Jesse Pratt
ED 482
3/9/15
2)
Dear future teacher,
As a future teacher you need to understand that language is very important in multiple
ways. In Wright (2010) in chapter two, he talks about how it is important to know that as
at teachers you will need to use language for communication, as an educator, as an
evaluator, and more. He also talks about teachers knowing the “five subsystems of
language,” (Wright 2010, pg. 26) which includes Phonology, morphology, syntax,
semantics, and pragmatics. As a teacher you don’t just need to understand how to
speak a language, or how to spell correctly, but you also need smaller parts of language
as in phonology. The reason you need to know things like phonology, which is “the
study of the sound systems of language,” (Wright 2010, pg. 26) is because as a teacher
it will help you understand why some of your students are having trouble with relations
to pronunciation, and accents. If you have a better understanding of language in all
aspects, then you will be able to get an understanding of why some students are
struggling with certain things, and then you will be able to help them instead of having
no idea of why they are having problems. Wright goes over how we don’t know exactly
how people learn a language, and because of that there are several competing theories
and debates on how we learn a second language. He talks about Skinner’s
behaviorism, Chomsky’s Innatist perspective, Van Pattern’s Cognitive perspective, and
vygotsky’s sociocultural perspectives. Teachers, who are knowledgeable about
language, and also their own students, are then able to build off of their students’
strengths and can instruct them the ways that they need to be instructed.
3)
Another thing to know as a future teacher is the trends of attitudes toward languages
other than English in the U.S. The U.S. has never really had a positive towards other
languages. According to Wright (2010) on page 55, he talks about enslaved Africans
being prohibited from using their native tongues, because they feared resistance or a
rebellion. In the article “Bilingual Education is a Human and Civil Right,” it talks about in
1864, congress prohibited Native American children from being taught in their own
language. Also it says that it took over 70 years to overturn that law. In more recent
years the government is doing more similar things in more of a sneaky way. They are
trying to pass English-Only movements. They call it “English for the Children.” In the
article rethinking schools, it says that such initiatives are denying the students their
human and civil rights to have a bilingual education, or to learn in their native language.
As a future teacher you need to understand what is happening with these movements,
because they can and will affect you and your teaching, as well as your students and
their learning.
7)
Testing for ELLs is a major topic in my opinion. We use testing to asses our students.
One major issue in testing ELLs is that they lack proficiency in English. If the content
tests are given in English, then the test results will not provide fair and accurate
assessment of the student’s true content knowledge. Instead the test would be more on
the student’s English knowledge. Some schools have the ELL students take their test in
their native language, which is a better way to asses ELL students. However, that is not
always possible. Some schools with English only are not allowed to test ELLs in their
native language. Also some school might not have to resources to translate to a certain
language, or lose some content in the translation. In my own experience, I lived in
Sweden and had my teacher verbally translate a test from Swedish to English, but it still
became very difficult for me to understand what he meant to say.
10)
When you have an ELL student, who is struggling, how can you distinguish between if
the student’s having academic difficulties or if they are having language difficulties? In
the article by Irujo, she talks about having a student named Ana, and how she had a
hard time in knowing if she was in need of Special Education, or if she is just struggling
in her lack of language proficiency. As a future teacher you are very likely, at some point
in your teaching profession to come by an example, where you have to make a similar
decision. If you just assume that the student needs Special Education, but in reality they
are just having difficulties with language, then that could cause them to probably not be
able to advance any farther then they are in the future, because they are not receiving
the right kind of support. You need to really think about it, and work with your students
so that you give them all the best chance that they can get. It is not your future that is
affected by your decision, but it is the future of your students.
1)
As a future teacher, you need to understand that the U.S. is a nation of immigrants, and
that we are currently experiencing high rates of immigration. We are having a lot of
refugees and immigrates coming to the U.S. Most of the immigration is coming from
Central and South America, as well as from Asia. It is important to know what is
happening, because it is very likely that you could have a student that is a refugee or
immigrant. You must know some of your students could have gone through some
dramatic experiences in their life. You want to do your best to understand that some
students could have had to leave their parents behind, and could cause them to
overreact at times. In Maxwell’s article talks about the U.S immigration policy allowing
young immigrants who make it to the border to stay. With all of the refugees crossing
the border daily, the government is struggling to provide shelter and food. Your students
rely on you to help them towards their future as much as you can. As a future teacher,
the least you can do is to have a better understanding of where your students are
coming from and what they might have been through.
I hope that you take an understanding that your future students future is in your hands
and that you are prepared the best you can to help them live up to their potential.
Sincerely,
Jesse Pratt