Post 157: Cultural Deficit Theory: Foreign Language as Enhancment vs Remedial

Post 157: Cultural Deficit Theory: Foreign Language Learning as Enhancement vs Remedial

When I was at a high school in the valley in California, I taught two language classes: French and ESL.  I taught American students, French. I was required to speak French for practically the whole period as per The Communicative Approach, although if a student asked a question in English related to the lesson, I would answer her in English. We decorated the classroom with French magazines such as Paris Match, L'Express, and we watched French TV on Youtube. We listened to French radio on Radio France. The school even had plans for the French teacher to take her French students to France during the Winter Quarter!  My French class was fun to teach. Students loved learning about French and the French culture. The French classes were seen as an enhancement to the American's students' education.  If my American students could speak French and become bilingual so the thinking goes, then my American students could get high paying international jobs, maybe even teach English in France.  Most of my American students were from upper middle class households and they had enough money to take a trip to France during the Winter Quarter.

During the parent/student conferences, the parents of my French students eagerly sat in their children's seats and I gladly showed them a PowerPoint of the French lessons we were covering. The parents especially liked the French foods we served during special French holidays. The parents loved asking questions about what other cultural events their children would participate in. In this context, language learning is seen as a fun cultural enhancement of the students' progress. Parents are eager for their children to learn another language. Throughout history, French has been considered a 'prestige' language that upper class English people would learn so it is not surprising that French retains this prestigious power over American parents.  Learning about another culture is also seen as a fun educational activity with no stigma attached.  I would tell parents about my 2 year stay in Paris, Avignon and Besancon. We also would talk about French politics, French food, French cafes and  how much fun their children were going to have when they go to France in the Winter. When a class is seen as an enhancement, then that class is fun to teach.

When I taught ESL to ESL schools for Vacation ESL students, then just like the French class, it is a fun class with no strings attached. When ELL  from many different countries like Japan, France, Italy, China, Saudi Arabia, come to the US, they take English lessons in the morning hours and during the afternoon hours they go sightseeing around Southern California to visit beaches, Universal Studios, UCLA, and other tourist spots. In this context, learning English is fun because it is an enhancement to their US vacation, hence I call these students, Vacation ELL or Vacation ESL students.  Vacation ESL students love learning about American culture. It is also fun learning about their cultures and making  fun comparisons between Japanese, Chinese, French, Italian food, differing views on politics, and Japanese, Korean, French, German, etc.. music.  Once again, when the language learning is seen as an enhancement like the Americans learning French, there is no stigma attached to learning about that culture or to explore other cultures.

It is only when students and teachers view language learning as remedial, or for dummies, or for poor students with no future, or for 'poor dumb students', or for students who are dumb because they are poor that we have problems. As soon as language learning is viewed as remedial or special education, language learning loses all its allure. When I teach ELL or ESL to ESL remedial classes, I get students who are sullen, rebellious, and not that eager to learn. The teachers blame the students' socioeconomic status of that because they are poor, they are too dumb to learn. Ovando calls this kind of mentality among educators, the Cultural Deficit Theory. Ovando states, "The culture of poverty approach implied that academic underachievement among many minority students are anchored in their socioculturally, economically, linguistically, impoverished environments." (Ovando, 184)

Students in this remedial ESL/English only model of sheltered classes are seen as 'deficient' and 'needing fixing' because they don't speak English well enough to be mainstreamed into the more prestigious 'normal' academic content classes.  Students in these remedial classes have varying degrees of fluency. Some have never been in a classroom before. Some have great L1 fluency and literacy. Most do not want to be in the class because it is a 'remedical' class. Educators tend to look down on such students and give these students a 'watered down curriculum' thinking that these students are not 'smart' enough simply because they don't speak fluent English.  It takes special training for the teacher to recognize the special needs of ELL and more teacher training needs to be done to make teachers aware of the culture deficit theory. Educators should have high expectations of all students and not look down on any class of students just because they do not speak English or make much money.

Instead, these students should be viewed as 'valuable cultural resource' as they come from many different ethnic backgrounds. The ESL teacher should engage in learning about the cultures of these students and then use that cultural background information as a cultural enrichment for the class thus affirming to the students the importance of their L1 heritage. Rather than ignore ELL cultures in the rush to teach them American culture or English, the educator should learn about their community, how they eat at home, their poltics, and get to know the ELL as people with the same zest and zeal as the French parents/students want to learn about French culture and with the same respect. I think it all comes down to respect. As soon as we think our culture is better than another culture (ethnocentrism), then you teach language minority students that they do not matter, that their cultural knowledge do not matter, then you are crushing the self esteem and the cultural identity of ELL.  I will talk about how teachers can make use of the students as valuable resource of cultural information to enhance the ESL classroom. As soon as the educator stops thinking of the class as a 'remedial' class, but rather as enhancing the students' education, then maybe students will learn to respect ESL like they do their mainstream content classes.