Post 152: Biculturalism Among Americanized Cbildren--The Asian American Experience

Post 152: Processes in the Development of Cultural Identities---Biculturalism

Biculturalism is when a person has the capacity to negotiate effectively within two different cultures. Being a bicultural person does not mean you spend equal time in each culture. Instead, you are able to switch back and forth between the two cultures seamlessly. However, sometimes if the two cultures have conflicting values, then a bicultural person will struggle between the two cultures. Is he part of the dominant American culture or his minority heritage culture? Which becomes more important? or less important?

I identify myself as Asian American. So, am I Asian? or am I American? or both. What does it mean to be 'Asian'?  What does it mean to be 'American'?  I have to grapple with these two cultures all the time. Does being Asian mean eating Chinese food? speaking fluently the Chinese language? knowing about Chinese culture, history and literature adhering to Confucian values of group think and the importance of obedience to elders? Does being American mean adhering to American ideas of individuality? eating a hot dog? eating a hamburger? liking football? celebrating American heroes like George Washington? Lincoln? What happens when the two cultures collide?  I like to think that I am both, as much Asian, as I am American.

When I am with my Asian family, I adhere more to the Confucian standards of obedience to my elders and when I am with my American friends, I feel more free to express my emotions, tell people what I want to do and define my personal idea of happiness to my partner.  I find it like code-switching between languages. I act one way when I am with my Asian family, and I act another way when I am with Americans. When I am angry and want my way, I think of this as my American side and when I am obedient, I see this as my Asian side.

This kind of duality confuses my parents who expect me to act 'Asian' and obey them thoroughly while being American means being more individual and pursuing your own happiness.  Conflicting cultural values in a bicultural person causes family arguments to occur. Trust me, I have had those with my parents. But in the end, we all love each other and learn to accept each other unconditionally.

Interestingly, no matter how I see myself as either Asian or American, I am considered the 'other' in both America and in China. I will discuss how others perceive Asian Americans in another blog post.

Ovando, Carlos & Combs, Mary Carol  Bilingual and ESL Classrooms 6th Ed. 

Post 151:Prefigurative Transmission--The Asian American Experience

Post 151: Prefigurative Transmission--The Asian American Experience

In this type of cultural transmission, the children to a large extent create culture change. For example, immigrant parents in prefigurative situations, vicariously experience much of American society and culture through their children.  The reality that such children present to their parents has been gleaned from the formal school system. These children are frequently the source of many answers to their parents' concerns. They serve as translators at the doctor's office, for example, they write the school absence excuse for their younger siblings. Virtually everything new is filtered through the children who may put aside some of the old beliefs as being obsolete.  Frustration grows on both sides. There may even be a sense of superiority on the part of the children. (Ovando, 169)

My Chinese grandparents lived with their children in Houston. My grandparents spoke no English. So, my aunt and uncle had to translate everything for them from English into Chinese. My grandmother adjusted quite well to the US. She tried to learn English; She learned to write English at an elementary school level. She did not mind living the American culture through her children. Towards the end of her life, my grandmother learned enough English to pass the citizenship test and she became a U.S. citizen.  My grandfather, however, was another story.

My Chinese grandfather had been a diplomat with the Chinese government. He was used to everybody in the government, and everything in the family obeying him. He was used to the Confucian idea that the absolute head of the household was the man earning the money. Once, my grandfather came to the US, he lost that power. He had to defer to his children for everything. He had to have his children translate for him. In essence, he went from having a position of authority as head of the household to now he was the child of his own children. He only survived 2 years in US.  He did not like the idea of the young treating their elders like children. My grandfather was not able to create another cultural identity for himself here in the US.

As teachers, we have to deal with parents in these different stages of acculturation. Some parents are newly arrived parents who expect their children to rigidly obey their social rules. School must be set to a teacher-centered classroom because that's how school was taught in the home country where the parents went to school. Then, you have parents who have been here a while and have gotten used to American culture so that the teacher can have an easier time communicating with these more Americanized parents without language and cultural barriers. In any case, teachers have to be aware of the level of acculturation immigrant parents may  be in and adjust their parent-student conference accordingly. Translators may be needed for newly arrived parents. A lot of times, the child serves as the translator.  I used to translate from English to Chinese for my grandmother and grandfather when they went to the grocery store and when they went to visit my teacher. More Americanized parents like my mother and father did not need a translator as they were more Americanized.

While the parents may retain part of the culture of the home country, it is usually the Americanized children who become bicultural. I will talk more about bicultural identity or for me what it has been like being Asian American in another blog post.

Ovando, Carlos & Combs, Mary Carol  Bilingual and ESL Classrooms 6th Ed. 

Post 150: Cofigurative Transmission--The Asian American Experience

Post 150: Cofigurative Transmission

In cofigurative transmission, there are multiple role models--old ones and the contemporary one.Emergent cultural traits may be attributed to the sharing between parents and children at a time when the traditional cultural patterns have lost some power over the young. Cofigurative communities may be represented, for example, by immigrant groups that are partially disengaging from the past and are beginning to relate in different ways to their children growing up in the United States. (Ovando, 169)

My Chinese parents as I mentioned in my previous blog post were raised in China. They were raised to obey their elders without question. Individual opinions are discouraged. Children are expected to sacrifice their own personal interests to the interest of the elderly parents. The elderly parents hold all the power in the family. The elders decide who the young marry, what work they do, and the elders are the holders of centuries of Chinese culture and tradition. When my parents emigrated to the US, they expected their children to obey them just like they had obeyed their parents in the Confucian tradition of respect for authority and state. However, that is not what happened.

In traditional Chinese culture, if a son marries a barren wife, he is expected to divorce her to marry a wife who can give him children to carry on the family name. Even if the son loves the barren wife, because the wife cannot bear children and the father orders the divorce, the son is expected to obey his father.  A daughter in law can never argue with her mother-in-law. She is always expected to kowtow to her mother-in-law.

My brother, however, is very Americanized. When he discovered his wife was barren, instead of leaving her, he stayed with her and they adopted a child. Instead of obeying Chinese tradition, he forged his own path for his own happiness thus disobeying Chinese tradition. Then,  my mother and sister in law argued over politics. One of them said they were a Trump supporter and a life long Republican and the other one said she was a Bernie supporter and a life long Democrat. First of all, the sister-in-law is expected to just obey her mother-in-law no matter what, but that is not what happened. Instead, my sister-in-law lost her temper and threatened to take my brother away from my mother. My sister in law blocked all my mother's emails and phone calls from my mother. In effect, for the first time in 40 years, my mother was cut off from her adored son. And my brother took his wife's side when in Confucian tradition, he is supposed to take my mother's side.

Having been raised in the Confucian tradition, my mother could not understand why my brother took his wife's side. As a result, she was heartbroken. She felt she had lost the love of her life. My mother did not understand that in America, individual happiness is more important than the strict obedience of parents. My brother cared more about his personal happiness than the good of the family. My mother's relationship with my brother after this was never quite the same. She became convinced until the end of her life, that my brother does not really love her no matter how many times my brother apologized.

With cofigurative transmission, the dominant American culture has more and more sway with the young and sometimes, like my mother, immigrant parents become lost and confused in the way their children act or react to their orders. Instead of obedience, Americanized children want to forge their own path, have their own personal happiness and have their own lives. Therefore, a lot of family conflict occurs between the immigrant parents and their children.

Ovando, Carlos & Combs, Mary Carol  Bilingual and ESL Classrooms 6th Ed. 

Post 149: Postfigurative Transmission of culture--The Asian American Experience

Post 149: Postfigurative Transmission of culture

In postfigurative transmission, adult community members pass on values, beliefs and behaviors to the upcoming generation with little alteration. Usually, in such contexts, the children question the cultural patterns they receive from elders very little. In the United States, the Amish and Hutterite subcultures closely represent postfigurative processes. Immigrants from traditional or rural societies may also have a background of strong postfigurative transmission. (Ovando, 168)

My father grew up on a farm in Shanghai China and my mother grew up on a beach in Taiwan. Both received a very Confucian childhood where when they were children, they were expected to obey their elders without question. The elders were the head of the family. The elders had the right to choose husbands or wives for their children. If the elders scolded their children, the children obeyed without question or else face dishonor and shame. I remember my grandmother scolding my mother for making foods that were not good enough for her family. My grandmother also told my mother that the American way of dieting to promote weight loss was wrong. My grandmother said, you always eat several plates of food to show your appreciation to the family for having plenty of food on the table. Only poor peasants eat very little and lose weight because they are poor. Wealthier people take pride in their weight gain. My mother just took it. She never questioned my grandmother's authority. My mother always did what she was told. When her elders told her to do something, she just did it without complaining. My mother and my grandmother did not like each other. No matter what my mother did, it was never good enough to please my grandmother.  As a small child, I never realized why my mother and grandmother always sat at opposite ends of the room. Yet despite my mother's dislike for my grandmother, she never disrespected my grandmother by arguing with her or showing her point of view.

When immigrant parents come to the US, they expect their children to adhere to these strict rules of obedience to their elders. They expect the children to obey them, in the same way they obeyed their elders. They have strict limitations on what you can or cannot do. Everything is done for the good of the family, the group. If a child thinks for himself, he is considered selfish and immature. Children are expected to sacrifice their own individual happiness for the good of the family. Family loyalty in Chinese culture is paramount. Group think is expected and honored.  A Chinese child in China is taught to obey without question. These values are then passed down from generation to generation for hundreds of years.  In fact, Chinese literature celebrate heroes who give up their own happiness to take care of elderly parents rather than marry the girl they love. So in a Chinese story, the hero walks off into the sunset with his elderly parents, not his wife/girlfriend like in American or European movies.  Immigrant parents are in for a shock when they raise their children in the US. This is the topic of my next post on Configurative Transmission as the immigrant parents have to deal with their Americanized children.

Ovando, Carlos & Combs, Mary Carol  Bilingual and ESL Classrooms 6th Ed. 

Post 148: Case Study of Intercultural Communication

Post 149: Case Study of Intercultural Communication


Intercultural Communication:  acknowledges the coexistence of multiple cultures in one single space. --one action occurring across several languages. If an individual can embody multiple cultures, then any interaction with that individual between 2 people can be deemed intercultural.  Intercultural communication means students of different backgrounds communicate with each other on a deep level. In a student-centered classroom, students of different backgrounds interact with each other as they do class projects, collaborative projects, engage in debates, peer edit each other's papers etc...When an international student interacts with another international student, that's when you have intercultural communication.

Like multicultural communication, intercultural communication has multiple nationalities in one place. But unlike multicultural communication, there is an actual exchange of ideas and learning between the people of two different cultures. Intercultural communication occurs when there is a deep exchange between people of two cultures. People get to know each other and get to learn about different cultures.  When I used to teach English as a Second Language, I used to teach ESL students from many different countries. I would spend class time talking to each student getting to know his/her culture. I didn't just correct my students' pronunciation or grammar mistakes as they learned English, but I really got to know them as people.  I remember a German student who hated the fact that Americans only associate Germany with Nazism.  I remember an Italian student who hated the fact that Americans stereotype all Italians as mobsters.  I had a Persian students who taught me how to each Persian rice in a Persian restaurant.  Intercultural communication is in a way the 'interaction with speakers of other languages on equal terms and respecting their identities

Post 147: Case Study of Multicultural communication

Multicultural Communication: refers to when people from multiple backgrounds with different ways of communicating coexist without interacting deeply. Often one culture has more prestige or is dominant over the other minority culture. Multicultural Communication exists in schools where you can have a classroom filled with students of many different cultures in a teacher-centered classroom where the teacher does most of the talking and the students of many cultures rarely interact with each other. These students of many backgrounds merely exist side by side in the classroom. Usually, there is a dominant culture involved and everyone is expected to abide by the rules of the dominant culture. And in a classroom, the dominant culture is that of the teacher-centered classroom.

When I went to elementary school, my teacher was the one who did all the talking. My classmates and I came from many different ethnic backgrounds. There were mostly African Americans in the class, Chinese American (me), a school from the Netherlands, an Native American girl and some Hispanic girls. (I don't know which country).  The reason I never got to know my classmates very well is because we hardly did any talking other than, "What date did the teacher say the quiz was?",  or "When is the project due?". Each of us would work on our projects individually and then show and tell it to the class. We never got to work together to get to know each other so our conversations were superficial at best. You have multicultural communication when people of different nationalities coexist side by side without really getting to know each other deeply.  I never learned about the different cultures in my class. I would have loved to learn about Dutch culture, Dutch food from Anne Marie or learn about Native American songs and food from Priscilla but since our teacher did all the talking and the focus was on reading and writing, for me to learn about the culture of my fellow students was lost. We communicated about class assignments, but we did not interact on any kind of deep levels.  We existed side by side but always separate in the classroom.

Post 146: What is the difference between Multicultural communication, Intercultural communication and Cross cultural communication?

Post 146: What is the difference between Multicultural Communication, Intercultural Communication and Cross Cultural Communication and Intracultural Communication?

Multicultural Communication: refers to when people from multiple backgrounds with different ways of communicating coexist without interacting deeply. Often one culture has more prestige or is dominant over the other minority culture. Multicultural Communication exists in schools where you can have a classroom filled with students of many different cultures in a teacher-centered classroom where the teacher does most of the talking and the students of many cultures rarely interact with each other. These students of many backgrounds merely exist side by side in the classroom.

Intercultural Communication: acknowledges the coexistence of multiple cultures in one single space. --one action occurring across several languages. If an individual can embody multiple cultures, then any interaction with that individual between 2 people can be deemed intercultural.  Intercultural communication means students of different backgrounds communicate with each other on a deep level. In a student-centered classroom, students of different backgrounds interact with each other as they do class projects, collaborative projects, engage in debates, peer edit each other's papers etc...When an international student interacts with another international student, that's when you have intercultural communication.

Cross Cultural Communication: comparison between 2 or more cultures such as communication, work habits...etc.. How do people of different cultures communicate?  Cross cultural communication occurs when anthropologists, ethnologists, or other social scientists compare the habits of one culture to another.  How do different cultures greet each other? In Japan, people bow to each other. In some parts of Asia, people stick out their tongue to say hello. And in America, people shake hands with each other, except now in these COVID 19 times, Americans are being told to avoid shaking hands. In Europe, people are being told not to air kiss each other in greeting. 

Intracultural Communication: meaningful exchange between members of the same social group or the same cultural or ethnic group.  When two people of the same ethnic group talk to each other, this is known as Intracultural Communication. If a Chinese person talks with another Chinese person, this is Intracultural Communication.

Post 145: Using stereotypical Asian American images to teach about Asian American stereotypes--The Asian American Experience

Post 145: Asian American stereotypes

Historic images such as the treacherous Fu Manchu, the exotic/erotic Suzy Wong, and the inscrutable Charlie Chan, coupled with contemporary depictions of the Japanese tourist and Samurai businessman, the dog-eating refugee on welfare, the gang member, and the violin-playing/whiz-kid/spelling bee champion, offer little of value in clarifying the identities and realities of Asian Americans. Yet, these pervasive stereotypes continue to shape how many parents, teachers, administrators, and students perceive Asian Americans, and how Asian Americans often view themselves. (Nang, Peter, Asia Society, Perceptions of Asian Americans)

Taken from Sax Rohmer's The Return of Fu Manchu  (Gutenberg Project)

THE RETURN OF DR. FU-MANCHU

By Sax Rohmer


CHAPTER I. A MIDNIGHT SUMMONS


“When did you last hear from Nayland Smith?” asked my visitor.

I paused, my hand on the syphon, reflecting for a moment.

“Two months ago,” I said; “he’s a poor correspondent and rather soured,
I fancy.”

“What--a woman or something?”

“Some affair of that sort. He’s such a reticent beggar, I really know
very little about it.”

I placed a whisky and soda before the Rev. J. D. Eltham, also sliding
the tobacco jar nearer to his hand. The refined and sensitive face of
the clergy-man offered no indication of the truculent character of the
man. His scanty fair hair, already gray over the temples, was silken and
soft-looking; in appearance he was indeed a typical English churchman;
but in China he had been known as “the fighting missionary,” and had
fully deserved the title. In fact, this peaceful-looking gentleman had
directly brought about the Boxer Risings!

“You know,” he said, in his clerical voice, but meanwhile stuffing
tobacco into an old pipe with fierce energy, “I have often wondered,
Petrie--I have never left off wondering--”

“What?”

“That accursed Chinaman! Since the cellar place beneath the site of the
burnt-out cottage in Dulwich Village--I have wondered more than ever.”

He lighted his pipe and walked to the hearth to throw the match in the
grate.

“You see,” he continued, peering across at me in his oddly nervous way,
“one never knows, does one? If I thought that Dr. Fu-Manchu lived; if
I seriously suspected that that stupendous intellect, that wonderful
genius, Petrie, er--” he hesitated characteristically--“survived, I
should feel it my duty--”

“Well?” I said, leaning my elbows on the table and smiling slightly.

“If that Satanic genius were not indeed destroyed, then the peace of the
world, may be threatened anew at any moment!”

Discussion Questions about Fu Mancu 

1. Is Fu Manchu the hero or the villain?

2. What nationality is the hero of the story?

3. How are Asians perceived in this photo and in this short excerpt of Fu Manchu?

4. How do these negative stereotypes still affect how people perceive Asian Americans today?  What negative stereotypes do people have today about Asians/Asian Americans because of Fu Manchu?

Post 144; Being Asian American during COVID 19--The Asian American Experience

Post 144: Asian American Experience Stereotypes

As mentioned in a previous blog post, the drawback of teaching culture as a 'laundry list' of heroes, historical events, etc..is that you reduce that culture to that list and you disregard the rich fabric of the people who make up that culture.  For instance, a laundry list of Asian American culture may include, "The Joy Luck Club", Amy Tan, Chinese fortune cookie, Chinese laundry, Fu Manchu, Charlie Chan, rice fields, Model Minority, computer and math nerds, Tiger Mom, Bruce Lee, Kung Fu, Karate, Martial Arts, Kung Pao Chicken,  Chinatown, majong, Peking Duck, Chinese restaurants, Chinese take-out food, Asian furniture or Asian art, geisha girls, Crazy Rich Asians, and The Farewell. And lately, Asian Americans have become associated with illness, Wuhan Virus, Chinese Virus--dirt, slovenly, illness, and death because COVID 19 originated in China and so did SARS. 

Asian Americans are seen as exotic objects just like the Asian art you see in the Asian furniture store. Asian Americans have always been seen as the 'other'--somebody not quite American. The prototypical American is still somebody of European descent--or more specifically, somebody of English descent. During this pandemic, for Asian Americans, this sense of 'otherness' has become even more pronounced. Non-Asians patrons no longer shop at Asian grocery stores for fear of getting COVID19 (false). Non-Asian patrons no longer eat at Asian restaurants because of their fear of getting COVID19 (false).  During the SARS epidemic, Chinese restaurants stood empty and many had to close.  Many non-Asian people do not distinguish an Asian American from an Asian from Asia. Also, many non-Asian people confuse all Asian groups together.

If you have Asian American students in your class, ask them how the COVID 19 crisis is affecting them. Make that a teachable moment about stereotyping and racism. When you add the student's personal stories to the curriculum, it makes the racism that much more real to the non-Asians because the racism is hitting close to home to their classmates. If you want a great book on the history of xenophobia in U.S. and how this relates to Asian American xenophobia, read Erika Lee's America for Americans. Fascinating book! Erika Lee goes on NPR to talk about COVID 19 and racism against Asian Americans https://www.npr.org/transcripts/813700167. A transcript of that broadcast is also available.

You can talk about the following topics about Asian Americans

1. Why is it wrong to say 'Chinese virus' or 'Wuhan virus'? Why is it more advisable to call this virus, COVID 19? (I mean why not call it the Chinese virus or the Wuhan virus since the virus, after all, came from Wuhan, China.) Even so, why is it still wrong to call this the Chinese virus? or the Wuhan virus?

2. Why are people not frequenting Chinese restaurants, but still going to Italian restaurants even though Italy is also showing a high instance of COVID19 outbreaks and death? What is it about Chinese restaurants that make them more 'infected' than Italian restaurants?

3. Since the COVID19 outbreak, how has public perception of Asian Americans changed?

4. After watching Crazy Rich Asians, by contrast, what was the public's reaction or perception of Asian Americans? How has that changed since the COVID19 outbreak?

5. How deep rooted is prejudice against Asian Americans (Google Fu Manchu to read Fu Manchu before you answer this question/notice when Fu Manchu was produced). As you read Fu Manchu, how are the Chinese depicted in this story?

6. Who was Charlie Chan and how does Charlie Chan contribute to deep rooted prejudice against Asian Americans?

7. How do you think Asian Americans are  now being treated during this COVID19 crisis?

8. Why do you think Asian Americans celebrated Crazy Rich Asians as a breakthrough movie?

9. Why do you think Asian Americans loved The Farewell as a breakthrough movie?

10. If you are teaching online, have students google Chinese stereotypes cartoons and discuss why these cartoons belittle Asian Americans and why these cartoons are racist?

11. Why is 'yellow face' considered racist? Should white actors be allowed to play Chinese roles in movies? Why or why not?

12. What effect do all these negative stereotypes have on Asian Americans, in your opinion?

13. Would you go grocery shopping in an Asian grocery store or eat at a Chinese restaurant during this COVID19 period? Can you get COVID19 from eating at a Chinese restaurant?

14. What kind of racism/discrimination have you or somebody you know experienced?

15. How did it feel when somebody gossiped about you behind your back or told falsehoods about you without evidence? Ever have a boss make up a bad situation just to get you fired? How did that feel? 

Post 143: The Role of Culture in Education

Post 143: The Role of Culture in Education

What is culture?  Culture is shared, not learned. Culture is shared in relation to a specific social grouping. Individuals of a particular culture are culture bearers of his/her group.  The various facets of culture are interrelated. The cultural traits of a particular group of people are largely integrated with each other to form an interrelated whole (Ovando, 167). This means that US culture is not a static object, but a constantly moving target of all the immigrants who make up the US. I tend to think of the US, not as a melting pot, but more like a salad, where the distinct characteristics of each immigrant group blend into a unique American salad that get tossed together to form an interrelated whole, which becomes American culture. There should be no such thing as a 'dominant' culture, but instead a sharing of all cultures together, each distinct, but each equally important.



Culture is fluid and constantly changing. Languages borrow from each other words. Different immigrant groups come to the US constantly changing the popular culture through music, food, or other trends. There is no set definition of US culture as just hot dogs, hamburgers, and the American flag. When we speak of American culture, it is a combination/interrelation between many different groups of people who all live in the US and call the US home. When we are born, we are not born, 'American', 'Japanese', or European American. Culture is something we learn at home from our parents, from our family, from being immersed in society. We learn our cultural traits from social interaction with others.

By the time a child arrives at school, he/she has socially interacted with his/her family. She has already developed habits of behavior, L1 or L2, methods of speech, and methods of dress. Even young children have already learned some of the cultural behavior of his/her culture as part of his L1 and L2 acquisition according to Krashen.  There is no set definition of culture since culture is always changing and always evolving as the person or as society evolves. A teacher has to understand and acknowledge the different cultural differences of the students in her class.

What is cultural tourism?

One common teaching approach is to teach about culture as a static set of traits--that is the tendency to view culture as a series of significant historical events and heroes, typical traditions, and culturally coded concepts or terms. Erickson (1997) has referred to such superficial treatment of culture as cultural tourism,  a focus on the more colorful and salient aspects of a group of people. This tongue in cheek approach to culture has been  called the 'laundry list' approach or the "facts, fun, fiesta' approach. Using the laundry list approach to Mexican culture. an educator that students should know  about Benito Juarez, Cesar Chavez, Delores Huertas,  la Virgen de Guadalupe, Cinco de Mayo, La Raza, Cholos, Azlan, and la quinceanera.  (Ovando, 167). This cultural tourism approach or 'laundry list' approach makes it look like culture is static, but instead, culture is fluid and constantly changing.

This limited approach to culture lends itself to stereotyping, and does not take into account the reality of the individuals as culture bearers who remake culture all the time. It does not take into account people's assimilation, or level of acculturation nor does it portray culture as an interrelated whole. One is inclined to believe that Mexican culture can be reduced to just that laundry list of items. Teaching culture using the 'laundry list' method is not a good way to teach students about Mexican American culture or any other culture for that matter.

What is the 'High Civilization View' of culture?

The High Civilization view of culture means putting more value on Western ideals than on non-Western ideals. Educators have often tended to use the word 'culture' as meaning the accumulation of the so called best knowledge, ideas, works of arts, and technological accomplishments of a particular group of people. In the case of Western civilization, "this high civilization" conjures up  an image of a sophisticated conglomerate of Western writers like Shakespeare, Dante, Cervantes, Socrates, and so on. If you don't know who these authors are, then you are laughed at for not having any culture or sophistication. According to Ovando, school curriculum  stresses the importance of western ideas as the hallmark of culture. This monocultural view of culture has negative effects on minority learners and the lack of acknowledgement of the accomplishments of other cultures leads to high dropout rates, alienation and low academic achievement among minority learners. (Ovando, 167).

What then, is the proper way to teach students about other cultures?

Ask the students what their culture is like means instead of assuming that all Mexican Americans celebrate Cinco de Mayo, ask students themselves, "What is your favorite Mexican holiday?" "Does your family celebrate Cinco de Mayo?"  You can ask Chinese students if they really eat Chinese fortune cookies, and you'll be surprised to find out that the Chinese fortune cookie was an American invention and is not a real Chinese food. The responses to your questions may confirm what you already know about that culture, but may also reveal new dimensions of a student's cultural identity. Involving the student in your curriculum reaffirms that students' sense of cultural belonging and encourages that student not to drop out or feel alienated in class.

1. Ask the students themselves what their culture is like.

2. Relate the curriculum to the students' culture.

3. Make sure the curriculum acknowledges the achievements of other cultures within the fabric of the history lesson, not just because it is a special day or special unit for that culture.

4. Make students aware that the accomplishments/achievements of their ancestors count and matter in US society, history and language to give young students a sense of cultural identity.

5. Avoid 'tokenism' when talking about other cultures.

6. Avoid teaching a "Eurocentric" point of view. Include other cultures in your curriculum.

I will be talking more about How to Create a Multicultural Curriculum in future blog posts.

http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/curriculum/characteristics.html

Ovando, Carlos & Combs, Mary Carol  Bilingual and ESL Classrooms 6th Ed.

Post 142: Reciprocal Reading Comprehension Strategy Instruction

Post 142: Reciprocal Reading Comprehension Strategy Instruction

Reciprocal Reading Comprehension Strategy Instruction is a four step method designed to improve reading comprehension in students who can decode, but who experience difficulty understanding the meaning of what they have read. The four steps  are 1) prediction  2) question generating 3) clarification and 4) summarizing. These four steps are similar to the Pre-reading, Reading and Post-reading method I posted earlier. (Ovando, 367)

I will go back to my Chinese student Zhen Ni, she was 13 years old from China. She came to the US to play music for my private school. I was her English teacher. Because she spoke no English, but only Chinese, I taught her English speaking, reading and writing in Chinese.  We used the Reciprocal Reading Comprehension Strategy Instruction or the UCLA (Pre-Reading, Reading and Post-Reading) method of reading comprehension.

Reciprocal Reading Comprehension Strategy Instruction

1. Teacher Reads.
2. Teacher Reads. Student helps.
3. Teacher and Student read together.
4. Student reads. Teacher helps.
5. Student reads.

We were reading in English and she looked at the Chinese on the other page for translation.  We used Chinese until she learned enough English to learn content on her own.---Goal of Bilingual Ed. Zhen Ni loved learning English with me!

1. Prediction--I taught Zhen Ni to look at the pictures of any story and tell me in Chinese what she thinks the story will be about. Then, I had Zhen Ni read slowly the title of the article/story and tell me in Chinese what the story title tells her about the main idea of the story.

2. Question-Generating--What is the story about? What do you think will happen next? I would then ask her all these questions in Chinese.  She could decode English reading slowly and understand slowly. She used her dictionary a lot when she encountered words she did not understand.

3. Clarification--When she came across a difficult concept or jargon, she would ask me what that jargon meant and once again, I would teach her about context clues and of course I taught her academic content in Chinese so she would not fall behind other students in her class.

4. Summarizing--I then would ask her in Chinese what she understood from the article. I would then ask her in Chinese, how would this be done in China? If you read this article when you were in school in China, how would it apply? She would tell me she used to read this slowly in China when she was in elementary school first learning her Chinese characters.

Ovando, Carlos.  Bilingual and ESL Classrooms. Teaching in Multicultural Contexts.

Because she had a lot of L1 literacy in Chinese, she was able to use her L1 literacy skills and apply it to learning her L2 English. This is why within 6 months to a year, she was able to read her first book entirely in English without needing translation. Once she reached an intermediate level of English, then I used the Natural Approach/Communicative Approach where I spoke to her only in the target language English so she could learn to associate words directly in English without cheating and going back to translation. Later, even when her English became fluent, she still liked to speak to me in Chinese because she was homesick. I am proud that Zhen Ni learned to read English so fast in a year.

Post 141: Traditional Test vs Authentic Assessment

 Post: Do Standardized Test really reflect student learning? What about authentic assessments?

Traditional Testing   vs Authentic Assessment

Contrived                          Meaningful, Real Life

Paper and Pencil               Performance Based

Recall/Recognition           Thoughtful Application

Standardized                     Personalized

Norm Referenced             Criterion Referenced

Teacher Centered             Student Centered

Uninteresting                   Engaging

Short Term                       Long Term



Contrived vs Meaningful

A Standardized test is created by a third party vendor and the teacher has to teach to the test. The Standardized test does not represent what the teacher has taught in the class, and it does not represent the students in the class. Standardized tests can be biased towards white middle class students and may not represent the needs of language minority students. An Authentic assessment tests what the teacher has taught in the class with projects tailored for the students in that class thereby making that assessment more meaningful for the students in that class.

Paper and Pencil vs Performance based

In a standardized test, students use pencil and paper to fill out the test whereas in a performance based authentic assessment, students do web projects, go on debates, write papers and these projects are graded based on that individual student's performance on that project thus making the assessment more tailored to that student's needs.

Recall/Recognition vs Thoughtful Application

A standardized test tests only for lower level cognitive tasks like memory recall while an authentic assessment requires more higher order thinking like application, evaluation, comparison, analysis and synthesis. Assignments that require higher order thinking tends to be hands-on projects like research papers, web projects, presentations, debates, and student discussion of a topic.

Norm Referenced vs Criterion Referenced

A standardized test is norm referenced based on national standards. The standards are based on the norms of how all students of a given grade are doing. It is not individualized or personalized. However, criterion referenced tests are based on the performance criteria of each individual student thereby making the assessment more authentic and more meaningful for the teacher and for the student. The best way to grade an assessment is through a grading rubric which has specific criteria set up for that specific assessment for that specific student/class.

Teacher Centered vs Student Centered

When a teacher gives a standardized test, it is the teacher who gives the instructions and it is the teacher who teaches to the test, while the students memorize facts for that test. Students do very little interaction. Students do not add their experiences or culture to the curriculum or the classroom experience. Whereas, in an authentic assessment, classroom activities are geared towards the students in the class. It becomes the students' responsibility to construct their own knowledge where the teacher guides the student in learning new skills through class projects thus making authentic assessments more student centered such as in a flipped classroom.

Uninteresting vs Engaging

A standardized test is BORING. The only thing I used to like about standardized tests was the chance to correctly color in those circles with my pencil with the correct answer because as a kid I loved to color in my coloring book. Otherwise I did not find the test interesting at all. However, when the class did class projects, group projects or the teacher read aloud to us, now THAT was fun. When the classroom was more student centered with activities not related to a standardized test, then I had fun in class. I remember learning about fractions by having the teacher cut up parts of a cake or pizza.

For me, I don't think standardized tests truly measures a students' knowledge. All it measures is how well students can memorize facts, that students forget right after a test. To me, true learning occurs is if students can use the skills they learned in class many years later or if students can learn to apply those new skills to their daily lives such as the ability to use the 5 paragraph essay structure in writing academic research papers, making business presentations, and teaching the next generation of students the 5 paragraph essay style of writing. Learning a skill you can use for the future to me, that is the true sign of learning.
 

Post 140: Seven C's of Business Communication

Post 140: Seven C's of Business Communication

These were the Seven C's of Communication that I used in my Business Writing class at AMU. I told my Business Writing students to apply these Seven C's to all their business communication assignments such as business email, business memo, business letter, business presentation, business report and business proposal assignment. These Seven C's were also used as a grading rubric for their assignments and forums.

Post 139: The Best Way to Teach Social Studies

Post 139: The Best Way to Teach Social Studies

Ovando says the traditional definition of Social Studies is "to promote curricular themes such as culture, people, and global connections to promote civic competence." (145). Ovando states that Social studies poses a variety of challenges for language minority students due to incomprehensible input and improper assessments. (245). Social Studies classes tend to be overly dependent on the excessive use of literacy skills and both reading and writing assignments involve writing and reading structures unfamiliar to language minority students. In addition, Social Studies involve too much abstract English vocabulary. Yet, social studies does not have to be boring if taught in a meaningful, integrative manner so that the content is relatable to ELL.

My ELL would complain to me, "Social Studies is too much reading. I don't understand all that vocabulary and all those hard English words." Or "I don't know enough English to understand the history lesson." or "All we do is listen to hard English we don't understand, then we take tests in hard English we do not understand. If we get low grades, the teacher is mad at us or thinks we are stupid because we get low grades."  With my ELL students I had to spend a lot of time teaching them reading comprehension skills, teaching them American sentence structure, teaching them American essay structure, in addition to teaching them the actual history content so they could succeed on the test. Let's just say when I taught that Sheltered History class, my ELL students couldn't wait to finish that school year and get out of that class." This is what happens when ELL are taught history in the traditional 'Passive Transmission' Approach method. Not only do ELL do not understand the history material, but the history material is also taught from a European American point of view that they are not familiar with.

To make Social Studies more meaningful to non-European language minority students, social studies needs to include the contributions of minority cultures so language minority students have enough scaffolding to understand the historical material and they can see how their ancestors contributed to the growth of the United States making Social Studies meaningful not only for European American students but to everybody else as well.

There have been two approaches to teaching Social Studies:

1. The Passive Transmission Approach

In the Passive Transmission Approach, you have a teacher centered classroom where the teacher gives the lecture and the students passively take in information. The teacher gives the facts of history and the students memorize these facts for the history test. Students read the history book, listen to the history teacher give facts, and then memorize said facts for the multiple choice history test.  The students take no active part in the class. Students are just empty vessels into which teachers pour information. The purpose of the Social Studies class is to learn World History or to learn American History. Social Studies also helps students learn American culture, values, customs and history from a European American point of view.  European American students learn about the contributions of other European Americans in American history and in World history.

2. Transformative Approach

In the Transformative Approach, you have a more student centered classroom where the teacher guides the students in the history lessons, and the teacher lets the students make up the curriculum or lets the students participate more in the history lesson.  Students do more discussion, talk about their experiences, talk about their home life, their culture, and they get to read history books that reflect the contributions of all cultures, and they get to learn history not just from a European American point of view, but from all points of view. The contributions of Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, White Women, Black Women, Asian Women are all interwoven into the fabric of the history curriculum and different points of view are discussed by the student themselves and by the different cultures in the history book. According to Ovando, Social Studies is best taught if the Social Studies class is 'meaningful, integrated, value-laden, challenging and 'active' (254).  The Social Study lesson should connet the student experience with the curriculum. Students best construct meaning when students can identify with the historical event so that students from different ethnic groups can 'see' themselves in the history lesson.  When students can relate to the lesson more, they will retain the lesson more according to Ovando (251).

Ovando, Carlos. Bilingual and ESL Classrooms. Teaching in Multicultural Contexts. 6th Ed.

Post 138: The Ineffectiveness of No Child Left Behind

Post 138: The Ineffectiveness of No Child Left Behind

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was the main law for K–12 general education in the United States from 2002–2015. The law held schools accountable for how kids learned and achieved. The law was controversial in part because it penalized schools that didn't show improvement. The goal of the law is that all students will score at the "proficient" level in reading and math by 2014. States set annual targets for the percentage of students scoring proficient with the final goal of 100% proficiency by 2014. Each year, students in every subgroup must reach the targe

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) is a US law passed in December 2015 that governs the United States K–12 public education policy. The law replaced its predecessor, the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), and modified but did not eliminate provisions relating to the periodic standardized tests given to students.

As for me, I am not a fan of standardized testing. I believe that when we teach kids, we want to teach them to use higher order thinking. Higher order thinking is not achieved when teachers are forced to teach to the test. Standardized testing only tests lower order thinking of memorization of facts and figures. Students spend time memorizing facts that do not require higher order thinking. Once the test is taken , the facts are forgotten.

What is lower order thinking?

Lower order thinking is any kind of learning that involves rote memorization and then you regurgitate these facts on a multiple choice/matching kind of test. Teachers teach to the test by telling students what facts to memorize, how to take a standardized tests and teachers have to get the students to get high scores on these tests so that the school gets federal funding and the teacher gets to keep their job. I do not think standardized tests accurately reflect student learning, and teachers waste precious school time teaching to those tests.

What is higher order thinking?

Higher order thinking is any kind of learning where students apply what they learn to their lives. Higher order learning requires a more hands-on Discovery/Inquiry method of learning where students analyze, compare/contrast, synthesize, encode what they learn. Students do web projects, write papers, grade each other's papers, go on class trips, to inspire higher order thinking. When students do web projects, make presentations, engage in debates/discussions, then students are better able to construct their own knowledge base, and learn to apply what they learn in the classroom to their lives so that years from now, students can still apply their skills and pass those skills to their children. 

Do you remember the facts you had to learn for your Reading/Math Standardized tests, or do you remember the fun class trip, presentation, debate you engaged in when you were in elementary/middle/ or high school? 

Post 137: Lau vs Nichols--Landmark decision that established ESL and Bilingual Ed

Post 137: Lau vs Nichols--Landmark decision that established ESL and Bilingual Ed

In 1974, the Supreme Court case, Lau vs Nichols had by far the most impact in establishing the legitimacy of ESL and Bilingual Education. Lau vs Nichols stated that Chinese students in San Francisco were not getting the proper English instruction that they needed. Lau vs Nichols defined the legal responsibilities of schools to provide ELL with English instruction. However, Lau vs Nichols did not tell schools how they should implement such a program. "Lau vs Nichols gave impetus to the movement for equal educational opportunity for students who do not speak English. Lau raised the nation's consciousness of the need for Bilingual Education, encouraged further legislation..mandating bilingual education." (Ovando, 67)

If a school had at least 20 students who spoke the same foreign language, then that school had to provide ESL instruction to those students. Moreover, the 1975 Lau Remedies stipulated that students receive bicultural training so that students would be proficient in both their L1 culture and their L2 culture. These days, even Language Majority American English speaking parents want their children to learn another language, so they enroll their kids in bilingual programs to learn languages like Spanish, French, or Chinese. Parents realize that if their kids are bilingual at an earlier age, then they can work abroad in other countries and widen the scope of their kids job abilities and get an edge on the competition in a stiff business market.

If I had had access to bilingual education in elementary school and had gotten to learn about Chinese culture and learn to read and write Chinese while learning academic content in Chinese, I wonder if I would feel more proud to be Chinese or be more bilingual? What kind of person would I have become? Would I be more proud to be Chinese? Would I be able to read and write in Chinese and get a job in China? Would this mean more self-esteem in my heritage? Would I be less ashamed to be Chinese? Would Chinese Americans in general be more proud of their heritage instead of wanting to look and sound more European (American) if we had had more access to our heritage at a younger age?

I think that letting immigrant kids talk about their culture in the mainstream class raises their self esteem and motivation. I think that acknowledging other cultures helps kids tolerate other cultures better and helps English speaking kids have multiple perspectives of the world. I think that knowing another language and knowing about other cultures does not detract from a kid to learn English fluently nor does it detract from the kid learning about American culture and values. I think when English native speakers learn about immigrant cultures, English native speakers become more aware and appreciative of American values, American customs and American traditions.

Post 136: Americanization of Immigrants--Purpose of School--Purpose of Bilingual Ed

Post 136: Americanization of Immigrants--Purpose of School--Purpose of Bilingual Education

Ovando states, "At the beginning of the 20th century, when English classes were taught for immigrants, largely for purposes of "Americanization", there was not yet a conscious effort to professionalize the field of English as a Second Language." (53) Although the US recognizes the need for students to learn a foreign language to improve international relations, yet, immigrants who are a natural resource of other languages are being told to lose their native tongue and culture in order to become Americanized by insisting on having an exclusively English only instruction.

When I went to elementary school, our school did not have an ESL program. Although I was born in the United States, I spoke only Chinese and understood very little English when I entered 1st grade. Once my teacher realized that the reason I was not participating in class was due to my inability to understand English, my 1st grade teacher told my mother to speak in English to me at home. So for me, the 'sink or swim' submersion approach was used on me as I was totally immersed in English at home and then spoke English at school. Sadly, I did lose a lot of my Chinese language in the process of learning English and American culture. Ovando calls this process, 'substractive bilingural education' when the student loses his/her native language to become assimilated into the dominant language. To this day, I cannot read and write Chinese and I speak Chinese at a 6 year old level (since that was the age I became immersed in English).

At my school, we had no bilingual education program and we did not have an ESL program so I did not get to keep neither my Chinese culture nor my Chinese language. Instead, I learned all about American culture and history, which by the way, as a kid, I thought was fun. I enjoyed learning about George Washington having wooden teeth so that's why he never smiled, or that Abraham Lincoln was always honest and never lied. I was raised in an African American school district so we studied a lot about African American history such as the heroism of Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. I remember that fierce look of 'revenge' on my African American teacher's face as she talked about how General Sherman marched through Atlanta burning it to the ground.  She loved the idea that the slave owners lost everything during the Civil War as revenge for their cruel treatment of slaves. Kids can relate to the taking down of the villain (the evil slave owning Southern plantation owners) and seeing the 'good guys' (Yanks) win.

 I learned all about American heroes and in elementary school, these American heroes did not have any flaws at all. I did not learn much about Native American history nor did I learn about the contributions of the Chinese immigrants in building the railroad until high school. For me, elementary school served as a springboard for the transmission of American values.  I didn't learn that my heroes like Thomas Jefferson or George Washington had slaves until I was in middle school and high school and I remember I didn't like learning that my American heroes had flaws.

I did not learn about my own Chinese culture or learn to read and write Chinese a little bit until I was in college. So, yes, in elementary school, I lost my L1 culture to be replaced by the L2 dominant American culture because before ESL, the purpose of schooling of immigrants was the assimilation of immigrant to American ideals of life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness and the American Dream. America was a melting pot, not a salad. Immigrants were told to 'lose' their culture and embrace the American culture to succeed, which is why my well-intentioned 1st grade teacher told my mother to speak English to me so that I would lose my Chinese 'otherness' and become Americanized.  I sometimes wonder what it would have been like if I had participated in a Bilingual Ed program where I learned to read and write Chinese 90% of the time learning academic content areas and teaching American students Chinese. I bet I would be more fluent in reading and writing Chinese if they had had a Dual Immersion Bilingual Ed program at my elementary school.

Post 135: Business and Technical Writing Process

Post 135: Business and Technical Writing Process

Post 134: The Writing Process Infographic

Post 134: The Writing Process Infographic

Post 133: The Reading Skills Process

Post 133: The Reading Skills Process

I learned that there are two ways to teach reading. You can teach students phonics and reading rules. You can also teach students how to predict story structure, use pictures, use the story title to improve reading comprehension. The Acquisition Method (Krashen's Acquisition/Learning Hypothesis) states that teacher should focus on meaning rather than form (phonics) to teach reading to make reading enjoyable to students.  At UCLA, I learned there are three steps to the Reading Process: Pre-writing, Reading and Post Reading.

Post 132: Well Structured Classroom For WEb or Face to Face

Post 132: Well Structured Classroom for Web or Face to Face

The characteristics of an effective classroom to help maximize language acquisition have been identified as (Enright and McCloskey 1985):

• Cluttered classrooms, where potential for spontaneity is the key.
• Teacher in many roles: teacher, participant, facilitator, spectator.
• Balance between “instruction” and interaction.
• Use of peer teaching.
• Materials are from the real world (i.e., paperbacks, newspapers, magazines, bus schedules, etc.).
• Provide students with many opportunities to do the classroom administrative tasks such as, attendance, lunch count, errands, notes to other teachers, bulletin boards, checking out books, etc.
• “Curriculum” is organized around events and tasks which students work on together and which incidentally (but not coincidentally) require language.
• Resources such as dictionaries, encyclopedias, books, schedules, etc., necessary to accomplish tasks are readily available to all students.
• Visitors are numerous and various; real people come to the class to talk to and work with students.

Post 131: When should a language learner use English Only method to learn an L2 or the 2 way Immersion method to learn a L2?

Post 131: Is English Only ESL the better way to learn L2 or is the Dual Immersion method the better way to  learn a L2?

English Only ESL Classroom

I think adults who have a firm command of their L1 and can read and write their L1 fluently can benefit from an English Only ESL classroom.

Adults who are fully literate in their L1 can then learn an L2 better using the Communicative Approach where they use the L2 from Day one, therefore allowing the adult learner to be able to associate the L2 language in their brain without translating into their L1.

For instance, when I learned French at Middlebury College, I participated in a full French immersion program where I lived in a French dorm and each student took a pledge that they would only speak French and speak no English at all for 3 months while living in the French dorm. We would eat, sleep and read, write all in French. We watched French movies. We attended classes all in French. We studied French culture in French, read French literature in French, and wrote our essays all in French. Even if you sang in the shower in English, you would be reported to the head dean for violating the language pledge. (Don't ask how I know about that :)  I learned a lot of French in the French dorms.

The Middlebury Language Program also has Immersion programs for Chinese, Russian, Arabic, Spanish and other languages. I remember my French dorm was next to the Chinese Immersion Program and I could hear Americans speaking Chinese and my next door neighbor speaking French. It was a fun experience. At the time, I was an undergraduate so I was fully literate in my L1 (English) already.

Similarly, for ELL who are fluent in their Spanish, or Chinese because of extensive academic training in their home countries, in my opinion, would benefit from an English Only ESL classroom approach to fast track these ELL to learning English without translation to their L1.

Dual Immersion Program

If you have a young child who was raised in a non-English speaking family, that child would come to school already knowing how to speak Spanish, but not know how to read and write Spanish. For such a child, I believe, a Dual Immersion program is best, because then the child can learn to read, write content areas in Spanish while learning English progressively until he/she can learn his/her academic content area also in English. He/she also has American students trying to learn Spanish trying to learn Spanish and the two could exchange cultural ideas and learn about each other's cultures and languages.

A Dual Immersion Program allows a child/teenager who is not very literate in his L1 to gain L1 literacy and mastery while at the same time gaining English mastery from contact with American students. The Spanish speaking student can help the American student with some translation if necessary and the English speaking student would help the Spanish speaking student with some translation if necessary so that both gain eventual mastery in both languages and they also learn their academic content material in both those languages becoming fully fluent bilingual speakers for life.

Post 130: Case Study for Critical Period Hypothesis

Post 130: Case Study for Critical Period Hypothesis

The critical period hypothesis is the subject of a long-standing debate in linguistics and language acquisition over the extent to which the ability to acquire language is biologically linked to age. The hypothesis claims that there is an ideal time window to acquire language in a linguistically rich environment, after which further language acquisition becomes much more difficult and effortful.  that language acquisition occurs primarily, possibly exclusively, during childhood as the brain loses plasticity after a certain age. It then becomes rigid and fixed, and loses the ability for adaptation and reorganisation, rendering language (re-)learning difficult. Penfield and Roberts (1959) claim children under nine can learn up to three languages: early exposure to different languages activates a reflex in the brain allowing them to switch between languages without confusion or translation into L1 (Penfield, 1964). Lenneberg (1967) asserts that if no language is learned by puberty, it cannot be learned in a normal, functional sense.

For the most part, I agree with the Critical Period Hypothesis popularized by Stephen Krashen that there is a critical period of time for the brain to learn languages and attain a perfect native like accent. After the brain lateralizes, that is develops the ability to put logical information into the left hemisphere and artistic/sentimental information into the right hemisphere, then the child loses the ability to attain a perfect accent since the person starts to analyze each new language he learns to his L1. This occurs around the age of 11 or at puberty as the brain matures and loses certain neurological functions for perfect speech.

When I was a toddler, I was exposed to only Chinese. Chinese has three tones that most Americans find hard to emulate at a later age. Each Chinese word will have a different meaning based on these 3 tones. If you use the wrong tone, you have a totally different meaning for the word. Ma in first tone means 'mother'. Ma in second tone means horse. Ma in third tone means angry. If you want to greet your mother in law, if you use the wrong tone, you may end up calling your mother in law a horse. Up to a certain age, a child can pick up these perfect tones for Chinese pronunciation without problem. But after puberty, then the language learner will have a hard time with the tonality of Chinese typical of American adult Chinese learners.  Since I was exposed to Chinese as a toddler, I speak Chinese with a native-like accent.

I also learned French when I was in 4th grade, so I am told that I speak French with a native-like Parisian accent, although I do make some mistakes with a very slight American accent especially if I am out of practice. Once I am in France for a few months, my native-like accent that I acquired in elementary school when I learned French comes right back.  I learned French before the puberty cut off when the brain starts to become rigid and fixed and starts to compare all new languages to L1.

However, I learned Spanish at the old age of 27. As a result, out of my three languages, my Spanish is the worst. I can understand what Spanish speakers say, but when I try to speak Spanish, I have a heavy American accent and I lack vocabulary as well in Spanish. However, through charades a native Spanish speaker can understand what I want. I can tell a Spanish speaker if I want something fixed in my apartment in Spanish, but very rudimentary Spanish since I learned this language very late. For me, the later I learned the language, the worse I speak it.

When my grandmother tried to learn English in her 60's and 70's, she never got beyond first grade English in her reading and writing. I remember when she used to write me Xmas cards in English, I thought her handwriting looked just like mine. (I was in first and second grade at the time). I remember thinking, "How can an adult write just like me a child?" especially after my 1st grade teacher had just scolded me on writing 'childishly' and that adults have much more elegant 'adult' handwriting because of years of practice. I thought Grandma did not practice her handwriting enough and that's why she had such 'childish' handwriting. Of course, the real reason why Grandma wrote that way was because she was trying to learn English at a very late age. Today, I admire Grandma for trying to learn English at such a late age and later I admire Grandma even more when she got her American citizenship at the age of 80.

The Critical Period Hypothesis postulates that the later you learn a L2, the harder it becomes and the thicker your accent becomes. It also becomes harder to read and write in the L2, not just speak in the L2 if you learn the L2 at a later age due to interlanguage fossilization.  It is too bad humans cannot retain that childlike ability to learn languages all their lives!

Post 129: Scaffolding for Advanced French Speakers

Post 129: Scaffolding for Advanced French Speakers  (COVID19 in French and English)

Many of you know about Coronavirus and how Coronavirus is in the news everywhere.  You have all read about this virus on social media and in the newspapers. Therefore, advanced French students who know about current events such as this already have scaffolding (background knowledge) in their L1 (English) about this deadly virus.

Now have these same advanced or intermediate French students go to www.google.fr (This is Google in French for French countries) and have them google coronavirus or COVID19 in French and have them read about coronavirus in French and they will be able to follow this story since this is a worldwide event.

Here are some vocabulary words in French that American students of French can learn through scaffolding about the coronavirus news in French :  (There are no accents in these words. I can ask students to put the accents in the right place--make the list interactive). Now have the advanced French students talk about the vocabulary list they have all made based on the new coronavirus words they have learned by reading the French version of the coronavirus news.

eviter la propagation de virus

confinement generale

confinement coercitif

point presse quotidien

la menace sanitaire

President Trump a dit, "L'Amerique sera bientot de nouveau ouverte aux affaires."

les personnes contaminee

Le virus a contaminee 557 personnes

une pandemie

se mettre en quarantaine

President Trump a dit, "Nous ne pouvons pas laisser le remede etre pire que le probleme."

La Reserve Federale annonce des aides massives aux entreprises.

Wall Street est tombe a son plus bas.

Les bourses europeene ont egalement chute

Les bourses HK a ouvert en hausse de plus de 3%

Confinement nationale

le plan de relance economique

les gueris

le taux de mortalite monte/baisse

Post 128: Language Minority Student Different Backgrounds can surprise you

Post 128: Language Minority Student Different Backgrounds can surprise you.

Use your Language Minority Student different backgrounds as a rich resource for cultural enrichment for your students and as a way for adult students and teenagers to get to know each other. Each human has a story. Let everyone in the class have a chance to tell their story. Students from conflicting cultures can get to tolerate each other better and if you are in a dual immersion program or in a mainstream classroom, learning the ELL background lets Language Majority Students learn about other cultures. Teachers who did not grow up around ELL can also learn and grow and become less biased towards ELL and learning that we are more all the same and different helps the class become a Community of Learners, one of the basic concepts behind The Communicative Approach.

Let's take my grandfather and grandmother. Both came to America in their 60's. When the ESL teacher looks at my grandparents, they see a Chinese elderly couple. From the teacher's perspective, the Chinese elderly woman (my grandmother) appears to have no English at all. The Chinese elderly man has some English, but he seems very proud, yet very sad at the same time. Of the two, the Chinese elderly man seems to be a bit more outgoing than the reserved wife. Yet, it is the reserved wife who really wants to learn English to become an American citizen. The teacher assumes that these ELL are refugees with no education from their previous country just like all the other ELL she has encountered in her short ESL career.

Luckily, my grandparents are in an ESL class that uses The Communicative Approach and students are allowed to tell their stories. There are two ESL teachers in this class--the young inexperienced ESL teacher who assumes all ELL are refugees and not very intelligent and the more experienced teacher who is a Mexican American 2nd generation teacher who knows differently.  As the inexperienced ESL teachers lets my grandfather speak, she is thinking that she will just hear another poor refugee story, but she is dead wrong.

She gasps in surprise as she listens to my grandfather's story and it goes like this: My name is James Huang. I was a top diplomat in the Nationalist Chinese government in China. I worked with the President of the Nationalist government, Chiang Kai Shek. After the Communists took over China in 1949, my wife and I first fled to Taiwan and then we came to the United States.  For more about the Chinese Revolution of 1949 go to this link. My grandfather told bits and parts of the Chinese Communist take over in his pidgin English. My grandfather had even met the President of the United States at one point and helped in making the US realize that the Nationalist government had the same aims of democracy and freedom as the US.  The Mexican American ESL teacher was not surprised at all by this story. She knew by my grandfather's proud demeanor that he was somebody of importance in his home country and she also knew he was having a hard time adjusting to the US because he went from being somebody of importance in China to a nobody in the US.  It was the more experienced ESL teacher who created the bonds of trust between her students and her while the younger ESL teacher learned to respect her ELL students.

In the end, my grandmother became a US citizen at the age of 80. Becoming a US citizen was one of the happiest days of my grandmother's life.  Grandpa sadly had passed away by then because he was not able to fully adjust to US life the way Grandma did.  Thanks to the Communicative Approach, my grandmother learned just enough English to pass her citizenship test and she and her teachers remained friends to my grandmother's death. I still have my grandmother's Christmas cards where she wrote to me in her broken English. I treasure them all.

Post 127: Scaffolding and Schema Theory in ESL Education

Post 127: Scaffolding and Schema Theory in ESL Education

English as a second language (ESL) students' learning units should build on the educational and personal experiences they bring to school (Early, Thew, and Wakefield 1986; Ashworth, Cummins, and Handscombe 1989). In language learning, students should be encouraged to use their previous experiences with oral and written language to develop their second language and to promote their growth to literacy (Au and Jordan 1981; Hudelson 1986, Edelsky 1986; Cummins and Swain 1986; Enright and McCloskey 1988). Students bring to school cultural identities, knowledge, and experiences that should be awarded by instructional practices rather than replaced or forgotten as learning takes place (Cummins 1986; Heath 1983; Jordan 1985; Moll and Diaz 1987).

Krashen's Input hypothesis states that learners progress in their knowledge of the language when they comprehend language input that is slightly more advanced than their current level. Krashen called this level of input "i+1", where "i" is the learner's interlanguage and "+1" is the next stage of language acquisition. Since each learner is a unique person with unique experiences, educators should use this knowledge base to build ESL curriculum. Getting to know each student and getting to know each students' background adds to the educator's arsenal of possible teaching topics that students can relate to. If what the teacher is teaching is similar to the experiences the students have had, then it makes it easier for students to relate to what the teacher is teaching. 

As the teacher bases her language lessons off the students' real life experiences, students can then be more motivated to learn the L2 language.  This correpsonds with Krashen's Input hypothesis where you teach just above what the student knows and then when the student makes errors, the teacher focuses on meaning not form and not constantly focus on correcting the student's every L2 mistake. For instance, when I was teaching ESL adult immigrant students, I taught them Survival English. I taught them how to say, "How do I buy a bus ticket?" "Where can I get a California ID?", "What is my Social Security Number?", "I am from Mexico.", "I want to learn good English to get a good job." And English grammar is then tied up with the real life expressions they learn much like how Rosetta Stone teaches its foreign languages using the Direct Immersion Method through pictures of real life. Using scaffolding (teaching based on students' prior experience) makes it easier for teachers to bond with students and gain the trust of students. If you remember the COI construction (Community of Inquiry Construction), Social, Cognitive and Teaching Presence? Cognitive Presence refers to how much the teacher knows about the students in the class based on student feedback and student interaction with the teacher. The more the teacher has cognitive presence, (knows about her students), the better she can construct lessons to match that background. 

Post 126: ELL Students

Post 125: ESL vs Two Way Immersion

Post 125: ESL vs Two Way Immersion

There are many overlaps between the Communicative Approach, ESL and Two Way Immersion Bilingual Education.

In Communicative Approach, you use the target language from Day 1, so students do not translate from their L1 and can directly associate the L2 vocabulary word without having to translate from their L1.

In the Two Way Immersion Approach, students are allowed to their L1 to learn their L2. For instance, Spanish speakers are grouped with English Native Speakers and the two groups want to learn each others' language. The Spanish Speakers want to learn the English from the English NS while the English NS want to learn the Spanish from the Spanish NS. There is an ESL teacher present to teach the academic content in the ESL portion of the class and there is a Spanish teacher present to teach the Spanish portion of the lesson. The Communicative Approach can be used to teach the Two Way Immersion in each portion of the class.

Both approaches have overlaps in that they promote student interaction, motivate language learning through the Community of Learners model. The teacher develops Social Presence, Cognitive Presence and Teaching Presence in order to get to know her class. The teacher acts as a guide to student language learning.  Students bond with each other using the Communicative Approach and when students feel a sense of belonging to the class, then students become highly motivated to learn, and get higher grades with high work ethic.

Post 124: ELL in US Public Schools

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   Spanish was the home language of 3.79 million ELL public school students in fall 2016, representing 76.6 percent of all ELL students and 7.7 percent of all public K–12 students. Arabic, Chinese, and Vietnamese were the next most commonly reported home languages (spoken by 129,400; 104,100; and 78,700 students, respectively). English was the fifth most common home language for ELL students (70,000 students), which may reflect students who live in multilingual households or students adopted from other countries who were raised speaking another language but currently live in households where English is spoken. Somali (38,400 students), Russian (34,800 students), Hmong (33,100 students), Haitian (31,600 students), and Portuguese (28,200 students) were the next most commonly reported home languages of ELL students in fall 2016. The 30 most commonly reported home languages also include several whose prevalence has increased rapidly in recent years. For example, the number of ELLs who reported that their home language was Nepali or a Karen language⁵ more than quadrupled between school year 2008–09 and fall 2016 (from 3,200 to 13,800 students for Nepali and from 3,000 to 13,400 students for Karen languages).⁶

In fall 2016, there were about 3.82 million Hispanic ELL public school students, constituting over three-quarters (77.2 percent) of ELL student enrollment overall.⁷ Asian students were the next largest racial/ethnic group among ELLs, with 521,300 students (10.5 percent of ELL students). In addition, there were 314,000 White ELL students (6.3 percent of ELL students) and 193,500 Black ELL students (3.9 percent of ELL students). In each of the other racial/ethnic groups for which data were collected (Pacific Islanders, American Indians/Alaska Natives, and individuals of Two or more races), fewer than 40,000 students were identified as ELLs. In addition, some 700,900 ELL students were identified as students with disabilities, representing 14.2 percent of the total ELL population enrolled in U.S. public elementary and secondary schools.

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¹ Genesee, F., Lindholm-Leary, K., Saunders, W., and Christian, D. (2005). English Language Learners in U.S. Schools: An Overview of Research Findings. Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, 10 (4): 363–385. Retrieved January 22, 2019, from https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327671espr1004_2.
² For 2014 and earlier years, data on the total number of ELLs enrolled in public schools and on the percentage of public school students who were ELLs include only those ELL students who participated in ELL programs. Starting with 2015, data include all ELL students, regardless of program participation. Due to this change in definition, comparisons between 2016 and earlier years should be interpreted with caution. For all years, data do not include students who were formerly identified as ELLs but later obtained English language proficiency.
³ Categorizations are based on unrounded percentages.
⁴ Saunders, W.M., and Marcelletti, D.J. (2013). The Gap That Can’t Go Away: The Catch-22 of Reclassification in Monitoring the Progress of English Learners. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 35(2): 139–156. Retrieved September 28, 2017, from http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.3102/0162373712461849.
⁵ Includes several languages spoken by the Karen ethnic groups of Burma and by individuals of Karen descent in the United States.
⁶ School year 2008–09 data include all ELL students enrolled at any time during the 2008–09 school year, except data for California that reflect ELL students enrolled on a single date. All other data in this indicator include only ELL students enrolled on October 1 of the corresponding year.
⁷ The number of Hispanic ELL students is larger than the number of ELL students who speak Spanish. Home language data may be missing for some Hispanic ELL students. In addition, some Hispanic ELL students may report that they speak a language other than Spanish at home (such as a language that is indigenous to Latin America).

¹ Detail does not sum to 100 percent because not all categories are reported.
² Examples of situations in which English might be reported as an ELL student’s home language include students who live in multilingual households and students adopted from other countries who speak English at home but also have been raised speaking another language.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, EDFacts file 141, Data Group 678, extracted October 18, 2018; and Common Core of Data (CCD), “State Nonfiscal Survey of Public Elementary and Secondary Education,” 2016–17. See Digest of Education Statistics 2018, table 204.27.

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D. (2005). English Language Learners in U.S. Schools: An Overview of Research Findings. Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, 10 (4): 363–385. Retrieved January 22, 2019, from https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327671espr1004_2.

² For 2014 and earlier years, data on the total number of ELLs enrolled in public schools and on the percentage of public school students who were ELLs include only those ELL students who participated in ELL programs. Starting with 2015, data include all ELL students, regardless of program participation. Due to this change in definition, comparisons between 2016 and earlier years should be interpreted with caution. For all years, data do not include students who were formerly identified as ELLs but later obtained English language proficiency.
³ Categorizations are based on unrounded percentages.
⁴ Saunders, W.M., and Marcelletti, D.J. (2013). The Gap That Can’t Go Away: The Catch-22 of Reclassification in Monitoring the Progress of English Learners. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 35(2): 139–156. Retrieved September 28, 2017, from http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.3102/0162373712461849.
⁵ Includes several languages spoken by the Karen ethnic groups of Burma and by individuals of Karen descent in the United States.
⁶ School year 2008–09 data include all ELL students enrolled at any time during the 2008–09 school year, except data for California that reflect ELL students enrolled on a single date. All other data in this indicator include only ELL students enrolled on October 1 of the corresponding year.
⁷ The number of Hispanic ELL students is larger than the number of ELL students who speak Spanish. Home language data may be missing for some Hispanic ELL students. In addition, some Hispanic ELL students may report that they speak a language other than Spanish at home (such as a language that is indigenous to Latin America).