ENTRY 4: REFLECTION

Reflection

Although I was once of those students who verified and received English Language Learner program support in high school, I have experienced and understand obstacles of ELL students but before taking this course my knowledge of understanding and teaching ELL is so limited. I had not expected that second language acquisition had so much to it. Three and half months passed by so fast. Although that period of time is not long, but it has brought many useful knowledge that help me to become a good teacher for my students and especially for my English Language Learners. From the readings, videos, assignments and blogs each gave me a large amount of information about Second Language Acquisition and each one of them is a piece of the puzzle; they connected together to create a big picture of Second Language Acquisition. The knowledge that I have gained in this course, I can apply it to my career as an educator who guide students to achieve academic success.

As I mentioned about puzzle pieces of this class, one of the most beneficial pieces would be the blog. It gave me the opportunity to knowing my classmates, others’ experiences and making connections between theories we learned and real-world situations. I feel it very interesting to learn from each other and personal experiences in the field of education. Each individual is unique so their individual’s learning or teaching experiences are very variable. The blog allowed me to watching/reading all my classmate’s interviews, reflections and giving/ receiving feedback. Definitely, there is always something great to learn from each blog. In this semester, my most favorite blog is Blog Entry 3, interview a Foreign Language/Second Language/Bilingual teacher or professor. The teaching experience and strategies of the teachers have shared in each interview are very valuable to me who will be a brand-new teacher the upcoming school year.

In second language acquisition, there are many factors that influence an individual’s L2 learning experience. According to Ortega (2013, p. 9), “Among these, the most important and well-studied sources of universal influence are age, mother tongue, environment and cognition.” During my student teaching, I have the opportunity to interact with some students who have no motivation; it leads to their reluctance to acquire knowledge/ lesson. I believe that the most effective factors that helps a learner learn more effectively is motivation. As an educator, I would like to be the one who inspires, motivates and be there for my students. I want my students to know that I really care about them especially my ELL students. To achieve the goal, my first step is getting to know my students; building a positive relationship between me and my students is a fundamental aspect of quality teaching and student learning. Next step, I would like to create a safety and comfortable classroom because students need to feel safe in order to learn. I am also would like to including differentiation in content base on students’ learning styles and interest so that my students appear to be more engaging in their learning.

Interview with Mr. Tran

Interview link:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=16kzqnjdET2RFCY6xD9A46P8vtOAFu_xV

For this interview, I was lucky to interview a teacher at Stevenson Middle School where holds a rich history of academic, cultural excellence and they are one of the top schools in district. His name is Kelvin Tran eighth-grade Algebra 1 and teaching bilingual students. His students’ native language mostly is Spanish and some Vietnamese. During the interview, Mr. Tran had mention about many researches about age as a big factor in learning second language. He said younger L2 do much better, they attend thing better. According to Ortega, learners who began acquiring the L2 before a certain age, which these studies locate to be around puberty, will tend to exhibit intuitions that are very close to those of native speakers (Ortega, 2009, pg.19).I asked Mr. Tran to give me some example of teaching strategies to help my future ELLs students. He emphasizes the benefits of using visual in teaching benefit to ELLs students. Visual technique provides a different form of explanation and provides the students with information that they may not have understood if it was presented to them in written or spoken form. Ortega also had mentioned, “the preferred sensory learning styles of ESL and EFL learners, such as visual, auditory, kinaesthetic/tactile and group/individualistic orientation towards learning.” (Ortega, 2009, pg.207). Mr. Tran also mentioned that the students speak their native language are not make any behavior issues in his class, they’re well behave and they’re still very shy and not a lot of talking during his class. In my opinion, an open/friendly classroom environment will provide some extra opportunities for ELLs students to feel comfortable sharing their ideas or asking questions during class.Language barriers are a barrier to learning and understanding the lesson content so it’s very important for me as a teacher to provide different strategies of learning and extra support for my ELLs students. There are many great teaching techniques/ strategies for that purpose and I learn many great things that I can apply to my future classroom via this interview.

Reference

Ortega, L. (2009). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Hodder Education.

ENTRY 2: INTERVIEW WITH HUY NINH

My interview video link:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sE5Lsy95g0vHoJQdXEMTRqLAD4n8k40v/view?usp=sharing

For my second blog entry, I decided to interview my younger-brother, Huy Ninh. Even though we live together, I never really talked to my brother about his experience learning English as the second language. Our parents do not know English so it was harder for us to learn English. Usually, our conversations are in Vietnamese so it’s a little bit awkward for me to interview him in English. 

According to Ortega, (2014, p.6) “Most people learn additional languages from a mixture of both naturalistic and instructed experiences.” For younger age, I think there are more naturalistic than older age. Huy started learning English since fifth grade at the age 10. According to Ortega (2009), children acquiring their first language complete the fear within a biological window of four to six years of age (pg.12). So, my brother already has a good L1 foundation at the time he starts learn L2. Although he started learning the second language at the age of 10, it was easier than me when I was 16. Ortega (2009) said, “younger starters were clearly better than adult starters” (p.18).

At the beginning of his journey learning English, he placed in ESL classes and spent 2-3 years in ESL programs, then he went to regular classes in 7^th grade. According to Ortega, “he five environmental ingredients that together contribute to (but do not guarantee) optimal L2 learning are: acculturated attitudes, comprehensible input, negotiated interaction, pushed output, and a capacity, natural or cultivated, to attend to the language code, not just the message” (p.79). I think his teachers did a great job of teaching him because he was about to enter the university he wished. As a future educator, I would like to focus and help ELLs students so that they can be success in their future as well.

Reference

Ortega, L. (2009). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Hodder Education.

ENTRY 1: SELF INTRODUCTION

Hello everyone- xin chào tất cả mọi người. My name is Quynh Ninh. I am a senior at University of Houston- College of Education and my major is Teaching and Learning. Since childhood, my dream is becoming a teacher and right now my dream is about come true.

1st Blog Entry Video: