Students in this class come from Mexico, Honduras, Cuba, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Puerto Rico. This brings different cultures together like the LUCHA program, Language Learners at The University of Texas at Austin’s Center for Hispanic Achievement. The LUCHA program helps secondary Spanish-speaking English language learners in their transition to public schools, and McAllen High School includes this program. LUCHA students have a difficult time trying to transition from their birthplace to the place they live in today, McAllen. Instruction should be designed and assessed differently depending on their needs. Students require special accommodations, for example frequent and immediate feedback is essential in making their transition easier.
While immigrant youth may gain useful knowledge and skills, they miss out significantly on culture resources because they become Americanized. Subtracting schooling occurs in a variety of ways. Classifying ESL (English as a second language) are labeled “limited English proficient rather than as Spanish dominant” (p. 173), faculty and staff linguistically butcher names through mispronunciations, materials such as the school handbook that does not even mention the ELS program are not provided in English, and information is withheld from capable youth which can result in failure. This chapter also addresses the divisions among youth such as Latina female friends, religious immigrant males, immigrant females in trouble, ESL students, mixed generation groups, and U.S. born
By providing different learning experiences in the curriculum teachers will be able to meet the needs of each student’s learning style. For ELL students, New Caney Elementary offers Bilingual programs dedicated to teach both languages, Spanish and English, that will essentially allow ELL students to learn the language. Programs like these were created to help students to thrive academically no matter their circumstance. To assess students at all times, one as a future educator must ensure that we are assessing the students in each lesson plan. The teacher must ensure that each student is grasping the content presented to them by monitoring their gained knowledge. In order implement the units from the curriculum, I will strive to provide various learning experiences to each student. I will provide visual activities for my visual learners, have hands on activities for my hands-on learning students, and provide discussions for the ones that learn through hearing and repeating things out loud. Each learning experience is crucial to the student’s academic success. By providing different types of learning experiences I will be able to make the lessons more effective and
The concept of schooling, and how it differs from education, takes center stage in Angela Valenzuela’s Subtractive Schooling. The book is the culmination of a three-year study of Seguin High School in Houston, TX. Using data analysis as well as extensive observations and interviews, Valenzuela puts a face to the numbers. A significant portion of the book focusses on the role of language in terms of its application to culture. The book also shows a road map to creating relationships with our disenfranchised youth that will lead to authentic learning and positive changes in school culture. Valenzuela’s Subtractive schooling offers a sordid and shocking tale of “what could have been.”
The curriculum for English-Spanish Learners (ESL) or English-Language Learners, was created to assist students who do not speak any or little English. Angela Valenzuela describes in her article, “Subtractive Schooling, Caring Relations, and Social Capital in the Schooling of U.S.~Mexican Youth,” that
She explains that students are seemed as incompetent and ignorant due to their level of proficiency in the English language, but in reality, there is a high chance they are smart individuals. Unfortunately, because American schools fail to understand the Mexican schooling system, students are left to suffer the consequences. Angela, explained that school that provide ESL or ELL classes participate in subtractive schooling. Subtractive schooling can be described as the removal of language and culture and forcemeat into the language and culture of the dominant culture, in this case English. The example that Angela used was the De-Mexicanization of students who migrated from Mexico to the United States and are forced into learning English and adopting the American lifestyle. Angela informs that students want to know that educators cared about them before being cared for. In order to do this, educators must embrace the culture of the students rather demolish it and make it into something else. Based on the issues that Angela provided it seems that teachers are unaware or just assume that Mexican-Americans do not care about school based on their attitude and style of dress. It seems that a great percentage of students drop out or fail to provide high marks in school because of the
At my all-girls high school, I’ve always stood out for having a “thick accent”. Aside from not fully understanding English, being different has taught me how to be a creatively gifted, intelligent, and influential entity among my peers. Throughout the years, I grew frustrated with myself for being unable to speak clearly to my classmates. Additionally, my friends did not understand how I spoke, where I came from, or what I cared most about in my culture. This stood out to me to make a change and prompted me to take action towards it. In tenth grade, I became the founding Vice President of the Spanish Honor Society, an organization that executes community service and immerse students in the different Hispanic cultures. Our school was on the need for a display of diverse Hispanic cultures. For example, the school's student profile tends to show a racial disbursement of “51% African American, 40.4% Hispanic, and 4.5% White.” Additionally, that “40.4% Hispanic” for students is only “Mexicans.” Taking this issue, Spanish Honor Society (SHS) presents students with an exciting way to learn more about their diverse peers and their cultures such as music, food, and beliefs.
Texas’ government must work towards narrowing the income gap between the White and Hispanic populations, caused by the underwhelming socioeconomic status of many Latin American immigrants. This could be done by reforming the state’s educational system to better help Hispanics succeed. “…a lack of proactive efforts to address the unique needs of [Hispanics] in the educational system has untold implications for the future economic and social prosperity of the country…” (Saenz, et al,76) If Hispanics are to be the majority, the state should put more emphases on bi-lingual education. This will help reduce language barriers and make it easier for Spanish-speaking Hispanic children to succeed in the educational system. To combat statistics showing that a Hispanic student with poor socioeconomic status is heavily prone to taking drugs, committing crime, joining a gang, and going to prison, the state should invest in mentor programs. A 2008 study on the effects mentor programs have on Hispanic children showed that: “…having a mentor translated into positive academic outcomes, including greater expectancy of success, higher educational expectations, fewer absences, and a greater sense of school belonging.” (Saenz, et al, 80) These efforts will result in Hispanics having greater preparedness for higher education. The state would also benefit from investing in vocational
Because Hispanics are the fastest growing population in the United States, it is critical for the development of prevention dropout programs to decrease the dropout rate and improve the quality of life amongst the Hispanic population (Reyes & Elias, 2011).
Education is the key to individual opportunity, the strength of our economy, and the vitality of our democracy. In the 21st century, this nation cannot afford to leave anyone behind. While the academic achievement and educational attainment of Hispanic Americans has been moving in the right direction, untenable gaps still exist between Hispanic students and their counterparts in the areas of early childhood education, learning English, academic achievement, and high school and college completion.
The Latino crisis of education has been a very concerning subject for many discerning about the future the economy of America. With Latino children making up a large percentage of the American school system, the continuous dropout rates of Latino children have started to worry many Americans. Even with the children who come from different ethnicities having an increase in amount of children who go to college, there have not been any improvements in the numbers of Latinos making it to college. The crisis in Latino education has occurred due to many different factors with the prime reason being the lack of support from parents, and it can be improved and slowly solved by educating the Latino parents.
1 inaugurated its Mexican-American Studies Department in 1998. The teachers say that evaluations of their department “have consistently shown that students who take and complete … course offerings pass the state required AIMS test at higher rates, graduate from high school are higher rates, have improved grades and matriculate to college at high rates while decreasing in the areas of discipline, poor attendance or dropping out of high school.”
Acculturation can determine whether a first generation Salvadoran American student’s pursues higher education. As new immigrants immersed in the American culture, they have to adapt or comprehend the culture acceptable “behavior, values, language, and customs” in order to educational succeed (McCallister 2015). Moreover, California is a diverse state that first generation students come across a dilemma of longer period of time to dominate the native language. For instance, Lucy grew up in Central California, in a small Hispanic enclave. As a result, Lucy was exposed to Spanish conversations at home and in the community, except in the school. School provided Lucy the opportunity to apply the immersion technique:
The Latinos education crisis is a prevalent issue in the United States. More and more research has uncovered magnanimous evidence that our education system is failing the students and thus creating a pipeline away from success and higher education and into gangs, prison and poverty. From 2011-12 alone Latinos made up almost a quarter of the enrolled students in public schools, Hispanic status dropout rate was 13% (higher than both African Americans at 8% and Whites at 4%), and 5% of all doctoral degrees conferred were earned by Latinos. (NCES, Digest of Education Statistics 2013). The crisis is a result of compounding failures and the perpetuation of stigmas within the educational, governmental and societal systems. As each of these systems are complex and composed of countless factors, addressing the issues the Latino population face, specifically within schools, is often overlooked and underaddressed. In light of the problems Latinos must compete against, this paper will address the potential for change and how it can be wrought, beginning on the microlevel of the educational system, by mandating and introducing culturally responsive teaching (CRT) into classrooms and school districts nationwide in an effort to counteract the lack of educational support and to decrease tracking of students onto the school to prison pipeline.. This paper will strive to answer the question of how culturally responsive teaching can address the educational deficits of the Latino/a
Estela parent’s played a huge role in her educational outcome. Her parents believed that having an education will open bigger and better opportunities for a job. Even though her parents didn’t know why they wanted her to get an education, they instilled the idea in her head. Language caused a problem when she first started school because all she knew was Spanish and everything we teach here is in English. After a while, she was able to understand it with the help of her teachers and bilingual classes. Throughout her whole education career, she has kept her culture and language active. She went traveled to Spain to learn more about her culture.
I agree with your choice of article based on your current topic interest. I as well had an interest in the article as my topic on improving post secondary transition experience covers the part of independence. It is important for the high school leavers to be ready for college or the work environment they are to face. From the post, I can tell that there is a problem in the high school education program as the instructors are not preparing the learners well for post-secondary experience. I have noted the same occurrence in my study the reason an intervention is necessary to ensure that learners leaving high school are well prepared. Your article had a fine breakdown of the participants on the basis of their ethnic backgrounds a factor I found