Language And Thinking Of The Esl Class Being Offered This Fall

“Our society tends to regard as a sickness any mode of thought or behavior that is inconvenient for the system, and this is plausible because when an individual doesn't fit into the system it causes pain to the individual as well as problems for the system; thus the manipulation of an individual to adjust him to the system is seen as a cure for a sickness and therefore as good.” This quote provides a lucent and focused direction to the prevalent predicaments of language discrimination. Unfair treatment, due to the way or type of style used while speaking can be seen in most everyday cases. The comparison between the book “Beyond Ebonics: Linguistic Pride and Racial Prejudice” by John Baugh and the continuously transpiring, real life event of

When I moved from Colombia to the United States on December of 2013, I started studying the language and using it for necessities. Despite of my efforts, I could not got rate of my accent and it made my pass a temporally hard time. People made fun of me and my bad speaking skills. Even though that I was from Colombia, for them I was Mexican. At the beginning it hurt my feelings because I knew that my speaking was not perfect but also it made me stronger, and made me want to improve it every day.

I propose to you a case study on a pre-kindergarten English language learning student through qualitative research. My goal was to find out if he faces any problems with regards to his behavior, academic progress and attitudes towards his teachers, classmates and parents. His name is David and just recently came to the United States from Russia about two years ago. He has a complicated time understanding what goes on in his environment because of the language barrier. The one positive aspect for David is that my assistant in the class is Russian as well. Even though he has a hardship speaking the English language and understanding his peers, my assistant helps translate words from Russian to English for him and vice versa.

As a first-generation South Asian American student herself, Anita Varma recollects her own experiences of working at her college’s writing center. “In my college’s writing center, as I can assume is sometimes the case in other writing centers, consultants often perpetuate deeply flawed presumptions about international students by lumping them together with learning disabled students,” (Varma 32). While making this assumption, Varma also writes of experiencing uncomfortable moments while consulting, “The first time a student made an obvious assumption about me by asking me when I learned to speak English, I was taken aback,” (Varma 32). An example of systematic racism (racial discrimination that has become established as normal behavior within a society or organization), it is clear that the client had no ill intentions in asking, yet made assumptions based on Varma’s appearance (Oxford Dictionary). Although in this case, Varma was the one being subconsciously discriminated against as a consultant, writing centers should use this example and reverse it so that it can try to be avoided in the case of a consultant making assumptions. Had a client come in and received similar treatment, the writing center may have faced backlash and lose its ethos. By having this sort of conversation within the writing

One of the notable attributes about living in a state and/or city in America is that whenever you travel outside of your city or state, most people are quick to point out your “accent”. However, from your standpoint,

Much like many immigrants are ridiculed for speaking broken English. John Baugh (2000) tells of a story from his childhood where he would mock students in his class who did not speak English as a first language. He would repeat what these students said with a mocking tone. As he grew older he began to realize that the way he teased many fellow students because of their broken English, was similar to the way he, and many of his fellow African American community members, were teased (p. 7-8). Baugh (2000) goes on to say that the mocking and false-sense of superiority he felt over the students learning English as a Second language was the same feeling many feel about those who speak Ebonics (p. 10). The reputation of Ebonics being a lower class dialect of Standard English, especially within the academic world, has created an academic disadvantage for many African American students (Baugh, 2000, p. 6). For these students, who are native AAVE speakers, there is no extra ESL or bilingual help to strengthen their Standard English, because Ebonics is not considered a language, but rather a dialect (Baugh, 2000, p. 3). This causes many African American students to never speak Standard English proficiently, and in turn do not read or write at grade

Within this paper we will take a brief look at the Language Acquisition Principles and how they work on the behalf of ELL students. We will see how these principles can be applied within our own learning environment. There is much information from Walqui article that gives a brief overview of ELL students and how things looked in the past for these students. Now that times has change we will see how educators can make the requirements for ELL students better and more effective for teacher and students. Hopefully, as we look at ways of changing learning for our ELL students we must remember that every student learns differently. Even if you follow the principles from

The thing about discrimination is that it would take everyone’s cooperation to make it disappear even just for a second but even if that happened, who says that it wouldn’t spawn up again from someone’s grudge from another. Discrimination from the use of a language is very common. In Sistah Tongue, Kanae’s little brother, Harold-boy, was discriminated by his mother. The mother said that “you not going get one good job is you no talk good English (Kanae).” Kanae thinks that the mother think Harold-Boy has one “speech impediment” which Kanae thinks that idea is “mento”, which is crazy. She thinks that idea is crazy because Kanae believes that Harold-boy is smart and he can communicate with his family just fine. I can relate to this because I was told that speaking Pidgen in the classroom or in the work place is improper and it is not “professional”. When I was a senior in high school, I was in IB and advanced placement classes and I used to speak Pidgen in class. That was until the teacher of my IB English class called me out and told me to not speak like that in class. When I did speak it, everyone would give me a dirty look trying to say “what are you doing?” Also in my senior year I worked at a frozen yogurt shop called Orange Grove. I always felt that I shouldn’t talk to costumers in Pidgen because I would feel that would be doing something wrong. But now I question that because would I really be doing

I’ve always been the type of person to take things to heart. So when says that I am “acting white” because i want to go to college and speak proper English, it gets to me. There were a few select members in my family that didn’t want me to go to Mentor High School because they thought I would be stressed out all the time and busy. The

Communicating what we want to say, how we want to say it is the goal of expressing ourselves linguistically. For English Language Learners (and their teachers), the ability to do that successfully in their new language presents a challenge. In the content areas of instruction, it is especially important to draw out the information that a student already knows in their native language – even when they do not have the linguistic ability to express themselves in English – in order to assess their level of understanding and engage prior knowledge. Using non-linguistic representations provides a way of bridging that gap between actual understanding and the ability to express that

For example, a few months back, my uncle (mother’s side) and his family came to US for the first time, and I spoke to them as if I never learned English. To me, I never notice the drastic change in my pronunciation when I go from English to Gujarati, but this is completely obvious to those around me who don’t quite understand Gujarati, my friends outside the Indian community. It was a noticeable due to the fact that I didn’t have an “accent” when I spoke English but rather had one when speaking my native tongue. I always get questioned if I change my voice when talking to my family or even speaking my language in general, but the truth is I don’t! It’s a natural method of communication for me, nothing gets altered within me to allow for a “realistic

Historically, humans have always been separated into groups based on appearance, whether that is concerning body shape, the clothes we wear, or the color of our skin. Stereotyping is a natural instinct that humans have because they feel the need to classify people in order to not feel threatened by them. Humans feel an obligation to know and understand people but do not necessarily want to be associated with them, thus they place people into specific groups, labeling them. One of the primary ways that we stereotype people is by their race. Being a minority that has always been prejudiced against in America, African Americans are often judged because of the way that they speak. Black students have struggled in academic settings that use Standard English, such as in the common American classroom. African American Vernacular English (AAVE) harms Black students through discrimination on standardized tests and in classroom environments.

For me, learning a language is a complicated process. It is different from learning other subjects. It involves a lot of practices and follow up. When I talk about my personal experience, I would say that I have a rich experience in learning English as a second language. English was taught to me for ten years starting from grade seven till graduation from university. After graduation, I felt that I should improve my language skills. Therefore, I did a lot of efforts personally to increase my fluency. Until now I still learn the language. Indeed, learning a language takes a lifetime.

From my readings to research from Edutopia to literature courses, I have gained a deeper appreciation for language. In order to understand what one is speaking, a person needs to spend time listening to one’s language and before responding must reflect and analyze what the other said and how to respond. If a person wants to love another person they have to listen to their language in order to speak their language, and the core part of learning another language is by listening. According to Joan Blaska, author of The Power of Language: Speak and Write Using “Person First” the language people use shows one’s bias and prejudices.  Beliefs and another’s performance fall under the influence of language. Blaska claimed “ the degree to which children are able to perceive themselves as competent and worthy, or the opposite, is heavily influenced by the verbalizations used by their teachers...Studies have found that labeling of students does affect teacher expectations which in turn affects student progress”. People have heavy influence with their words, because of this, our language must be intentional in a way, that breaks down negative stereotypes and helps one gain empathy as well as seeing others capabilities. Communicating and reading others comments and inquiring others has helped me to accept

For several times, I was being discriminated against not only because of my English mastery but also my Chinese accent. The most embarrassing one took place at the first day of my school. As a person of Chinese decent, I was extremely nervous while I had reached the admission office. After waited for nearly an hour in the line, I eventually got the chance to