It is important to explore the effects of nonmainstream comparativeapproaches to language instruction because these methods may resistmonolingual attitudes, which promote language dom
Agreed. English only is NOT helpful. Especially when the system prepares so few for academic literacy or analysis.
ode-switching uses the same approach in its appeal to speakers of non-mainstream language varieties, suggesting that switching to mainstreamAmerican English in academic settings, job interviews, and other profes-sional environments is more socially acceptable than using nonmainstreamvarieties of English in these situations and will likely lead to academic,economic, and professional suc
Jenkins address this, and I should use this as a counter pint to it. The fact remains, certain judgements WILL be made about your ability to sound professional or use academic standard english. Why should code switching be a bad thing if it offers more linguistic flexibility and more opportunity for it?
e, I referred to code-switching as the "good hair" of the academiclinguistic community. As mentioned previously, "good hair" in the movieSchool Daze is considered African American hair that is straight or wavyand closer to the texture of European American hair, thus making it moremainstream and more acceptable in our s
An interesting point about forced adaption to a system. though I am not sure I agree that adapting to SAE in college is a bad thing like they make the point about changing ones hair to be.
Based on these song lyrics, one might assume that Africwho straighten their hair and wear European Americanfrom identity issues and an inferiority complex that cadon their cultural heritage in order to fit into mainstpeople of color who engage in code-switching might alproc
A point worth addressing or paraphrasing. People changing thins about the way they are normally to fit into a society that demands they are more "mainstream" in aestehtics to be acceptable.
s, "as long as there isprivileged speech, it is hard for disenfranchised speakers to hear others whoare not in their circumstances discuss their disempowered language, regard-less of the inten
This is more true than false, and I think lends itself towards why code switching as a teacher comes off as condescending. But code swtiching as a student is more appropriate because it encourages linguistic flexibility while it is most useful
This statement delivered by Gordon is problematic belanguage or dialect difference as unconventional and uneducation.
But isn't that what standards are for? At least in academia, is having less conventional modes of speech the normal thing. A uniform pattern is the "Standard" so to speak.
hiteness (Borsheim-Bto Gordons teaching methods is an example of how herproach may have caused the African American student iif her culture was demeaned or devalu
This is why I don't think code switching for Teachers is appropriate. But Code switching for STUDENTS makes sense. It preserves language, while adding the much more formal and less used SAE for whatever they need.
ive approach, SRTOL advocates for anwhich the first language and culture continues towhile the second language is added. Thus, additstudents to build up their confidence in the abilityand retain their
Spot on. Should direct quote or paraphrase this.
CCC). The philosophy of subtractive bilingua"should help students substitute one set of languags
Returning to an different point of "english only"
ry world" (191). In these studies, rthat if the contrastive analysis approach is not applicultural pluralism and cultural equality, it may hastudent perceptions about
How can this be addressed without weakening standards for academic literacy?
r 56). In Young s text, code-as an alternative for teachers, because code-meshing pa more "egalitarian path i
Valid. But should it not go both ways? Students and teachers gotta do the work to understand one another, not just one for the other.
e varieties. According to Young, this pea form of language discrimination because it represenguistic into
Another point on the SAE oppression thing. While not invalid, inherently, do we agree with the idea that it is the instiutions that need to flex and loosen standards? I don't think so. While he has a point with this, I do not think mastering code switching or meshing or SAE is inherently wrong. ((Which is addressed in Jenkin's points))
al world)" and AAL is "appropriate" only fohome, or t
Now THIS is where the issue is. While having mastery of academic language is important, it should not be at the expense of another language or dialect.
ue in AAL, and many left withAcademic English was "needed to live in
Is this wrong though? Even if it is not the preferred method of communication is it not valuable to have mastery of?
merican"). My researchVerbal Tradi
AAL= African American Language Need to keep these two acronyms in mind
A-¿A-frican American Language (AAL) speakers, who are often deemed"basic writers," have home literacy and language practices that preparethem for academic success in composition classrooms (Ampadu; C. Lee;
Not mastering Academic SAE = / = Literacy OR marker for success. Ties in to points made by both Young and Murillo and Schall about the standard english pushing others down.
Again, the genres inwhich students are asked to write should align withthe disciplines in which they are writing them. For ex-ample, in a science class, students might construct amini research paper for experiments they conduct. Inpreparing for this larger assignment, students mightfirst keep detailed lab notes listing their observa-tions and then provide their interpretations of thoseobservations.
WIll need to paraphrase this and attribute it correctly. But I think the poit is that students, to be prepard for collegeneedto be given a variety of challenges in the fields they will encounter in college, with varying levels of difficulty. From scholarly narratives to lab reports from a biology course, students need toat least have a glancing knowledge of the things they will be faced with.
elated, students should have opportunities to en-gage in both low-stakes and high-stakes writing assign-ments throughout the school day in a variety of genres
This I think is a key suggestion that is worth repeating in my own paper. Direct quote because it is succinct and does a good job. Ties in to next hi-lighted section which is part of this same argument
In particular, students need specific guidance inhow to access content from complex texts in all disci-plines through disciplinary-specific literacy instruc-tion
Summarized nicely. It is not enough to say "there are different kinds of papers, here is how they look" they have to be taught how to research for and how to construct them.
Yet, doing so drew on a skill set thatshe had not had the opportunity to develop, leaving herfeeling that she was at a disadvantage
Undeveloped skills from focusing on wrong information to pass down.
Ten students in-dicated that they struggled with thinking analytically,or comprehending, critiquing, and synthesizing ideasfrom complex texts
Again, if the pattern bears out over larger numebers, this means over HALF of students, especially or inparticular non-standard english speakers could be struggling with college.
Although Elizabeth’s situation of beingassigned a research paper but not taught how to actuallyconduct and report the research is an extreme exampleof the gaps in students’ preparation, it still representsthe knowledge, or lack thereof, that some students hadwhen they began their university careers
Could quote this directly. Succinctly said and supports my point
The lack of rigor thatMateo had experienced frustrated him. He felt as if histeachers had done him a disservice because he did notfeel adequately prepared for the demands of his collegeclasses, although he also admitted that he could haveput in more effort: “It’s kinda my fault, too, because ofnot putting the work into reading and writing.”
This is a key moment of clarity that ties into MY larger point. While academic institutions bear some responsibiliity, perhaps most of it, students must be willing to put in the work. HOWEVER----for them to do so, rigorous, truly "teaching" work must be provided by the teachers.
After their first semester of college, 12 of the 18 studentsreported that they felt unprepared for the literacy tasksexpected of them in college. Another three felt some-what prepared, and only three believed that they be-gan college ready to tackle the reading and writing thatthey encountered in their freshman year.
This is wild. Only 3 felt fully prepared for what was asked of them,and given the sample size it could just be part of the natural bell curve of studiousness. But the pattern holds true. School left MOST unprepared.
Of these 18 students, 17 identified as female andone as male. Sixteen of the students identified as Latinx,one as African American, and one as white. Fourteen ofthe students indicated that Spanish was their first lan-guage.
Ties Directly to Murillo and Schall as they were focused on spanish speaking areas in texas.
, in their initial interview, 12 ofthe 18 students identified as feeling unprepared.
That;s 2/3s of studentsnot feeling prepared for college. That's significant if the pattern holds across numbers and place.Other papers suggest it does.
Additionally, many first-generation college studentsbegin their academic careers as emergent bilinguals,learning English in school. As multilingual writersin high school, they have unique needs not often ad-dressed by their mainstream instructors, leaving themstruggling to fill in the gaps on their own
Ties into Murillo and Schall's point about their group in Texas. Similar problems with bilingualism.
When they are asked to write some-thing longer, it is often a five-paragraph essay followingan organizational structure provided by the teacher(Ferris & Hayes, 2019; Kiuhara et al., 2009). Just like thereading tasks assigned to students in high school, re-search has suggested that students are not learning howto construct discipline-specific texts or texts that askthem to explore topics and develop original arguments.
Ties in everything under this heading. But this touches on the first point that there are multiples forms of writing one will be made to use. Not just narrative composition, but things like lab reports. There are multiple forms of academic writing and high school is not preparing them at all for college, let alone dialects
He was not alone. In this article, I highlight theperceptions of 18 first-generation college students as theyreflected on their high school preparation for the literacytasks of college. Overall, students reported feeling unpre-pared for what was expected of them.
While a small sample size, it adds more weight than an individual accounting
ateo (all names are pseudonyms) graduatedfrom high school as the valedictorian. Yet, evenwith his top grades, he found that the literacydemands of college were much more rigorous than thoseof his high school. “I didn’t really learn how to write orread,” he said. “I would do all the assignments and justget it over with ’cause they were just really easy.
This directly ties into the idea of it being school that is the issue, not necessarily Enlish Literacy.
The theme that emerged most clearly was a belief thatgrowing up speaking Spanish hinders English litera-cy development.
Is this a biased? Or is this a structure of the system set up so that everyone is made to learn English?<br /> They are able to read and speak in Spanish, so it's not that they are lacking development, but may not have developed equal linguistic skills in both-----How can Bilingualism be taught without slowing the education of either?
Although mostparticipants began elementary school as home-languagespeakers of Spanish and Tex-Mex, few were encouragedto read and write these languages in school, even in so-called bilingual programs
This is where the English as de facto "lingua franca" is a hinderance. It does not have systems in place to help with developing 2 languages besdies one another and can often hinder one to learn English.
A majority of participants commented thathigh school classes were structured to the point of beingrepressive, that they were seldom asked to express theiropinions or feelings about what they were learning, andthat reading assignments in high school were uncon-nected to their experiences and interests. In addition,participants felt unprepared for the kinds of academicwriting tasks required in their college courses and forthe amount of reading expected of them as freshmen
The key point. High school does not prepare for college. It prepares for specific, standardized tests. Rote memorization vs learning HOW to think. This is something that extends beyond language barriers.
LUZ A. MURILLO isan associate professor of bilingualeducation, literacy, and reading inthe Department ofCurriculum and Instruction at the University of Illinoisat Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, USA; e-maillmurillo@illinois.edu.JANINE M. SCHALL isan associate professor intheDepartment of Bilingual and Literacy Studies at TheUniversity of Texas Rio Grande Valley, Edinburg, USA;e-mail janine.schall@utrgv.edu
Both have background in the field, making them reliable sources
We report findings under four themes: contrasts be-tween home and school literacy forms and practices,differences between high school and college as learningenvironments, linguistic discrimination experienced atschool, and the belief that being a Spanish speaker is abarrier to developing strong literacy skills in English
This mirrors again Dr. Young's piece in how people are raised speaking differently vs how they are expected to perform in school. As well as the shared linguistic discrimination, albeit for different reasons. (Dialect vs language barrier)
literacyin the casedevelopmentconcernof immigrant(Jiménezbyandcollegeetlanguage-al.,fresh-2015),Academicmen is a national concern (Jiménez et al., 2015),especially in the case of immigrant and language-minority youths
This is the key point, even if they get specific about demographic.
Rich out-of-school literacy practices, including reading and writingfor pleasure, continued through high school, althoughmany participants noted that their pleasure readinghad declined in college because of what they regardedas a heavy academic reading load.
This is important to note for the argument about Academia not being structured to help elevate.
Similarly, many students viewed bilingualism asa negative factor in terms of literacy developmen
This is odd. It is a known thing that people who learn 2 languages have healthier brain neural activity. It's Literally good for the brain to learn. But perhaps unrelated to this
At the same time, many students viewed Spanishand bilingualism as barriers to the development of aca-demic literacy. Thus, with respect to language, studentsexpressed some ofthe same deficit perspectives, includ-ing blaming Spanish-speaking students and families fornot knowing English and for home reading and writingin Spanish, that may have hindered their own literacyprogress in the first place
I am not sure what to write here. This feels like massive failure of educators and parents. Learning two languages is like a super power. It's sad to think people blame their bilinguialism as a barrier to success, and not an additional tool.
subtractive, English-only schooling, resulting in lan-guage loss and reduced access to the potential benefitsof biliteracy
Knowing Two languages is better than one in almost every professional and academic setting.
At all levels of education andthroughout students' educational trąjectories, curricu-lum and instruction for Mexican-origin students shouldaim to add literacy in English and in Spanish rather thansubtracting Spanish to add English
I would say this could apply to the dialect conversation from Dr. Young's piece as well. There should be structures in place to ensure people can use the english that is needed for academic purposes of an English speaking nation, AND preserve the language utility of the first, in this case, Spanish.
Students reported that the texts featured inhigh school were boring and that instruction focusednarrowly on test preparation. College reading, in con-trast, required interpretation, synthesis, and express-ing opinion to a degree not found in high school classes.Students expressed frustration that college instructorsoffered little concrete assistance for navigating collegetexts, other than exhorting them to "read carefully.
Another point for the argument of educational mismatch. High school is not preparing people for college, making college all that more difficult when it does not need to be.
Learning how to question and think is a critical part of the academic process, and waiting until college to begin it can only delay people's success.