10/24/17

The Fu chapters were very illuminating in terms of how she addresses specific ways in which to engage emergent bilingual students as a teacher that essentially speaks exclusively in English. Even beginning to try and consider ways to cross the language barriers and reach these students, as well as considering and trying to find or develop strategies to empower them to use their home language AND become proficient writers of English feels like an extremely daunting task. Fu speaks at length about the emphasis that should be placed on allowing students to engage material and think, brainstorm, develop ideas, and even write in their native languages first, allowing them to synthesize material in whatever way is going to be most beneficial for them, and then encouraging them to translate those ideas later into English. She also speaks about how teachers who do not speak the native language of their students can go about assessing work that they may not be able to understand, which was essentially giving them credit for the effort they put into the work.

I understand the validity of this approach, as it feels like the only option a teacher in that situation would have, but to me it seems like it still shortchanges these emergent bilingual students in their proficiency as writers of both their native language and English. I say this because she says that students who aren't proficient writers in their native language will struggle to develop as writers of English, and she suggests that if students have these literacy issues that they should be first taught to develop these skills in their native language before asking them to move into English. But if they aren't proficient writers of their native language I will never be able to pinpoint that issue if I can't understand their writing. And if I can't understand their writing then I cannot help them develop writing skills in their native language. And if they aren't proficient writers in their native language then asking them to be proficient in English seems cruel. I don't have answers for how to solve these problems, but they seemed like areas that could have been unpacked more, at least to clarify for teachers like me who feel ill-equipped to teach emergent bilinguals.

In the Pahl / Roswell chapter, the section about identity stood out to me the most. It addresses how students make meaning by taking their own ideas and perspectives and infusing them into whatever they are writing about; and this seems to make perfect sense. However, we recently discussed the Common Core's approach to "close reading" as defined and illustrated by David Coleman, a chief author of the standards. The CC's interpretation of "close reading" means for students to engage the text and the text only, leaving out the contextual factors and especially leaving out any response or interpretation that student's may have to the text. Not only is this disturbing because it speaks directly against what Pahl / Roswell have to say about how students read and write according to their identities, but it is disturbing because this is the framework that the education system in America is built around. I thoroughly enjoyed the Pahl/ Roswell chapter, but I couldn't help but think about how those in control of standards and curriculum would likely disregard their theory.