On the other hand, the above could also be a subtractive factor. Since Luis is an “immigrant minority” student and school success is related to upward mobility, his family may push toward assimilation of the presumably white English speaking teacher’s culture. This may diminish his cultural supports within his own family and community and negatively affect his confidence and self-esteem. Furthermore, if his teacher is not culturally sensitive and lowers expectations for Luis’s learning because of his background, he may not get the “dynamic and agency-rich learning environments” (Rethinking the Word Gap, pg. 4)  he deserves. Finally, due to the value that his family holds for educational institutions, they may not question the teacher’s practices. 

 

One potential additive factor is Luis’ identity within large Spanish speaking community and strong cultural familial ties. This is a potential factor as it is up to the teacher to take the responsibility to act on the opportunity of having a large community to draw information from in order to incorporate diversity of cultural and ethnic backgrounds into the classroom which is another recommendation by the article mentioned above. The large community may be a push for the educator and school as a whole to train educators to embrace this community they work with if they aren’t already.

A subtractive factor related to Luis’ case is the abrupt transition to English-only instruction at school. As discussed in previous CSD courses, it is important to acknowledge linguistic differences and, where possible, utilize a student’s L1 to support their L2 learning. This drive towards English dominance will likely serve to underestimate Luis’ abilities and limit his ability to access the curriculum. Further, teachers’ negative attitudes towards bilingual children/families (like discussed in “Rethinking the Word Gap”) may decrease their expectations for Luis and in turn allow them to feel comfortable providing him a lesser quality of education.

Sadly, while working in California public schools, I can recount numerous cases of discrimination against children with similar backgrounds to Luis. These kids were often taken less seriously, and provided what I felt was a lower quality of education compared to their peers.

 

One subtractive factor that relates to Luis’ learning is his school and education system. Since Luis is only receiving instruction in English, this is taking away opportunities for him to continue growing his knowledge and language skills in Spanish. This will make it difficult for him to grow his literacy skills in either language. Another subtractive factor is the fact that Luis’ teachers are all monolingual English speakers. This will make it difficult to implement the five recommendations described in “Responding to Marginalization of Students of Color in K-12 Education”. Not only does this make it difficult for teachers to foster reciprocal relationships with Luis’ parents, but it also makes it difficult for them to ascertain and incorporate components of Luis’ culture into classroom learning. While I hope Luis’ school system is providing teachers with the training needed to incorporate diverse approaches to learning and critical thinking, it sounds like this is often not the case for the schools in our country.

References:
Paradis, Johanne; Genesee, Fred; Crago, Martha. Dual Language Development & Disorders (CLI) (p. 328). Brookes Publishing. Kindle Edition. 

 

References:
King, H. (2019, November 25). Responding to Marginalization of Students of Color in K-12 

Edication – Cognia – The Source. Cognia. http://source.cognia.org/issue-article/responding-marginalization-students-color-k-12-eduation/.

Paradis, J., Genesee, F., & Crago, M. B. (2021). Dual language development & disorders: a 

handbook on bilingualism and second language learning (3^rd edition). Paul H Brookes Publishing Co. 

As teachers use this approach, they need to become well versed at linguistic structures of the dialect and how those structures relate to MAE. As students learn the differences and similarities between AAE and MAE, they develop their metalinguistic awareness, which can be a powerful tool throughout their lives. Teachers can develop strategies that will reinforce the MAE needed for reading and writing in the academic environment without putting down AAE. In Washington and Seindenberg’s (2021) words, “adapting instruction and materials to encompass and embrace such variation reduces the load for both teachers and students, allowing them to reach their respective goals.” 

Washington, J.A., & Seidenberg, M.S.(2021, summer). Teaching reading to african american children: when home and school language differ. American Federation of Teachers. https://www.aft.org/ae/summer2021/washington_seidenberg

 

What I think the challenging step of this approach is to let the students understand the different patterns of the languages. Sometimes, their native languages are from a very different language system, and it will make them feel difficult to learn the language components and compare them correctly. For example, a Chinese student may feel confused when they try to learn the morphemes like the affixes and prefixes.

 

Washington, J. (2020, August 3). NAVIGATING THE LINGUISTIC LANDSCAPE WITH JULIE WASHINGTONThe Windward Institute. https://www.thewindwardschool.org/the-windward-institute/read/julie-washington-linguistic-landscape-equity-access