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Teaching English as a Foreign Language / Chair "Didaktik der Anglistik und Amerikanistik mit dem Schwerpunkt interkulturelles Lernen"
Campus Am Neuen Palais
Building 19, Room 1.24
14469 Potsdam
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Wed, 4-5 pm
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I studied English, German and Music in Gießen and Manchester, where I spent a year as a foreign language assistant. In 2003, I received my teaching degree and worked as a research assistant for Teaching English as a Foreign Language at Gießen University from 2004 to 2008. As a doctoral student in the International PhD Programme (IPP) – a programme belonging to the Gießen Graduate Centre for the Study of Culture (GGK/GCSC) – I completed my PhD thesis about teaching Black and Asian British Literature to learners of English with the aim of developing inter- and transcultural competence in 2009. After receiving my second state examination (Zweites Staatsexamen) in 2011, I continued to teach English and German at a grammar school for three years. In 2013, I worked as a stand-in professor for Teaching English as a Foreign Language at Gießen University. In October 2014, I was appointed professor of Teaching English as a Foreign Language at the University of Potsdam.
My research areas include teaching literature and culture, inter- and transcultural learning, global education, competence-oriented learning tasks as well as empirical classroom research. I am particularly interested in using literary texts, e.g. Black and Asian British literature and other postcolonial literary texts, for inter- and transcultural learning. Another current research area concerns genre-based approaches to language learning with a focus on the development of genre-based materials and learning tasks for teaching speaking and writing skills.
I am also involved in several teaching projects which focus on the development of EFL teachers' professional competences: Studientage Englisch (What's UP?) für Schüler*innen, Didaktikwerkstatt Englisch (with Prof. Dr. Jana Roos), KEnDiLi (Kooperation Englischdidaktik und Linguistik, with Prof. Dr. Dagmar Barth-Weingarten), Forschendes Lernen im Praxissemester Englisch (with Prof. Dr. Jana Roos).
Information on selected projects in research and teaching can be found below.
"Verzahnung Fachwissenschaft und Fachdidaktik im Lehramt Englisch" (mit Prof. Dr. Jana Roos)
Drittmittelprojekt im Rahmen der „Qualitätsoffensive Lehrerbildung“ (BMBF) an der UP (PSI), 2019-2023
Lehrprojekt mit Prof. Dr. Dagmar Barth-Weingarten, seit Sommersemester 2018
Landeslehrpreis 2019 (MWFK, Brandenburg), 25.06.2019
"Forced Displacement and Migration from an International and Global Perspective: COIL Project to Promote (Inter-)Cultural Competences of English Teacher Training Students" (with Susanne Gnädig)
Funding: University of Potsdam, KoUP Cooperation Funding for International Projects (2019)
International experience is of great importance for student teachers of English, because today they increasingly teach in culturally diverse learning groups and, as foreign language teachers, also take on the role of 'cultural mediators': In our society, which is characterized by migration, cultural diversity and globalization, it is important that pupils develop communicative and intercultural competences in foreign language teaching, which enable them to communicate interculturally and to assume responsibility as 'global citizens'. In order to support and monitor such educational processes, foreign language teachers themselves must possess (inter-/trans-)cultural competences. Preparing future teachers for teaching about global challenges is thus a vital task for teacher training, not least since the learning area "Global Development" (KMK, 2016) was declared a central educational dimension in schools in connection with the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. Learning across national borders can be an essential key for students to understanding and reflecting perspectives and patterns in the perception of global phenomena - in this case displacement and migration - and thus further developing the '(inter-/trans-) cultural competence' of teacher students.
The COIL seminar with international partners from three main UP regions (South Africa, USA, Mexico) aims at the development of (inter-/trans-)cultural competences of teacher training students in English. Within the framework of a COIL seminar, students from the participating partner institutions will exchange ideas on the subject of forced displacement and migration. This topic is of global importance and, due to a number of different migration movements (e.g. Africa, Europe, Central America) it is currently present in national discourses. The special value resulting from the international discussion in the planned COIL seminar is the possibility to view the phenomena of forced displacement and migration from different perspectives, i.e. to make the multitude of perspectives (national, international, global) visible. By exchanging ideas with students from South Africa, the USA and Mexico about the global phenomena of displacement and migration and their perception in the respective societies, UP students can experience these phenomena across national and regional areas. The seminar will also provide opportunities for discussions about how the different perspectives in foreign language teaching can be experienced by learners.
The research project examines what role the EFL classroom can play when dealing with the global issue of forced displacement and migration. A special focus will be put both on theoretical considerations, i.e. the role of language teaching in global (citizenship) education and education for sustainable development (ESD), and on the role refugee narratives can play in this context. In particular, the project aims at developing teaching materials to show how refugee narratives (picture books, autobiographic narratives, graphic journalism) can develop foreign language learners’ understanding of refugee experiences, support the critical reflection of conventionalized images of refugees in the media and, possibly, even invite them to take action by participating in cultural discourses or even choose to play an active role in their own communities.
Publications:
Freitag-Hild, Britta (ed.) (2019): Globales Lernen:Seeking refuge. Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 53.159.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2019): Seeking refuge. Globales Lernen zum Thema Flucht, Vertreibung, Migration. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 53.159: 2-7.
Freitag-Hild, Britta/Strobel, Katharina (2019): Die Mystery-Methode: globale Zusammenhänge problemorientiert und kooperativ erarbeiten. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 53.159: 8-11.
Freitag-Hild, Britta/Martin, Franziska (2019): What would you do if your country became a warzone? Mit einer Autobiografie Fluchtumstände eines Kindes nachvollziehen. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 53.159: 30-37.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2017): Children’s Stories of Migration. Globales Lernen mit Kurzfilmen, eine Ausstellung über Fluchtgeschichten konzipieren. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 51.149: 24-31.
Genre-based approaches to language learning are based on the idea that any kind of social interaction happens in the form of cultural ‘genres’ and that these genres are formed according to certain, i.e. linguistic, discursive and social, rules (cf. e.g. Paltridge 2001, Hallet 2011). Learners therefore need to acquire these generic rules and internalize them in order to be able to communicate successfully. While genre-based approaches to teaching writing skills have found their way already into course books and language learning materials, genre-based approaches to teaching speaking are rather scarce. The research project therefore aims at developing genre-based materials and complex learning tasks for developing the learners’ speaking skills, which will also be tested in English classrooms.
Publications:
Freitag-Hild, Britta/Kroschewski, Annette (2018): Digitalisierung im Englischunterricht: Fokus Mündlichkeit. In: Surkamp, Carola/Khuen, Yvonne (eds.): Digitalisierung im Englischunterricht: Arbeiten aus der Klett Akademie für Fremdsprachendidaktik, Sektion Englisch, https://www.klett.de/inhalt/digitalisierung-im-englischunterricht/muendlichkeit/9911.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (ed.) (2017): Lebenswelten erproben: Simulationen. Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 51.147.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2017): Den Ernstfall (er)proben: Mit Simulationen Kommunikations- und Handlungsfähigkeit entwickeln. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 51.147: 2-7.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2017): Globalsimulationen planen und gestalten. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 51.147: 8-11.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2014): How Far Will You Go? Your Carbon Footprint: Übungen zum Diskutieren und Argumentieren. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 48.131:32-37.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2014): Lernaufgaben im genre-basierten Englischunterricht: Kompetenzen zum monologischen und dialogischen Sprechen entwickeln. In: Fäcke, Christiane/Rost-Roth, Martina/Thaler, Engelbert (eds.): Sprachenausbildung – Sprachen bilden aus – Bildung aus Sprachen. Dokumentation zum 25. Kongress für Fremdsprachendidaktik der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Fremdsprachenforschung (DGFF) 2013. Baltmannsweiler: Schneider Verlag Hohengehren. 77-89.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2013): Kommunikationssituationen im Alltag meistern: Generisches Lernen im Simulationsprojekt. In: Best Practice. Das Magazin für den Englischunterricht (Cornelsen), Oktober 2013
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2013): Giving advice to a friend. Generische Sprechaufgaben zum dialogischen Sprechen. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 47.126: 20-25.
Selected publications:
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2017): ‚I swear, if it hadn’t been so late, I’d have done something about it.‘ In einer Schreibwerkstatt eine Kurzgeschichte verfassen. In: Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 51.150: 38-45.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2016): Identity, Intercultural Relationships and Growing Up in the 1970s: Teaching Anita and Me to Promote Inter- and Transcultural Learning. In: Viebrock, Britta (ed.): Feature Films in English Language Teaching. Tübingen: Narr. 207-216.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2015): Szenische Interpretationsverfahren am Beispiel von Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun. In: Hallet, Wolfgang/Surkamp, Carola (eds.): Dramendidaktik und Dramenpädagogik. (=Handbücher zur Literatur- und Kulturdidaktik 4). Trier: WVT. 203-220.
Freitag, Britta (2010): Visualisierungsaufgaben im Literaturunterricht: Lernerorientierte Zugangsweisen zu Andrea Levys Roman Small Island in Schule und Hochschule. In: Hecke, Carola/Surkamp, Carola (eds.): Bilder im Fremdsprachenunterricht. Neue Ansätze, Kompetenzen und Methoden. Tübingen: Narr. 181-198.
Freitag-Hild, Britta (2010): Theorie, Aufgabentypologie und Unterrichtspraxis inter- und transkultureller Literaturdidaktik. British Fictions of Migration im Fremdsprachenunterricht. (=ELCH 42). Trier: WVT.
Freitag, Britta/Stroh, Silke (eds.) (2008): Transcultural Identities: Britain. Der fremdsprachliche Unterricht Englisch 42.95.
University of Potsdam
Teaching English as a Foreign Language
Department of English and American Studies
Prof. Dr. Britta Freitag-Hild & Prof. Dr. Jana Roos
Am Neuen Palais 10
14469 Potsdam
Tel.: +49 331 977-1134
Fax: +49 331 977-1605
E-Mail: siheinze@uni-potsdam.de