Blog 4-EDU 411 Advocating for ELLs

I have worked as a teacher at Head Start for 6 years. In the past three years the my classroom has completely transformed. When I started teaching I worked with 34 English speaking families. I now work with 5 Arabic speaking families, 2 Swahili speaking families, 3 Kirundi speaking families, and 24 English speaking families. The families that speak languages other than English have very limited English language skills, yet the services I am to provide for them are identical to the services I provide for the English speaking families. From the first year working with these families I became an advocate for them. It was easy to tell that we were ill prepared for the influx of refugee families speaking languages we had no support services for and that is where my journey began. I reached out to the families, visiting their homes when I knew older siblings would be present to help me speak with parents and writing notes to send home that would allow them to take the note to someone else for translation or to have a child translate and help them respond. I invited them to come to the classrooms, come on field trips, attend meetings encouraging them to be as active as possible in their child's education. I encouraged them to continue to speak their native language at home but also to take ESL classes. And I switched my specialization here at Kendall from Special Education to ESL. I don't anticipate that this trend will reverse itself and as an educator I feel it is crucial that I am able to work effectively with these students and families.

We send home surveys at the end of the year for parents to fill out asking them to rate our program and give feedback. Several of my ESL families sent back their surveys. Their comments were very similar; thank you for teaching my child, thank you for teaching my child English, please be patient while we learn English, we try very hard to learn. This is the same message I hear at meetings and conferences.    

This year I have had my first sibling of one of my first refugee families, so I have had the privilege of teaching two of their children. This family received a Habit House this year and I have been volunteering on Saturdays at the construction site. As I have been working, I have been able to serve as a go between with the family, who is more comfortable with me now, and the construction team, who are unfamiliar with working with ESL adults. I can help the crew communicate with the family because I am familiar with them and also I understand how to communicate, that I have to use basic vocabulary and gestures and patience. It has given me more insight into what this process is like for these families and how difficult it really is.

These families need to be empowered in multiple ways. First they need to learn English so that they can support their children's education. Next they need help in understanding that they have rights and certain guarantees in this country, which most likely was not the case in their country. We need to extend a hand to them in educating them, as well as their children, and this often means thinking way outside the box because of the language barriers. Most importantly we need to be vocal about what these children need in our classrooms.

 

Blog 3 EDU 411 - Advocating for ELL's

These past two weeks I was able to meet with a family resource worker, a site supervisor, health and wellness coordinator, and the special needs coordinator for our Head Start program. I observe these people on a daily basis in the field and we meet as a team once a month to discuss family situations, student needs, and other issues. They all have struggles working with our ELL families that are similar to those we see in the classroom environment. One common thread we see is cultural barriers. Head Start is unique in its social service piece and in the program we work to see that all children have physicals, dental exams, dental treatment as needed, and if there are nutritional concerns or health issues we work closely with the families to see that services are provided.   I have one child in my class that failed her vision screening and we have referred the family to a clinic for further testing. However, dad refuses to take her because he does not want his daughter wearing glasses. He also informed us that he is on a strike from doctors. In the team meeting, one of the administrators said “They are in America now. They chose to come here. They need to change.” And there you have it… this is where the struggle comes to a head. Two opposing views, neither side wanting to give in, and a huge communication gap that none of us are equipped to fill. Heavy sigh.

                Assessment materials that accommodate diverse learners can make a huge difference, even in the case of vision screening. Our screening is done with English alphabet symbols, by English speaking screeners, that the children are unfamiliar with. This child is Arabic speaking. The symbols were unfamiliar to her and her vision may be fine, it could very well be the setting and use of unfamiliar materials to screen. When I try to present the point of lack of background knowledge I am met with a lack of background knowledge by the adults. Each encounter I have with these situations just proves to me that there really is a need for advocacy in so many areas for our ELL’s.

                A little additional experience I have had the past two weeks has been volunteering for Habitat for Humanity. One of my African families has qualified for a Habitat home and I am volunteering to help them reach their 300 hours. They don’t have family here and a select number of community members that are able to help. I have been working four hour shifts the past two Saturdays. The parents have been working both weekends also and they have brought two or three male friends with them each time.  The crew in charge of the home will dictate to volunteers what needs to be done and then we just do it. Well, the crew is obviously unaware and unprepared for the language barrier. They will ask one of the men to get a ladder or bring them plywood and a dialogue of hand gestures, body language, and pointing follows until they get it right. After a few of these encounters, the crew just starts avoiding the volunteers because it is hard, they are on a time schedule, and they don’t understand. When I am there I serve as a go between, demonstrating, or guiding, the men so they can follow the directions. The father wants so badly to work on his home that he spent half of last Saturday sweeping the cement foundation. And anytime they see me (I have had children from all of the families in my class over the past three years) going to move or lift something they all come to tell me no and do the work.  Last week I spoke to the two leaders while I was out there. I told them which of the men spoke the most English and explained that even when they say “yes” or nod, they may still not understand. If they could show them once, then the men would be able to do it as needed.  I pointed out how the home owner was doing anything to stay busy and work on his home. I know this doesn’t directly relate to my thesis about assessment with ELL’s, but it all relates because the lack of understanding permeates the schools as well, even to the highest levels of administrators. And it is heartbreaking.  Advocacy is the answer, patience will be needed, it will take time, but the effort is worthwhile.