1. This chapter was a carry over from the previous week discussing language. While I thought last week was a little bit more clearer, this weeks work did correlate after I read it twice. Transitioning from reading language to actually speaking it was the final connection I think that could have been made. I never thought of such things as slip of the tongue errors being a cognitive process or break down of a cognitive process until reading this text. The chapter went into more depth about terms that were mentioned in last weeks readings. Discourse and narrative being the two main ones. From there it transitioned from writing back to bilingualism.
2. One thing that I was confused about was the transitioning of chapter 10. Why did it go from talking about speech to briefly talking about writing, back to speech (acquisition of second language and profeiciency)? From what we have learned throughout this semester, this caused interference that hindered my ability to fully comprehend what was going on in the reading. LOL (Gotta love application)
3. How do you apply this in your work? The beginnings of my teaching career, I started off in two bilingual schools. It is very interesting to see the dynamics of bilingualism at work, especially with Hispanics. I believe that them learning both languages actually makes them better speakers. It is amazing how they will be having a whole conversation in Spanish and drop in the occassional english words. I encourage this learning for I think it makes better students.
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Hi William! I didn't know you had that experience working in two bilingual schools... that's cool. I think children who are exposed to a second language early in life will experience many benefits. I would include in those benefits a different perception of the world in general. I mentioned in a post about children raised in other parts of the world being exposed to two languages in the home and how in America we often don't recognize this reality.
ReplyDeleteI have long wished that my son's school district would implement a Spanish curriculum, but unfortunately they do not see the value in such a program.
Hope you are well.
I would think that bilingual students have great communication skills as well. They definitely benefit from exposure to both languages and I'm sure culture as well. Did a lot of the students you work with grow up learning two languages, or did they choose to learn a second as they got older. I don't work in the upper grades, but I know Spanish was an option at my high school, and I would do it all over again if I could. I learned a lot, but never really had the chance to apply it by speaking fluently with a native speaker. I think if I would have stuck with it I could have done a lot more. Instead I have kind of forgotten a lot of the vocab and grammar rules.
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