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I speak English and Spanish. I learned English as my primary language and spoke only English until I was 18 years old. I began learning Spanish when I was 14 years old in my high school Spanish class. I started to actually speak it in college when I was 18 years old and chose to pursue it as one of my majors. I can now speak it with advanced proficiency, but I would not say that I am 100% fluent. I will elaborate on more of linguistic development in the following slides and posts.

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Factors that Contributed to my Language Development

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Factors that Contributed to my Language Development

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In the following slides, I will touch on some of the many factors that have impacted my linguistic repertoire today. The factors that I will discuss include the following: family background and race/ethnicity; place of living (one or more regions or countries), education, and residence (urban, suburban, rural); and occupation.

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My mom and dad had the greatest impact on my language development in my early years. They are both monolingual English speakers. My mother grew up in Canton, OH, and my father grew up in Minnesota before moving to Troy, OH in his preteen years.

Ethnically, I am mostly German and Swedish, along with a mix of other European ethnicities. I have attached a video that discusses the immigration to Minnesota in the 1800s. Racially, I identify as white. Unfortunately, my family does not have any tangible cultural or linguistic ties to our ethnic background.

I have been told stories about how the first immigrant from my dad's side, Diedrich Bohmbach, came over to the United States to escape being recruited in the Prussian War because his brothers, uncles, and father had been killed. The story, as I have heard it, was that his mother did not want to lose another son, so she told him to get on the boat to America when he was 16 years old. He went to Minnesota to farm, and never saw his family again. When he arrived, he refused to speak any more German as a way to declare that he was no longer Prussian, and only spoke and taught English to his children. Diedrich Bohmbach's decision to his home abandon his home language and only speak English has certainly had a profound impact on my family's linguistic history.

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They Chose Minnesota: Immigration to the North Star State

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Above is a timeline I created on Canva that highlights where I have lived. I will elaborate below on the places that I believe had a profound impact on my linguistic development. 

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Places I've Lived, Types of Residences, and Education

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Places I've Lived, Types of Residences, and Education

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Late 1997-2001

I lived in Germany from ages 1-3. My family moved to Germany because my father was in the Air Force. Because we mostly interacted with people from the Air Force base, my brother (who was born there in 1999) and I did not learn much German. I remember practicing German phrases and learning songs in German and French, but it did not profoundly impact my linguistic repertoire.

2001-2015 - Education

I lived in Troy, Ohio for these years and attended the public schools for the entirety of my time. I would describe where I grew up as a rural suburb of Dayton. In school, I only learned English until I was 14 years old. Most of my classmates were monolingual English-speaking students, though there were some Japanese students who were ESL. I remember learning a few basic Japanese greetings.

In high school, I started to learn Spanish. While I was learning the grammar rules and did well in my high school Spanish classes, I barely spoke any Spanish at all because we were rarely (if ever) required to speak.

In the summer of 2014, I went on a school trip to Europe. We visited many countries including Germany, Switzerland, Austria, and a few more. It was during this trip that I realized that populations in many other countries of the world are multilingual. I questioned and became a bit disillusioned with the monolingualism of the United States, and I credit this travel experience to being one of my major motivators to taking my Spanish learning more seriously.

2015-2019 - Education

I continued developing my linguistic abilities in English and Spanish during college. I attended Wheaton College in Illinois. I graduated in 2019 with a double major in Spanish and Economics.

Wheaton, Illinois was a true suburb of Chicago. When I arrived there, I realized that my hometown was probably more rural than a suburb. Wheaton College is also an evangelical Christian school, so I was introduced to a lot of new cultural and linguistic norms in English that I had not previously been privy to. For example, people often referred to parts of their life as "seasons" of their life or they would say things about "guarding their heart" when referencing protecting themselves in a relationship. I learned that "Christianese" was a term for this new jargon I was hearing regularly.

I also continued to develop my academic language skills in English as I was expected to produce college-level oral and written presentations in my general education and economics classes.

As far as linguistic development in Spanish, I remember that I was first required to actually speak Spanish during my Spanish 201 class freshman year. I realized that my Spanish speaking was at a much lower level than that of my classmates in the same class as I was. Though I struggled with speaking, I did have a reasonable command of the more basic grammar rules (present tense conjugation) and could read some texts. I was determined to continue my Spanish learning because I wanted to be bilingual. As I continued through my Spanish major, I became more passionate about not only learning the Spanish language, but also continuing delve into the content that was discussed in my Spanish classes including (but certainly not limited to) the impact of US foreign policy on Latin America, the impact of the United Fruit Company/banana republics, the history of immigration policy in the US, and the indigenous groups throughout Latin America.

Fall 2018 - Education

While I spoke Spanish and engaged in meaningful content through my coursework, living with a host family in Costa Rica was a huge milestone for my language development in Spanish. While in Costa Rica, I studied in San Jose for the bulk of my time. In Costa Rica, we were taught to pretty much always use "usted" when talking to someone. I remember being so confused when my host mom would ask me "Como le fue?" after my classes. I was wondering "how was what? And for who?" Being in Costa Rica taught me how to utilize lots of colloquialisms that I had not picked up on in a classroom setting. For the last two weeks of my time there, I lived with an indigenous woman, who was Bribri, on an organic farm. I remember having to take the bus to Limon (about 2-3 hours away from San Jose) and just being instructed to get off at the last stop. When I arrived, I waited for about 4 hours, my ride was nowhere to be found. Having had my phone stolen a week or so prior, I had to gather up the courage to ask a nearby store owner to use their phone so that I could call my program manager. When I was able to do this successfully with my linguistic skills in Spanish, I felt empowered and proud of how far I had come. During this experience, I was forced to figure out how to order food, use the bus system, solve other problems I encountered, and build relationships with my host families in Spanish. I am eternally grateful for this opportunity.

August 2019-March 2020

During this time period, I lived near Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico, an urban area. I taught in Tlajomulco, Jalisco, which was a more rural area.

In Mexico, I learned how to build relationships and manage conflict in Spanish. I learned lots of Mexican slang, figured out how to rent my first apartment, and made friends in Spanish. I credit this as my most impactful linguistic experience in my Spanish development.

I remember using "usted," as I had in Costa Rica with everyone, with a group of people who were my age, and they all thought that that was hilarious. This, among, many other missteps and miscommunications, helped me develop my linguistic abilites.

July 2020-Present

My language skills in English and Spanish have been profoundly impacted by my time teaching in Cleveland first at an immersion school, and now at a CMSD IB school. I will dive more into this information on the occupation slide.

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In this section, I am going to discuss how my occupation (teacher) has impacted my linguistic development.

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After graduating college, I taught English as a second language in Mexico to students' whose L1 was Spanish. This time allowed me to development my linguistic skills in Spanish as I was living in Mexico. It also familiarized me more with how to teach English.

In 2020, I began teaching 2nd grade at an immersion school in Cleveland. I taught math and Spanish in Spanish to students whose L1 was English (apart from 1-2 students whose L1 was Spanish). This occupation helped me continue to develop my skills in Spanish as I was teaching in Spanish and communicating with families in Spanish. I learned many new phrases while teaching on Zoom like "Prende el microfono" or "Ponte en silencio." I also learned lots of new terms for how to teach math. For example, a big second grade standard is adding and subtracting with regrouping. So, I learned to use phrases like agrupar and desagrupar and talk about place value.

In 2022, I transitioned to a Cleveland public school. The previous school was a charter. Since switching positions, I have noticed that my Spanish skills do not come quite as naturally (despite still regularly communicating with parents in Spanish) as they did when teaching at my previous school, so I have sought out opportunities to practice with friends and travel.

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In this section, I will discuss the idiolects I speak in English and Spanish. 

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English

I grew up in the Midwest near Dayton, Ohio. Therefore, my English idiolect is heavily impacted by this region. Some examples of words or sounds typical of my idiolect might be saying "ope" when you are about to run into something or someone or if there is a somewhat close call, leaving out the /t/ sound a bit when saying words like Dayton or Wheaton (Day-in, Whea-in). I have also been told that I say "bagel" differently than other people, but some of my friends from my hometown say it the same way I do. I say it like "bay-goal." I also say pop instead of soda refer to people as "you guys" instead of you all or y'all.

I also did some research on the stereotype of "Midwestern nice." According to an article from The Economist called "Is there any truth to the idea of Midwestern nice?", Midwestern nice can be defined as "apologising involuntarily when scooting past someone, both to warn of your presence and to express regret for any inconvenience your mere existence may have caused. It is greeting people as they step into a lift and wishing them well as they leave. It is a strong preference for avoiding confrontation." While this is certainly not the case for all people in the Midwest, some Midwestern cultural norms have been prevalent in my life. For example, saying sorry when simply walking past someone, and having some people-pleasing tendencies has impacted the words that I use on a regular basis and, therefore, my language development.

Link to article: Is there any truth to the idea of “Midwestern nice”? (economist.com)

Spanish

As I mentioned in the section about places I have lived, my Spanish is heavily impacted by my time in Costa Rica and Mexico. My experience of hearing people think it was funny to have used usted (and other experiences using usted and people asking me to use tu because it made them feel old), I almost always use tu when speaking Spanish, except when speaking to the parents of my students. I also use words some that are used more in Mexico such as "pluma" for pen, "va" as a way to say okay, and "que chido" or "que padre" to say cool.

I would also say that my Spanish vocabulary is strong with terms related to education and travel because those are the situations in which I have used it the most. There are other situations where I understand very little of the conversations because I am unfamiliar the vocabulary being used. Being a Spanish learner continues to challenge and enrich my linguistic repertoire all the time!

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Reflecting on my own linguistic experiences gives me more insight about how my current and future ESL students feel about learning a new language. When learning Spanish, I remember all the fear and anxiety I would have when I had to solve a new problem or manage a certain situation in my L2. Even when at a level of Spanish when I considered myself near or at proficiency for the situation I was in, there was/is often a small feeling of anxiety or insecurity. I have had to be brave in pursuit of my learning, and I know that this is only a fraction of the bravery that my students have to muster as they enter into an entirely new school setting and culture.

I can also imagine based off of my own experiences that, even if a student seems to effectively communicate in English in some situations, they might not yet have the language and vocabulary to fully express themselves in other situations. Being mindful of this can help me, as their teacher, meet their needs with a posture of empathy, understanding, and humility.