Blog Entry 2

Hi everyone! This is my Blog Entry #2 and I interviewed my fellow classmate, Angelica. She is twenty-three years old, who was born here but both her parents came to the United States from Mexico. Angelica grew up only knowing Spanish because she was not introduced to English at a young age. She learned her second language, English mostly from school and also from her older siblings. When I asked her where she mostly learned English, I was surprised with her answer because she said she mostly learned at home. “Students from a minority home may find the culture of the school vastly different from the culture of their home, and the teacher may be their first contact with the social world outside the home, and their first contact with English.” (pg. 29) This caught me off guard because usually people learn English at school and her family members knew only Spanish. She said she learned from her older siblings and watching TV. What I found interesting was that she had a difficult time learning English because she was put straight into a general classroom with no bilingual teacher. So Angelica was forced to learn English but not in a pleasant way because her school had no resources. She was disobedient at school because she had no idea what her teacher was saying. Angelica mentioned a strategy that her teacher used that actually helped her was partnering her up next to a peer that was fluent in English. I asked Angelica her preference on the best way to learn English and she said through talking and communicating with other people verbally. I also asked her why was it important to her to learn English. “We live in America! Everyone here speaks English. Not only do we want to be bilingual, which is a plus but we want to learn English so we can help people and to get a job. ”With helping others, Angelica is becoming a teacher to help students that grew up like her. She has her own small group of ELL students in her mentor’s classroom. Angelica uses her bilingual advantage to help translate any confusion they may have. I also teach at the same campus she does, Dogan Elementary, where it is 65% Hispanic. “Whether you are becoming a regular classroom teacher, you are also a language teacher. As a language teacher, you share responsibility for helping your ELLs develop their proficiency in English and their ability to use oral and written English for academic purposes across content areas.” (pg. 60) I believe that as part of being bilingual, we should use our ability to support everyone’s learning experience.

            At the end, I asked her about a quote, “I’m no good at learning English.” I asked if she thought this was an attitude some people have towards learning English because of bad experience or was it because some people just lack the ability to learn. She said she thinks people lacked the ability to learn because you can learn any language as long as you try!

Wright, Wayne. Foundations for Teaching English Language Learners: Research, Theory, Policy, and Practice. Philadelphia, PA: Caslon, 2015. Print. Second Edition.