In
Flynn's article The Language of Power: Beyond the Grammar
Workbook, she explains
the relationship between
appearance and language,
especially race as it relates
to language.
She explains that in the
classroom she watched which
was located in a middle-class white area, the
students of color required a lot more help because their cultures
didn't value the same things as their
school. She
specifically touches on the
subject of progressive pedagogy-writers
and readers workshops-which
she seems to find a problem
with as it relates to
students of color. I found
the activity where the students wrote rules for their selected
language, switched with a partner, and had to write a speech based on
their partners rule sets for language fascinating. This is an
incredibly smart way to get students to not only learn to follow
grammar rules of other languages, but it's a great way for them to
see how hard it is for non-native English speakers to follow the
standard English rules! (I just may use this in my classroom).
For
my portfolio, I will be showing varieties of the English language:
standard English, home-language English, a mesh between two different
languages, etc (use of a colon to further explain the varieties
of language in a list). In my case, I think it would be interesting
to incorporate a lot of my home language because it is a language in
itself- German/English. With my future students, it would be
interesting to tell my own experience with language and how my
“broken English” home has encouraged me to study English and, in
a way, be very conscious of the way I talk, making sure it's always
correct. My main reason for wanting to teach language and grammar is
because I want to teach that everyone's language is valued and
shouldn't be thrown away and replaced with standard English. I really
want to teach that there is a time and place for certain language,
just as other social rules, and that one language doesn't need to
replace all other languages. One of my main arguments is that
non-native English speakers aren't praised enough for learning
another language (English) as native English speakers are praised for
knowing 50 words in another foreign language. What's interesting to
me is that English is one of the hardest languages to learn, yet,
native Spanish speakers are rarely praised for being able to speak it
fluently, but I can speak 10 words in Spanish and now I'm the coolest
person in class. The system of language is a little jaded to me and I
want to try to shift that in my classroom.
I
think my favorite activity to do to incorporate everyone's chosen
language is to do a free write at the beginning of each class. The
students will each have a journal-that I will keep and
pass out-and they will be able to write however
they want, the only time they can write without “proper” grammar
(use
of parenthetical dashes to add
in an un-needed but descriptive part of the sentence). This is
not only a great way to incorporate their language, but it's also a
great way to get to know your own students. I will allow students to
share sentences out of their journal if they choose to, and as a
class we can discuss why it's okay to use certain words or grammar in
that situation, but maybe not in another situation. I would hope that
some students would have code-switching languages like I do, so we
could have a wide variety to discuss.
Mikah,
ReplyDeleteI really like your statement about writing rules for certain languages fascinating! I actually did not think of that being that great but, I went back and read that part of the article again and I totally agree with you! Being able to see and feel how hard it would be for students to try and speak with a different dialect or follow another languages rules can be a real eye opener for students. It is really cool that you want to incorporate this into your classroom one day! I think your pattern in the beginning of the second paragraph works really well! It flows with your writing and I definitely think you used the punctuation correctly! As well as in your last paragraph where you use parenthetical dashes. You executed that very well, too! In regards to another place where you could use that pattern you could incorporate it into this sentence: "I really want to teach that there is a time and place for certain language, just as other social rules, and that one language doesn't need to replace all other languages." Perhaps by placing parenthetical dashes around "certain language". I had a really tough time finding a place for you to implement a pattern because you use such great punctuation throughout your entire post! I really like how you want to put in your final cover letter your own experiences with german english as well as show your future students that you have experienced this first hand and how you dealt with it! I also really like how you compare a time and place for certain languages as a time and place for certain rules, that was a great analogy. The idea you want to incorporate into your future classroom is awesome, I want to do something similar as well! Your ideas for the final cover letter are awesome and very detailed, I really liked everything you have here!
great job!
-Haley
I really like the idea that you are going to be pulling from personal experience with German/English. And I think it will be very enhancing to reflect on how that affected you growing up, in school and your future career choice. I also think it is important to look at what Standard English is and when it is useful and how it has it's own culture as well because then it might make it easier for other students to understand it and also students who have that as their home language can maybe develop a sympathy for the importance of other students home languages.
ReplyDeleteI like that you used a semicolon to incorporate a list into your blog however the ending "list" item does not seem listy so it somewhat clashes with the other listed items when reading it. But I like where you are going with that! Maybe instead of saying that it is a mesh of languages you could add in German English or even say combinations.
Brooke