A.

9 Culture and learning environments

Ol
d Sun Anglican Aboriginal School, Southern Alberta: note the Union Jack on the board at the
back

A.9.1 The importance of culture

Within every learning environment there is a prevailing culture that influences all the other
components. In most learning environments, culture is often taken for granted or may be
even beyond the consciousness of learners or even teachers. I will try to show why faculty,
instructors and teachers should pay special attention to cultural factors, so that they can
make conscious decisions about how the different components of a learning environment are
implemented. Although the concept of culture may seem a little abstract at this stage, I will
show how critical it is for designing an effective online learning environment,

A.9.2 Defining culture

I define culture as

the dominant values and beliefs that influence decision-making.

The choice of content, the skills and attitudes that are promoted, the relationship between
instructors and students, and many other aspects of a learning environment, will all be
deeply influenced by the prevailing culture of an institution or class (used to mean any
grouping of students and a teacher). Thus in a learning environment, every one of the
components I described will be influenced by the dominant culture.

For instance, parents tend to place their children in schools that reflect their owns values and
beliefs, and so the characteristics of learners in that school will also often be influenced by
the culture not only of their parents but also of their school. This is one of the many ways that
culture can be self-reinforcing.
A.9.3 Identifying cultures

I first noticed the impact of different cultures many years ago, when I was doing research in
the U.K. on the administration of large comprehensive (high) schools. Given that these
schools had deliberately been created by a left-of-centre government in Britain in the 1960s
to provide equal access to secondary education for all, and that these schools had many
things in common (their size, their curricula, the idea that every student should have the
same educational opportunities) one would have expected that they all would have had a
similar prevailing culture. However, I visited over 50 such schools to collect information on
the how they were managed and the key issues they faced, and every one was different.

Some were created from formerly highly selective grammar schools, and operated on a strict
system of sorting students by tests, so that successful students would go up a level and the
weakest students would drop down a level, in order to identify the best prospects for
university. Here the dominant value was academic excellence.

Some schools were single sex (I am still puzzled by how a school segregated by sex could
be considered ‘comprehensive’). One of the key objectives of a girls’ school I visited was to
teach girls about ‘poise’. (This led to a very confused miscommunication between me and the
headmistress, as I thought she had said ‘boys’.) Here the dominant value was on developing
‘ladylike qualities’.

Others were inner city schools, where the focus was often on bringing the best out of each
child, whatever their abilities. In such schools, each class would contain children with as wide
a range of abilities as possible, but they were often rowdy, raucous places in comparison to
the more elite-oriented institutions. Here the emphasis was on inclusiveness and equal
opportunity.

The differing cultures of each of these schools was so strong I could sometimes detect it just
by walking in the door, by the way students reacted with staff and each other in the corridors,
or even by the way the students walked (or ran).

A.9.4 Culture and learning environments

Whether you consider culture to be a good or bad influence in a learning environment will
depend on whether you share or reject the underlying values and beliefs of the dominant
culture. Residential schools in Canada into which aboriginal children were often forcibly
placed are a prime example of how culture drives the way schools operate.

The main purpose of such schools was deliberately to destroy aboriginal cultures and
replace them with a religious-influenced Western culture. In these schools children were
punished for being what they were. In such schools, all the other components of their
learning environment were used to reinforce the dominant culture that was being imposed.

Although the outcomes for most children that attended these schools have turned out to be
disastrous, those responsible (state and church working together) truly believed they were
doing the right thing. We are still struggling in Canada to ‘do the right thing’ for aboriginal
education, but any successful solution must take into account aboriginal cultures, as well as
the surrounding predominant ‘Western’ culture.

Culture is perhaps more nebulous in higher education institutions, but it is still a powerful
influence, differing not just between institutions but often between academic departments
within the same institution.
 A,9.5 Culture and new learning environments

Because prevailing cultures are often so dominant, they are very difficult to change. It is
particularly difficult for a single individual to change a dominant culture. Even charismatic
leaders will struggle, as many university presidents have found.

However, as new technologies allow us to develop new learning environments, instructors

now have a rare opportunity consciously to create a culture that can support those values
and beliefs that they consider to be important for today’s learners.

For instance, in an online learning environment, I consciously attempt to create a culture that
reflects the following:

 mutual respect (between instructor and students, and especially between students)

 open-ness to differing views and opinions

 evidence-based argument and reasoning

 making learning engaging and fun

 making explicit and encouraging the underlying values and epistemology of a subject
discipline

 transparency in assessment (e.g. rubrics and criteria)

 recognition of and respect for the personalities of each student in the class

 collaboration and mutual support.

The above cultural elements of course reflect my beliefs and values; yours may well be
different. However, it is important that you are aware of your beliefs and values, so that you
can design the learning environment in a way that best supports them.

You may also consider these cultural elements to be more like learning outcomes but I
disagree. These cultural elements are broader and more general, and reflect what I believe
are really necessary conditions for building an effective learning environment in a digital age.

Lastly you may question the right of an instructor to impose their personal cultural conditions
on a learning environment. For myself, I have no problems with this. As a subject expert or
professional in teaching, you are usually in a better position than learners to know the
learning requirements and the cultural elements that will best achieve these. In any case, if
you believe that learners should have more say in determining the culture in which they
learn, that too is your choice and could be accommodated within the culture.

A.9.6 Summary

Culture is a critical component of any learning environment. It is important to be aware of the

influence of culture within any particular learning context, and to try and shape that culture as
much as possible towards supporting the kind of learning environment that you believe will
be most effective. However, changing a pre-existing, dominant culture is very difficult.
Nevertheless, new technologies enable new learning environments to be developed, and
 thus provide an opportunity to develop the kind of culture within that learning environment
that will best serve your learners.

However, in every learning environment there will be cultural elements that prevail through all
components, which is why I have added culture as a background to all the components of a
learning environment in the graphic below.

Figure A.9: All the components of an effective learning environment

Activity A.9 Considering culture in a learning environment

1. Do you agree with my definition of ‘culture’ as used in describing an effective learning

environment? If not, how would you define it? Would you use another term for what I am
discussing?

2. Can you describe the culture of the institution in which you work? What are its prime
characteristics or goals? Or are there many cultures?

3. Can you describe the culture within your own class or classes? What do you ‘inherit’
and what can you create or change?

4. Do you share my views on the importance of understanding the culture within a

learning environment? Or is culture something a teacher should/can ignore?

5. What would be the ideal culture for your classes/teaching? How could you foster or
create such a culture?