Author: rebeccasellers

Jimenez et. al. (2009) opened their article, Transnational and community literacies for teachers, with the story of students and teachers who had frequent misunderstandings in class.  When the students were asked why they were so frustrated, they mentioned that the class was boring and they felt their teacher didn’t care about their lives. It is incredibly sad that students feel this way, but it seems to happen often whether there is a language barrier or not. What I really appreciate about this article is that the authors carried out their research with this fact in mind. This project involved risk on the part of the authors because it took them out of their comfort zones and into a world they were potentially unfamiliar with. It was also a big project to take students into those communities, and introduce a multimodality aspect to the assignment. However, I think these risks are what we need to keep in mind when we are teaching so that we can help students feel comfortable in our classrooms. Whether it is keeping up to date with media, taking our classes into local communities, or bringing attention to injustices against our ELL students, we need to be mindful of how we can care for our students, as well as teach them. This course has proven that this is especially important for student who are learning English and need all the support they can get. It may mean a bigger time commitment for us but it is definitely worth it to make students feel safe and supported in our classrooms!

My short practicum has given me insight into the real experiences of the ELL students. I observed quite a few English Language learners in different subjects, but the majority of my time was spent working with students in art classes. I was glad to see that students of various cultural backgrounds were given the opportunity to make art that was influenced by each of their cultures. They were encouraged to embrace all different factors that make up their identity, including language. There was also a lot of space in the lessons for the teacher to work with students one on one to clarify any language or expectations that may have been unclear.

I taught a class each day and was able to create lesson plans and vocabulary handouts that helped to scaffold the new academic language I was incorporating into my lesson. I soon learned, however, that even if I believe that I have explained things very clearly it does not mean that it translates completely to the students. I had one student in particular who needed time to digest the new information before being able to ask her questions to clarify unclear language and academic expectations. Tailoring my lessons this way was a challenge but such great practice for the future. I am thankful that I was able to have this small glimpse into planning and carrying out lessons that are accessible for ELL students, even though I know that I have a long way to go.

One instance that stands out in my mind was an interaction between a teacher and an ELL student outside one of my observed classes. They discussed the language ability of another English Language Learner. These two students sit next to each other in class, and the first student has been translating what the teacher says to the second student. When the teacher approached the first student in the hallway, she asked that they student stop translating for the second student because she believes this is preventing the second student from learning and practicing their English. After reflecting on this exchange, I realized that from what I observed, it was true. The second student struggled greatly with English and would speak in their first language the majority of the time without using the class as an opportunity to practice English. However, I was puzzled at the teacher’s request to the first student who was just trying to befriend and support the second student. As much as I agree that the student needs to practice their English more often, I do not think it was right to put the responsibility for the second student’s progress on the first student who was trying to help. Though I do not know the whole situation by any means, from what I saw there was hardly any language support from the teacher for the struggling student during my two short weeks. I believe this should to change, and the teacher should be more conscious to address the needs of ELL students when the lessons are designed and presented. I am curious what the best way would be to handle this situation if it arises in my classrooms in the future.

I thought I posted this weeks ago! Oops.

I found this chapter interesting because I did not realize how many different actions are required for reading and comprehension. An individual must pick up on how the author is using their words and phrases, align oneself to that usage, and then they need to “chunk” like information together. They must also read and interpret abstract text on a level that they can ask their own questions about it, and must be constantly meta-reading. This is an overwhelming amount of information to process on a sentence by sentence basis, especially for students who are being introduced to academic texts for the first time. I realize that when I assign readings for art history or art theory I must be conscious of this fact. The chapter has given some great tools on how to interact with the students in their readings. Because I find that I process more when I read aloud, I plan on using the “read-aloud” and “comprehend-aloud” in my classes so students have a jumping off point for their reading. Hopefully, an introduction to the literature will help them get excited about where the text is going. I have had experiences where I am assigned an academic reading, do the reading, and still feel like I have missed the main point of the article when I come to class and hear others discussing it. Perhaps a “comprehend-aloud” exercise would equip my student to understand the process of interpretation so that they can bypass the same confusion. However, I would not want to overuse either of these techniques and make students feel annoyed and unintelligent when they do the readings on their own. It will be interesting for me to find that fine line in my teaching.

I appreciate the overarching emphasis throughout this chapter on the value of “process over product”. Of course we want students to come out of their exercises with new discoveries and reinforced learning, but my own experience in secondary school has taught me that the process is not valued nearly enough. When we emphasize the way that we come to learn something in the classroom, we let students know that their work along the way, mistakes and all, are an important part of education. I believe that shifting the emphasis to process might take away some of student fear of being wrong/forming an opinion that might be contrary to popular belief. Most processes use collaborative, critical discussions that are highly useful in learning academic language and developing skills that allow students to work successfully in teams. All of these things are fundamental tools that will help students when they reach university programs like this one.

Perhaps another reason that I like the idea of sometimes valuing process over product is because this ties closely with artistic practices. An artist tries to be cognisant of the way their piece is developing and dialoguing with their main theme, the materials they are using, the potential audience, and especially other artists’ works. In many ways, the process is more pivotal than the final piece that is produced because it is often while making that artists learn the most. I think this can definitely be paralelled to our students’ learning processes if we give them the support and the space to make discoveries along the way.

Fang and Schleppegrell’s article highlights the importance of giving students the tools to identify discipline based language patterns, which will aid their overall academic comprehension. I found this article very practical and informative, because I just recently struggled with understanding the academic context of the word “affect” for one of my class readings. I had no previous understanding of the word, and when I looked it up, there was a different meaning provided for each context (philosophy, psychology, or linguistics) that was used. Because it was an art education paper, I still was not sure how to insert and interpret ‘affect’ in the article. About half way through the paper I was able to make use of the academic language tools I have learned over the years and associate ‘affect’ with its proper meaning within the art education lens.

Although an art class usually involves more hands on activities than literature, there is still important art history and theory reading that I would want to introduce to my students. This writing is typically subject specific and can be difficult to understand if the reader does not have a solid grasp on art vocabulary words before they begin. The structure that Fang and Schleppegrell suggest would be a great place to start when working with students to decipher academic texts, no matter the subject area. I appreciate that their approach is portable because it would give students the knowledge to work through texts in different subject areas on their own.

Fang, Z., & Schleppegrell, M. J. (2010). Disciplinary literacies across content areas: Supporting secondary reading through functional language analysis. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 53, 587–597. doi:10.1598/JAAL.53.7.6

Chapters 1,2, and 3

Growing up in small towns in northern BC, I rarely interacted with kids whose first language was not English. Even my high school was fully comprised of English speakers, and it wasn’t until I graduated and started travelling that I discovered the discouragement that can arise when trying to overcome language barriers. Because of this background, I have realized I will need to be very cognisant of the language backgrounds of my students and careful to include the needs of English language learners in my classroom. I have found the first few classes to be highly informative and they have encouraged me to think about the way I personally use language on a daily basis, as well as consider the kind of approach I want to take towards language as a teacher. I found it especially helpful to reflect in class on how different I felt in situations when navigating outside the realm of my first language, and how I often felt like I was being left out of some sort of club. It will be important for me to remember those experiences as I begin to teach.

I am interested in how we as teachers can equip students with the language skills needed to succeed, while valuing and affirming their own language and culture. The text mentions that while we encourage their progress in English, we “must be willing to push back against society’s narrow-minded expectations (often evidenced through tests, writing samples, and grading practices) and limited perceptions of our students’ abilities” (Zwiers, 2008, p. 12). Because I am not very well acquainted with curriculum yet, I am curious just how much flexibility there really is when a teacher wishes to adjust grading practices to better work with ELL students.

The text gives practical examples that illustrate the way teachers can build their student’s understanding of academic language while encouraging participation. I would never want to discourage or shut down a student struggling to comprehend, but I can see how I could get frustrated in a large class with students of varying language abilities. The tools highlighted in the text will be very important in combating impatient responses like that, and while it will take time to put this into practice, I feel more confident having identified these different language techniques.

Zwiers, J. (2008). Understanding how students use language. In Building academic language: Essential practices for content classrooms (Ch. 1, pp. 1-17). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.