Teaching Bilinguals and Richard Rodriguez's Aria
In the three videos about teaching bilingual students, the teachers and students both make an effort in teaching each other and building upon the knowledge obtained by bilingual students. Unfortunately for author Richard Rodriguez, he had difficulty being brought into the American school system with Spanish as his second language. He discusses how he considered it a "private language" due to him needing to know English and be taught in English. He also said that his peers could have picked up on Spanish faster if they had started earlier due to the wealth and sources given to the school system they were in. Rodriguez also felt like English was intimidating due to its unfamiliarity and wanted more people to be taught Spanish so that he felt more comfortable. These two pieces of information depict two sides of the story: one being the newer progressive way of teaching bilinguals and supporting their culture and improving their capabilities, and the second being the "Americanization" of people so that it is easier for control over a classroom with lesser regards toward the students.
In this article it talks about a Puerto Rican immigrant who was able to get better support through a bilingual teacher she had in the fifth grade. The article discusses more need in this area of teaching, for it vastly improves the potential and understandings of students who struggle with a language barrier.
In this article, it discusses how the US Education Secretary Miguel Cardona visited a school system and discussed to faculty and students how important bilingual education is, with most of those students being bilingual learners themselves.
To summarize above, bilingual education is an important piece developing in the art of education that will further produce more capable minds by unlocking more potential. By making these students more comfortable as well as having english students learn another language, the intelligence and understanding capabilities of these students would be unmatched.
I think that these are very great ways for students that are bilingual learners and what teachers do to work better with.
ReplyDeleteI like that you made sure the linked articles have possible counters to or resolutions for the problems and struggles non-english speaking students face. Many pieces will acknowledge the issue, but not provide any solution, so it's refreshing to see some strategies thrown out there.
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