It is necessary to remember that children’s imagination begin to be developed around two and a half to three years of age, signalling the beginning of pretend play. In addition, most young children play pretend games and interact with their dolls, stuffed animals, or other special toys as if they were alive. However, a lot of children take imaginative play a step farther and create an invisible friend. In fact, children with imaginary friends tend to imagine an egalitarian relationship, like a real friend. First of all, imaginary friends can be human, animal, or fantasy creatures. Furthermore, children can readily describe what these friends look like and how they behave. Many children even offer details about hearing or touching their invisible friends. Also, like real friends, invisible friends do not always cooperate. Their invisible friends do not always come when called and do not leave when is asked. It cannot be forgotten, they almost know that these friends are not real.
Invisible friends can sometimes be a part of the life of a child and a family for years. I did not have an imaginary friend; but, I read the book called “Charlie and Lola”. In this book, Lauren Child provides an example about this intriguing phenomenon. Lola is coming up for school age; she is just entering the peak period for engagement with imaginary friends. Soren Lorenson is Lola's imaginary friend, her confidante and security blanket. Lola uses Soren as a mouthpiece for her own anxieties but only Lola can see and hear him. When Lola and Soren Lorensen are playing, he is rather detailed and has the look of a real person only grey and translucent. While they are left alone they can talk openly, when someone interrupts them, he loses detail and he becomes more transparent.
It seems logical that children who invent invisible friends might be lonely or have social problems, but after finding information based in empirical analysis and including a huge range of different sources, I found that research does not support those assumptions. For the vast majority of children, an imaginary friend is not only normal, also beneficial. On the one hand, children with imaginary friends tend to be more creative, are more likely to have better verbal skills, have richer vocabularies, develop better-internalized thinking(link is external) and are better able to entertain themselves. On the other hand, parents also give numerous examples of how invisible friends help their children to process with life events. They can ask questions to find out more about the friend and they may learn something about child’s interests, wishes, fears, or concerns. Children invent imaginary friends to help them to cope with traumatic experiences. These special friends offer the opportunity to practice conflict resolution and can be a source of comfort when a child is experiencing difficulties.
Sometimes parents worry that kids have imaginary friends because they cannot make real ones, but there is no correlation between the number of imaginary friends and real friends a child has. In fact, children with imaginary friends tend to be very sociable. No doubt, parents also worry that having an imaginary friend means that children are confused about what is real and what is not. But, instead of that, children know the difference between real and imaginary friends.
Surprisingly, invisible friends do not necessarily disappear when childhood ends. By this I mean adult fiction writers are most likely to create an imaginary character and that is not a substitute for relationships with real people. They often talk about their characters taking on a life of their own, which may be a similar process to children’s invisible friends.
I think most of the time, having an imaginary friend is harmless for a child, but there are certainly exceptions. In very rare cases imaginary friends can indicate an issue that something is wrong. Sometimes, lonely and depressed children invent friends to better cope with loneliness and depression. Some children with mental illness may believe that imaginary friends exist when they do not, or the imaginary friend may tell them to do things they do not want to do. However, this is rare.
As a result, I do not think that there are disadvantages for children in having an imaginary friend. Moreover, having an invisible friend is a fantasy play and a companionship to play and have fun with it. In fact, compared to those who do not create them children with imaginary friends tend to be less shy, become more sociable, have a fluent interaction with their schoolmates, and they are more resourceful and creative. Concluding, an imaginary friend is good for healthy development of the child and it is a unique and magical expression of children’s and adult’s imagination.
Culture in FLT
Understanding the nature of the relationship between culture and language is important to the process of learning another language. Language is more than just a code. It also involves social practices of interpreting and making meanings. It is language in its cultural context that creates meaning.
Traditionally, one way in which culture has often been understood is as body of knowledge that people have about a particular society. This body of knowledge can be seen as information. Culture is not, simply a body of knowledge. Culture can be seen as practices that humans pass through generation to generation. Our values, beliefs, morals, and views on diversity are shaped based upon our upbringing, the values within society, and the norm adopted by our culture. Our feelings and own personal experiences have a huge impact on our cultural views.
Imagine our world without music. This would be really sad, silent, mute and useless. Music lets us rediscover our humanity, and our connection to humanity. When I listen to music with other people, I feel that somehow we are all in this together. For me, music is the language, which allows me to express emotions.
Currently there are several cultures as a result of different ways of inhabiting the world, different languages, religions, techniques, art, music, cuisine and social structure. Other views and opinions make us grow up. Different realities and comprehension are allowed. There are no superior or inferior cultures. Every culture has their own beliefs and ways of thinking, by having an open mind to others perspectives open our eyes to world. An opportunity to see the world through another’s eyes can help us see things better and make changes within our opinions and actions.
We took pictures around us that allow us to represent our culture. We used an innovative and participatory methodology: Photovoice. It is a process by which we can identify, represent, and enhance our culture through a specific photographic technique. We discussed and reflected on these photos and have written a text that gives voice to the image. Photovoice promotes critical dialogue and knowledge about important issues through small group discussion of photographs.
Looking at our classmates’ photovoices has allowed us to know different interpretations which enable us to be more conscious about our actual world, where a huge range of cultures coexist in the same county, city or classroom. I would like to point out the importance of the education involving the gender culture, trying to destroy the male chauvinism which still prevails in our society. One signal of that is gender violence where women are helpless because there are not so many measures to reverse this situation. We need to fight this stigma and discrimination towards women.
Other photovoices talked about the “bullying” phenomenon in which stalkers are difficult to be identified while victims are suffering these terrible consequences. They do not receive any support from institutions, and without solution, their life turns into a nightmare. For this reason, I think that it would be necessary to put a new subject in the teacher curriculum where teachers use this tool to know how to act if there is a “bullying” case in the school. I need to know how to transmit social values such as respect, tolerance and solidarity.
To conclude, I think that if this type of activities are managed correctly, they allow students to comprehend the world through different perspectives, and moreover, identify the problems, react, and solve them. Education is one of the most powerful tools to achieve a more egalitarian and fair society.
The most positive aspect of culture in EFL is the idea of individual and social humane enrichment. This global exposition leads me to be more open-minded, to understand other points of views, to leave behind prejudices and to start enjoying other cultures.
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