication, CLIL, PBLT

Short summary

This presentation outlines a CLIL course for a class of seven nationalities. It explores how classroom diversity was used to teach cultural and intercultural theory. The session highlights a "Guidebook Project" where multinational groups created practical resources for new international students. The presenter will share the project design, instructions, and grading criteria, offering a framework for building inclusive communities and facilitating intercultural mediation in diverse educational settings.

References

Byram, M. (2021). Teaching and Assessing Intercultural Communicative Competence: Revisited (2nd ed.). Multilingual Matters.
Coyle, D., Hood, P., & Marsh, D. (2010). CLIL: Content and Language Integrated Learning. Cambridge University Press.

Abstract

This practice-oriented presentation outlines the design of a CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) course on Intercultural Communication. The classroom featured a diverse student body representing seven nationalities, including native and non-native English speakers. Following the "4Cs" framework (Coyle et al., 2010), this content-driven model used the classroom's diversity as a "living community" to explore cultural and intercultural theory.

The presenter will detail a semester-long scaffolding approach that guided students from foundational concepts to sensitive discussions on stereotypes and culture shock. Rather than traditional language instruction, the course facilitated "language through learning." This allowed students to develop the discourse skills necessary for high-level intercultural mediation (Byram, 2021) through group interaction.

The session highlights the "Intercultural Communication Guidebook" project. In this collaborative task, students from seven nationalities synthesised their learning to create a practical resource for incoming international students. The presenter will share the instructional design, assessment criteria, and specific prompts used. Attendees will gain a clear framework for implementing similar tasks and receive practical tips for leveraging a multinational student body to build a supportive, inclusive classroom community without compromising student privacy.