Connection Standards
There are many ways that readers can choose to read. They can, for example, look for the patterns of ideas and concepts in texts in order to compare them with their own, culturally-familiar schemata for such concepts. In doing so, they are trying to forge connections between the text's culture and their own. These connections build vital bridges between how the text presents concepts or information (as a pattern, based in culture, rather than as information bits) and how a reader recognizes patterns of culture. To highlight this distinction, the Standards draw a distinction between language learners who learn to make connections and those who learn, for example, about German culture without reference to their own culture.
In terms set by the
connection standards, a reader has set a goal of
connecting with the cultural patterns expressed in a
particular text -- that is, to identify in what ways that
reader can use a text to identify similarities and
differences in behaviors, language use, activities, values,
or responses to scenarios depicted. The connection
standards applied to reading, then, emphasize a reader's
ability to learn about the German culture and its contexts
by means of a text -- for instance, to reinforce and further
that reader's knowledge of other disciplines or to recognize
the distinctive viewpoints characteristic of a
German-language culture. This dynamic might be
visualized as follows:
contexts
(Goal: understanding the L2 world,
in terms set by the reader)
reader-audience text
In this version of Standards
goals, the reader-audience is less focused on their own
performance as communicators, and more interested in the
kinds of cultural knowledge that a text exemplifies.
Ultimately, however, evidence of that successful
connection will be sought within the
reader: that he or she has, indeed, internalized
more "things German" through the reading process, in a form
that he or she can verify, confirm, or express to
others.
CULTURE
STANDARDS
COMPARISONS
STANDARDS
COMMUNITIES
STANDARDS
COMMUNICATION
STANDARDS