For more advanced students capable of thinking critically about the underlying cultural metaphors that lurk in our subconscious and come out in language, this activity is great. It's probably too advanced for younger students or those at the very beginning of language study, though.

If you are looking for a way to get students to recognize and address stereotypes, this is a basic activity for changing stereotypes into generalizations. 

There are great cultural learning web resources out there. Some are proprietary and have associated costs (see Country Navigator as an example). The Hofstede website tool is free, but I always caution teachers against unintentionally reinforcing stereotypes with its use. That's why I recommend you check out this tool, which has suggestions for how to use the website to best effect. 

Culture mapping gets students to think about their own cultural values, which can be helpful both for self-awareness and in preparation to interact with someone from another language background. There are a ton of activities in the HubICL related to cultural values. TIP: Go to the toolbox and search for the word "values", or click on Tags under the Discover menu and search for values there.

Language Envelopes takes a lot of effort to put together, but boy is it worth it! I love seeing students creatively trying to arrange objects into categories and eventually coming to the conclusion that semantic and other linguistic categories are constructed rather than natural (and one of many options). There is also a virtual version that uses Jamboard, if your learners are not physically with you.

Part of openness, or the willingness to interact across cultural differences, is tolerance for discomfort (social, emotional, mental, physical), so activities like this can be helpful for students to become more self-aware and more skilled at managing uncomfortable interactions/situations.

One of my favorite media activities uses the TED talk "The Danger of a Single Story". It is highly engaging and can be used to inspire openness to multiple narratives and perspectives. Check out the HubICL tool for discussion prompts and links in a complete lesson plan.

Annette Benson pulled this toolbox into one of her collections, with lots of concrete details about where to find elements of the SALTO collection in the HubICL, so I am passing along that resource to you here.

For those of you who like to give your students something physical to manipulate, these experiential tools are great for icebreakers as well as debriefing learning. My absolute favorite is the Mini-metaphor set, so that is the one I linked here. Click Related Tools for other similar products, and check out under Links the video I made explaining how I like to use these.

Two of my favorite culturally focused icebreakers are Voices from the Past and the Name Game. You can read what I wrote about them in this TESOL collection or visit them directly in the toolbox. Both are great in diverse groups but also can be fruitful in more homogenous language classrooms.

In any collection for teachers I like to include a few icebreakers that are appropriate to the teaching context. Many teachers overlook the teaching potential of icebreakers, which are useful for more than having students get to know each other and can be a great source of cultural knowledge or at least an opportunity for self-awareness development. That said, there are some caveats to icebreakers, and I think this blog highlighted in Annette Benson's collection on Icebreakers that Teach is good food for thought. While you are there, check out the rest of Annette's handy collection!

If you'd like to take a deep dive into the Pendulum model, there is now an open access learning module in the HubICL's Professional Development Zone for you to explore and apply.

More recently, Sundae and I discuss the Pendulum model and our latest related project on Richard Farkas' podcast, The Intercultural Toolbox. You can find the video version here.

When the article first came out, Sundae and I talked it up on her award-winning podcast series, Expat Happy Hour.

You can download not only the article but a handy 2 page fillable pdf reflection worksheet on the Pendulum model from the Publications area of the HubICL.

Here's where it all began. The link here leads to the open access article available for free download from the publisher. This article is also available published inside the HubICL.

Just what the title says.

This document lists the instruments cited in the Smackdown video.  Note that in order to open the HubICL "curation card" about each instrument, you'll need to be logged into a HubICL account.

In this video, participants will learn to understand the Intercultural Praxis model and identify concrete examples of each aspect of the cycle (Inquiry, Framing, Positioning, Dialogue, Reflection and Action). 

In this activity, participants will read a case study about a diverse group of students attending an environmental justice event. The students in the case study have conflicting viewpoints about environmental justice based on their own cultural frameworks.

In this book, participants will be able to gain familiarity with the study of communication among cultures, recognize history, power, and global institutions as central to understanding the relationships and contexts that shape intercultural communication, value reflection and action. and practice these tools to create a more equitable world through communication.

This activity can be used in team-building workshops for the dual purpose of introductions and reflection. This facilitation tool is easily adaptable to different contexts, e.g., the activity can be used to facilitate discussion about participants’ progress in class research projects.

For this activity, participants will learn how to build rapport, make introductions, create connections, review names, and become more comfortable with each other.

In this activity, participants will learn how to define and identity personal agendas, and study how personal agendas can create conflicts in a Case Study. Students engage in group and small group discussion to explore their understanding of personal agendas.

This lesson asks participants to reflect on their emotions and practice managing them during interactions that may be tense or uncomfortable. They can choose either to talk with a family member or close friend with whom they disagree on a deeply-held value/belief or to attend an event in which their social identity is minoritized. Either way, they will reflect on their emotions before, during, and after the conversation/event and consider how they might more strategically manage their emotions for future difficult encounters.