I have read this book for two other classes in my collegiate career, both for education classes. So as I read through this again, I tried to make connections to my future as an ESL teacher.
Chapter 1:
In chapter 1, Freire explores how oppression has been justified through the constant cycle of "oppressor" vs. the "oppressed." He explains how the balance of power is relatively stable between the colonizer and the colonized.
"Freedom is acquired by conquest, not by gift. It must be pursued constantly and responsibly. Freedom is not an ideal located outside of man; nor is it an idea which becomes myth. It is rather the indispensable condition for the quest for human completion." (47) Freire claims that freedom can result from praxis (informed action), when a balance between practice and theory is achieved. Looking at this from an educational point of view, I see this as a sort of call for educational equality that is suppose to be there, but isn't. We can think of educational laws being made by our elected officials, but how many of them have actually taught? There is no balance, and that is very visible in our society.
Many of us want to be teachers in the future, and we have heard of the "educational" reform that has been going on with NCLB and schools being shutdown. If we, as pre-service teachers, think that the answer to a struggling school is to strip them of resources (money, activities, other resources) will be the "kick in the butt" for schools to improve, then we are just continuing the cycle of the oppressor and oppressed that Freire discusses in my opinion.
Is NCLB technically equal education? And if it isn't (<-- it isn't), would that make NCLB unconstitutional?
Chapter 2:
In chapter 2, Freire tends to direct the discussion to more of the educational aspect. He discusses the "banking" approach to educating students versus the "problem-posing" approach to educating students.
The "banking" approach tends to dehumanize students. School, based on this, is considered more or less alienation. The teacher's job is to fill students with contents of the narration, and the students are supposed to be like "receptacles" that take in all of the content by recording, memorizing, and repeating all of it, then go on to the next unit. I feel that without a change to the way we assess our schools and children, that this route is what we are heading (or are already) in. These standardized tests being the BIG SHOW for comprehension and knowledge are unrealistic to produce real, accurate, maybe even authentic results. There are many things that students can do that these end-all, be-all tests can never show. I am not trying to go on a rant and saying to toss out the whole system, but I think there has to be some sort of compromise or ideas for how we can fix the system that certain educational reforms have corrupted. If we don't, I fear that teachers will have no choice but to use the "banking" approach to keep the scores.
From all educational sectors, including ESL, I believe that a "problem-posing" approach is the better route. This approach strives for students to be conscious of the world around them. I see this as a way that students should be asking questions. We affirm our students that they are never done learning, they will always be unfinished, because we never are finished. Probing these students creatively with more than just a fill in the bubbles (neatly of course) sort of examination of their competence seems a bit better of a reflection of their education. Students shouldn't be seen as empty when they come into your class, even if they are newcomers of the language, we all have sort of an intellectual foundation, but I know I am just preaching to the choir when it comes to who will read this. ;)
I guess this is my last blog for this course, so thanks for those who do read these! Good luck with finals!
See you in class and can't wait to see each group's units!
Blogfully yours,
The TESOL Bro
Tommy T.
Monday, December 5, 2011
Monday, November 28, 2011
Placement, Assessment, Pogramming Myths
Myth: L2 students just need to be placed in an English-speaking environment and they'll learn the language. That's how my grandparents learned English.
Reality: To be considerate of students' ever-developing language, they need to be provided an appropriate education that nourishes that. This is true for older learners especially, who have been exposed to their L1 for a substantial amount of their life.
I know that my family would agree with this myth, but it is just unrealistic to think someone can just be thrown into a classroom and pick up all the components of a language like grammar, vocabulary, reading, speaking, etc. without any formal instruction. On top of that, legally students have rights to a quality education that is equal, NOT necessarily identical. These students are most likely not handicapped nor non-achieving, they are just at a disadvantage in their language proficiency at the moment. Some support in and out of the content area, like an ELL class, can serve to be a great scaffold to English competence.
The idea that we should only assess ELL learners to see if they are "ELLs" is not only wrong, but ignorant. "L2 learners should be assessed for not only placement reasons, but also on diagnosing students' progress and needs, assessing students' performance, and determining program effectiveness" (Samway & McKeon, 2007). It is the responsibility of the teacher to be sensitive to all their students by knowing their needs and giving them the best possible way to succeed.
NCLB (No Child Left Behind) holds schools responsible for all students, including ELLs. They are tested in their proficiency of listening, reading, writing, and speaking. Now, I am not the biggest fan of NCLB, but however, I do agree that districts should be responsible for ALL students. As the book lists (Supreme Court Cases), schools are legally bound to provide equal education to all students. It is their responsibility to provide further assistance so that students can have a better opportunity to succeed and move-on in their academic careers.
Reality: To be considerate of students' ever-developing language, they need to be provided an appropriate education that nourishes that. This is true for older learners especially, who have been exposed to their L1 for a substantial amount of their life.
I know that my family would agree with this myth, but it is just unrealistic to think someone can just be thrown into a classroom and pick up all the components of a language like grammar, vocabulary, reading, speaking, etc. without any formal instruction. On top of that, legally students have rights to a quality education that is equal, NOT necessarily identical. These students are most likely not handicapped nor non-achieving, they are just at a disadvantage in their language proficiency at the moment. Some support in and out of the content area, like an ELL class, can serve to be a great scaffold to English competence.
The idea that we should only assess ELL learners to see if they are "ELLs" is not only wrong, but ignorant. "L2 learners should be assessed for not only placement reasons, but also on diagnosing students' progress and needs, assessing students' performance, and determining program effectiveness" (Samway & McKeon, 2007). It is the responsibility of the teacher to be sensitive to all their students by knowing their needs and giving them the best possible way to succeed.
NCLB (No Child Left Behind) holds schools responsible for all students, including ELLs. They are tested in their proficiency of listening, reading, writing, and speaking. Now, I am not the biggest fan of NCLB, but however, I do agree that districts should be responsible for ALL students. As the book lists (Supreme Court Cases), schools are legally bound to provide equal education to all students. It is their responsibility to provide further assistance so that students can have a better opportunity to succeed and move-on in their academic careers.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Shohamy Response
I tend to agree with Shohamy that there is a "pressing need for language testers to develop a variety of procedures to elicit and assess discourse skills" (pg. 213). Sometimes I feel that teachers may get caught up with all the responsibilities that goes with being a teacher, and forget about what is best for ALL of their students. There is a tendency where we assess students the same way each unit, chapter, assignment, etc., with gap-filling, multiple choice, true-false, etc. worksheets and tests that only test the basic and/or academic language. As we have learned from our 346 class and the anthologies unit, there are different alternative assessments we can give students, like portfolios, journals, and speeches in order to evaluate our students. As we know, every student functions differently in the academic setting. Therefore, shouldn't we find different ways of assessment? However, there are questions of how much variety there should be, or the amount of class time would be used.
What are some thoughts from the cohort? I think it is possible to use a variety, but explaining it to the "higher-ups" may be the more difficult part.
Shohamy (1994) had done some research on was the use of humans versus machines to elicit oral samples. The results showed the "language obtained from the video-recorded and audio-recorded procedures was more direct and did not involve much use of pragmatic devices; the language elicited from test takers interacting directly with testers (i.e. face-to-face or telephone) was more elaborated and indirect and involved a large number of pragmatic and social devices" (pg. 207). The results overall found that the telephone task included the highest amounts of pragmatic devices and was the most elaborated. I just find it interesting that a face-to-face context would not use as many, or more, pragmatic devices than the telephone. It would be interesting to re-test that now with how the use of texting has decreased the use of phone usage among the upcoming generations. A face-to-face conversation just feels a lot more authentic.
What does everyone else think of the results concluded (pg. 207)?
Good luck to everyone with Dr. Kang's final tomorrow!
Blogfully yours,
The TESOL Bro,
Tommy T.
What are some thoughts from the cohort? I think it is possible to use a variety, but explaining it to the "higher-ups" may be the more difficult part.
Shohamy (1994) had done some research on was the use of humans versus machines to elicit oral samples. The results showed the "language obtained from the video-recorded and audio-recorded procedures was more direct and did not involve much use of pragmatic devices; the language elicited from test takers interacting directly with testers (i.e. face-to-face or telephone) was more elaborated and indirect and involved a large number of pragmatic and social devices" (pg. 207). The results overall found that the telephone task included the highest amounts of pragmatic devices and was the most elaborated. I just find it interesting that a face-to-face context would not use as many, or more, pragmatic devices than the telephone. It would be interesting to re-test that now with how the use of texting has decreased the use of phone usage among the upcoming generations. A face-to-face conversation just feels a lot more authentic.
What does everyone else think of the results concluded (pg. 207)?
Good luck to everyone with Dr. Kang's final tomorrow!
Blogfully yours,
The TESOL Bro,
Tommy T.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Week 12 Reflection (ENG 394)
Last week, the class focus was on working on their quarter two book projects. The students were supposed to be using their learning strategies, such as making predictions, making connections, and asking questions of the text.
Individually, I had a chance to have an individual conference with one student, Arham. First, I allowed him to explain what was going-on in his book, in which he was only a few chapters away from completing. I noted how he wasn't using all of his reading strategies to understand the text. He was only using predictions while he was reading, and when he did explain the text to me, he would use exact quotes that he read to me straight from the book. When I asked him what questions he might have for the last few chapters, he asked very basic questions like, "What will the boy [named Michael] and his sister find in the basement?" Arham was able to hit the main ideas for the most part, but was missing a lot of context clues that could have better-developed what he thought could happen, and even connect with, in which he told me how he thought his house was haunted when he first came here, because the home was so different from he lived in when he was in Pakistan or Toronto. Overall, he did a nice job, but he, like many of the students, had to be guided to use all the strategies they should be applying.
The students' bell-ringer for the week had them analyze drop-out rates at local high schools. The students had the opportunity to understand some new vocabulary, like dropping-out and population, while also connecting it with math by doing averages of the amount of students dropping out of a particular school. The students seemed to run into some difficulty at first, but by the end they were very comfortable with the calculator and understanding the chart.
One interesting technological skill I saw was in the other ELL classroom. She used the SmartBoard and made a game in which the students individually had clickers to choose the correct answer to review for their test. They reviewed vocabulary, sentence structure (which is correct), and gap-filling exercises. The students, combined (3 students), scored a 70% based on all their answers throughout. Towards the end, the students were given an opportunity to receive "Cav Cash." The students seemed to respond stronger in that they took time to answer, and not rush. The incentive ended up bringing the overall score up to the mid-70s by the end of the hour.
Individually, I had a chance to have an individual conference with one student, Arham. First, I allowed him to explain what was going-on in his book, in which he was only a few chapters away from completing. I noted how he wasn't using all of his reading strategies to understand the text. He was only using predictions while he was reading, and when he did explain the text to me, he would use exact quotes that he read to me straight from the book. When I asked him what questions he might have for the last few chapters, he asked very basic questions like, "What will the boy [named Michael] and his sister find in the basement?" Arham was able to hit the main ideas for the most part, but was missing a lot of context clues that could have better-developed what he thought could happen, and even connect with, in which he told me how he thought his house was haunted when he first came here, because the home was so different from he lived in when he was in Pakistan or Toronto. Overall, he did a nice job, but he, like many of the students, had to be guided to use all the strategies they should be applying.
The students' bell-ringer for the week had them analyze drop-out rates at local high schools. The students had the opportunity to understand some new vocabulary, like dropping-out and population, while also connecting it with math by doing averages of the amount of students dropping out of a particular school. The students seemed to run into some difficulty at first, but by the end they were very comfortable with the calculator and understanding the chart.
One interesting technological skill I saw was in the other ELL classroom. She used the SmartBoard and made a game in which the students individually had clickers to choose the correct answer to review for their test. They reviewed vocabulary, sentence structure (which is correct), and gap-filling exercises. The students, combined (3 students), scored a 70% based on all their answers throughout. Towards the end, the students were given an opportunity to receive "Cav Cash." The students seemed to respond stronger in that they took time to answer, and not rush. The incentive ended up bringing the overall score up to the mid-70s by the end of the hour.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Ensuring Social Relevance/From the "Good Kids" to the "Worst"
Kuma:
How does a language become a "standard" variety?
In a world where technologies like the internet spreads and develops language, it is inevitable that the English language will develop a large number of local varieties. However, how can we judge what should be considered "standard?" All varieties are considered "rule-governed" (Kuma, p. 240), that being they are conditioned by phonological, syntactic, semantic, and rhetorical rules. There is a great debate that brews over which standard or variety one should adopt for the purpose of learning and teaching English in the educational setting.
In my opinion, I think it is logical to teach the standard or variety that is used around the region in where the instruction is taking place. I remember in my year of taking Spanish in high school, we tended to learn more of the standard of Mexican-Spanish, because my teacher was from Mexico. However, in college, my first teacher was from Spain, so she tended to instruct towards the variety of Spain-Spanish. I believe that this should be the tendency of us as future educators. I would love to teach English abroad in South America or Europe. What makes me ponder though is if I was to teach English in Spain or Italy, should I direct my instruction more towards British English? Or American English?
I understand that the we as educators face a challenge between helping learners balance between holding their linguistic identity while at the same time "prepare them to face the sociopolitical and economic imperatives that point to the need to master and use the dominant language" (Kuma, 266). I feel the best way one can do this is to value students' culture and language, however, we have to realize that there exist powers above us that want to be the puppet masters.. #buzzkill
Leki:
"...several scholars have posited that schools perpetuate prevalent societal images of immigrants and minority
groups through a hidden curriculum of schooling" (Auerbach, 1995; McGroarty, 1985; Tollefson, 1989). They contest that the hidden curriculum functions as a means of socializing immigrants to take on certain roles and positions in society (e.g., consumer, worker, tenant). Leki argues that "these sorts of archetypes or representations of ESOL learner identity inevitably exist in all institutional settings (and in all classrooms) in which students are educated" (pg. 40).
On one hand, I see Leki's point, there are barriers and stereotypes out there that hold back students. The idea of "if you work hard, you will have success," just isn't there anymore. The Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island ideal is very outdated. In the education realm, there are examples of schools that could have these hidden curricula. For example, in response to the fairly broad and open-ended essay prompt, "Give an account of an event that actually happened or that you imagined,"Claudia told the story of how she had been singled out for harassment by U.S.-born peers as a newcomer in elementary school (D, English, November 9, 1993).
However, I am still conflicted in believing that all institutional settings of education categorize ESOL learners by socializing them into society by placing them in certain roles and positions in societies. Then again, I think of my internships in Chicago where I have seen students not even offered opportunities to research into higher education like a four-year college. They had military recruiters at lunch, but never a college recruiter.
I feel that immigrant students are not given as much an opportunity as well, because many higher-ups think of them as not capable because of their proficiency in the language, and that just is not right.
I am interested to hear others' thoughts/experiences about this topic.
See you all tomorrow!
Blogfully yours,
Tommy T.
How does a language become a "standard" variety?
In a world where technologies like the internet spreads and develops language, it is inevitable that the English language will develop a large number of local varieties. However, how can we judge what should be considered "standard?" All varieties are considered "rule-governed" (Kuma, p. 240), that being they are conditioned by phonological, syntactic, semantic, and rhetorical rules. There is a great debate that brews over which standard or variety one should adopt for the purpose of learning and teaching English in the educational setting.
In my opinion, I think it is logical to teach the standard or variety that is used around the region in where the instruction is taking place. I remember in my year of taking Spanish in high school, we tended to learn more of the standard of Mexican-Spanish, because my teacher was from Mexico. However, in college, my first teacher was from Spain, so she tended to instruct towards the variety of Spain-Spanish. I believe that this should be the tendency of us as future educators. I would love to teach English abroad in South America or Europe. What makes me ponder though is if I was to teach English in Spain or Italy, should I direct my instruction more towards British English? Or American English?
I understand that the we as educators face a challenge between helping learners balance between holding their linguistic identity while at the same time "prepare them to face the sociopolitical and economic imperatives that point to the need to master and use the dominant language" (Kuma, 266). I feel the best way one can do this is to value students' culture and language, however, we have to realize that there exist powers above us that want to be the puppet masters.. #buzzkill
Leki:
"...several scholars have posited that schools perpetuate prevalent societal images of immigrants and minority
groups through a hidden curriculum of schooling" (Auerbach, 1995; McGroarty, 1985; Tollefson, 1989). They contest that the hidden curriculum functions as a means of socializing immigrants to take on certain roles and positions in society (e.g., consumer, worker, tenant). Leki argues that "these sorts of archetypes or representations of ESOL learner identity inevitably exist in all institutional settings (and in all classrooms) in which students are educated" (pg. 40).
On one hand, I see Leki's point, there are barriers and stereotypes out there that hold back students. The idea of "if you work hard, you will have success," just isn't there anymore. The Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island ideal is very outdated. In the education realm, there are examples of schools that could have these hidden curricula. For example, in response to the fairly broad and open-ended essay prompt, "Give an account of an event that actually happened or that you imagined,"Claudia told the story of how she had been singled out for harassment by U.S.-born peers as a newcomer in elementary school (D, English, November 9, 1993).
However, I am still conflicted in believing that all institutional settings of education categorize ESOL learners by socializing them into society by placing them in certain roles and positions in societies. Then again, I think of my internships in Chicago where I have seen students not even offered opportunities to research into higher education like a four-year college. They had military recruiters at lunch, but never a college recruiter.
I feel that immigrant students are not given as much an opportunity as well, because many higher-ups think of them as not capable because of their proficiency in the language, and that just is not right.
I am interested to hear others' thoughts/experiences about this topic.
See you all tomorrow!
Blogfully yours,
Tommy T.
Practicum Experiences (10/31- 11/4)
Last week, the students chose new books to read individually for the Quarter Two Book Projects. To begin, the class was taught a new reading strategy, "asking questions." We attached sheets into their notebooks where they could write questions for before, during, and after reading a section, giving them an opportunity to output and them give input for what they understood of whichever passage they were reading through. *A cool tool that the students used during silent reading times were "whisper phones." Whisper phones allowed students to speak into this plastic item that appeared as a phone, where they could hear themselves read and pronounce the words in the book, but not distract others around them.
One day last week, their was a student field trip that took students from several places to a career fair. Therefore, certain teachers had to leave the building to chaperone. Our ELL classroom that morning had students not in the ELL program sitting-in for a study hall "type" hour. During the hour, it was very noticeable to see that the ELL students were nervous. The "cat seemed to have their tongue" in that they were silent. They did not want to ask nor answer any questions. I talked to one of the students later, a boy from Pakistan, and asked him if he was alright, because usually he is very talkative during class. He told me, "I don't know, I get nervous with them (Non-ELL Students) here. I don't want to be made fun of." I then asked him if they make fun of him, and he just shrugged his shoulders.
One thing I enjoyed that the teacher did this week was that she held individual conferences about the new books that the students were reading. She had them tell myself and her about the book, to see if they are understanding, making connections, and asking questions. One student, from Africa, was able to connect to one of the characters in the book that reminded here of a teacher she had back in her home country. However, she, and many of the others as well, only focused on single strategies that they were comfortable using. Many were not connecting the new reading strategy (asking questions) to their books. It seemed that they were still confused on how they should do that. The teacher allowed me then to give a mini-lesson on how to use the strategy. They seemed to pick it up, but I won't be able to see if they were able to until I check their notebooks tomorrow.
Blogfully yours,
Tommy T.
One day last week, their was a student field trip that took students from several places to a career fair. Therefore, certain teachers had to leave the building to chaperone. Our ELL classroom that morning had students not in the ELL program sitting-in for a study hall "type" hour. During the hour, it was very noticeable to see that the ELL students were nervous. The "cat seemed to have their tongue" in that they were silent. They did not want to ask nor answer any questions. I talked to one of the students later, a boy from Pakistan, and asked him if he was alright, because usually he is very talkative during class. He told me, "I don't know, I get nervous with them (Non-ELL Students) here. I don't want to be made fun of." I then asked him if they make fun of him, and he just shrugged his shoulders.
One thing I enjoyed that the teacher did this week was that she held individual conferences about the new books that the students were reading. She had them tell myself and her about the book, to see if they are understanding, making connections, and asking questions. One student, from Africa, was able to connect to one of the characters in the book that reminded here of a teacher she had back in her home country. However, she, and many of the others as well, only focused on single strategies that they were comfortable using. Many were not connecting the new reading strategy (asking questions) to their books. It seemed that they were still confused on how they should do that. The teacher allowed me then to give a mini-lesson on how to use the strategy. They seemed to pick it up, but I won't be able to see if they were able to until I check their notebooks tomorrow.
Blogfully yours,
Tommy T.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Awareness and Interaction COLLIDE!
In terms of interaction, I agree with Krashen that teachers can give "the best possible language lesson" by just talking (Krashen and Terrell, 1983, p. 35). The book uses the example of a school in Wonderland where learners watch programs in simplified language such as children's programs. I see this sort of behavior at my own practicum site. The teacher simplifies her language by saying things such as "Everyone do bell-ringer," or "open book." The students respond and do as she says. As I do believe that listening and reading are important for developing adequate language competence, does this sort of instruction effect manufacturing language competence? In my opinion, I feel that teacher-talk simplifies and does not promote extended verbal interaction, and for middle-school and high-school students, I feel that does not help their progression.
Gee (1994, p. 190) says about teachers of English is also true of all language teachers: "English teachers can cooperate in their own marginalization by seeing themselves as "language teachers" with no connection to such social and political issues. Or they.. accept their role as persons who social students into a world view that.. a constant sense of the possibilities for change."
Reflective Task 7.6 (pg. 165):
What are everyone's thoughts? Agree? Disagree?
*I can see Gee's point, but if my language teaching is not connected to social and political issues, I don't feel that I am cooperating in my own marginalization. Now, I am not trying to take away any importance from addressing these issues, but I feel it must be instructed in the right context. Personally, I feel that the audience and proficiency of the students play a huge role. However, these issues do offer a great opportunity for extended verbal interaction in the classroom. I feel that a teacher is suppose to help shape their students into well-informed global citizens, but we must also be careful with the way that we share our views, as to not offend or propaganda our students into our own beliefs.
The two chapters offered us ways in which foster language awareness and facilitate interaction. The two intertwine in the way we approach teaching and promote interaction.
See you all tomorrow!
Blogfully yours,
The TESOL Bro Tommy T.
Gee (1994, p. 190) says about teachers of English is also true of all language teachers: "English teachers can cooperate in their own marginalization by seeing themselves as "language teachers" with no connection to such social and political issues. Or they.. accept their role as persons who social students into a world view that.. a constant sense of the possibilities for change."
Reflective Task 7.6 (pg. 165):
What are everyone's thoughts? Agree? Disagree?
*I can see Gee's point, but if my language teaching is not connected to social and political issues, I don't feel that I am cooperating in my own marginalization. Now, I am not trying to take away any importance from addressing these issues, but I feel it must be instructed in the right context. Personally, I feel that the audience and proficiency of the students play a huge role. However, these issues do offer a great opportunity for extended verbal interaction in the classroom. I feel that a teacher is suppose to help shape their students into well-informed global citizens, but we must also be careful with the way that we share our views, as to not offend or propaganda our students into our own beliefs.
The two chapters offered us ways in which foster language awareness and facilitate interaction. The two intertwine in the way we approach teaching and promote interaction.
See you all tomorrow!
Blogfully yours,
The TESOL Bro Tommy T.
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