Blog Entry 3
For this entry, I decided to interview my mentor teacher, Mrs. Martinez, who works at Pilgrim Academy. I have known her for approximately 2 months, and we have become quite close. I find myself texting her like I would my very close friends. In the short time span that I have known her, I have learned a great deal from her and I look forward to the rest of my time with her this school year! Reflection: Although my interview with my teacher was not as long as was required, I feel like I got a lot of valid, and resourceful information from it. Her answers supported a lot of what I have learned and read about in class. She told me previously (not mentioned in the interview recording) that she had taken Spanish as a foreign language since she was in the 5 th grade. She is now currently fluent in Spanish and can hold up conversations and understand native speakers. This being said, she still struggles with some terminology and reading and writing it. ...
Hey Jenny,
ReplyDeleteBeing Vietnamese I can relate to some of things you had to deal with growing up. Language barriers can definitely make it tough to when communicating with family and sometimes even with friends. Hearing about your path from being an ESL student to now almost graduating was very satisfying because it feels as though your journey is near completion. I am interested in hearing about how your growth in English and Vietnamese (also maybe French) during the end of your high school years and to the present time. Have you taken any Vietnamese courses or were you taught only at home from your parents how to read/write/speak in Vietnamese? Also, how did you fulfill your foreign language requirement at UH or did you not have one?
Besides those questions I would like to say that your story is very inspiring, and I wish you the best of luck as you go forward in life.
Hi Jason!
DeleteVietnamese people have different experiences with the Vietnamese and English language and I enjoy hearing about them. I agree that language barriers can make it hard to communicate with family and friends sometimes. For example, when I speak to my parents or my grandparents’, there are some words I have to say in English because I do not know the Vietnamese word for it because it is not a common word I use when speaking to them. My growth in English has gotten extremely better and my growth in Vietnamese has also gotten better. I speak to my parents, as well as my family, frequently so the language is well-practiced and used every day. French, on the other hand, has diminished and I still remember certain words, vocabulary, and grammar, but I do not recall how to speak in sentences. I did not take any Vietnamese courses because I lived in a town that was predominantly Caucasian and Hispanic only. I only learned to read/write/speak at home from my parents. I was not required to fulfill a foreign language requirement at UH, but had to take more science courses instead. Thanks for commenting on my blog and your well wishes!
Hi Jenny! It's so cool to know that we are both Vietnamese! I was also raised speaking Vietnamese and learned English through school. I also was confused since I was so young being forced to speak two languages not knowing why. I am also surprised because I am a part French as well AND was going to major in Biology for nursing my first year AND business after that! Wow we have so much in common! Going back to when you talked about going back and forth between languages reminded me on self-regulation and how you had to take control on when to use the language. "Autonomy, ' the capacity to control one's learning' and self-regulation is a key ingredient of autonomy" (Brown & Lee, 2015, p. 74). This kind of relates how we have to control our own learning instead of being forced back and forth. Being forced and pressured to switch back and forth confused us a lot while growing up! Thank you for sharing your wonderful and surprisingly relatable story! I enjoyed your cute pictures as well!
ReplyDeleteHi Julie!
DeleteWow! It was great getting to know more about you and reading that we have so much in common! I think you made a great reference to Brown and Lee in that I did have to use autonomy to control what languages I spoke at school and at home. I had to speak specific English specifically at school so that I could get my education, as well as communicate with my teachers and peers. Yes! I totally agree that going back and forth between languages was super confusing as a child, but I am now grateful that my parents taught me how to keep up with my Vietnamese culture and language. I think that it is a great quality to have to be able to speak another language, especially in the education profession because you never know what students may speak Vietnamese and need assistance. Thank you for watching and commenting on my blog, and I look forward to learning more about you as we learn together in this class!
Hello Jenny, Great video! Very interesting to see how you mastered two completely different languages and basically all on your own! I can relate to this experience as well because I grew up with Spanish and English- two languages as well. When I worked at Kids R Kids learning academy I also gained a lot of experiences with students that would only speak a certain language at home. It was so amazing to see them learn English at daycare! After only just a couple of years of attending the school, the children learned English and were even teaching their mono-lingual parents English. It seems that you have learned to speak English and Vietnamese through a strategies based instruction. Through daycare, perhaps it is that you became aware of how you were learning 2 different sets of languages, and that you regulated which language is which. (Brown & Lee, 2015, p. 51)
ReplyDeleteHi Valerie!
DeleteI think it is awesome that you are able to speak another language, and especially Spanish! Living in Texas, it is very useful to speak Spanish because so many people are Spanish, or speak Spanish, since we are so close to the Mexican border. I think that your experience at the Kids R Kids learning academy is truly wonderful and impactful, in that you were able to see kids grow and learn to speak a second language. I agree that I learned through a strategies-based instruction through my day care. I had to regulate which ones to use during which times and differentiate between the two. Thank you for commenting on my blog and for taking the time out of your day to give me your input!
Hello, Jenny!
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to meet you albeit through a screen. I think it is so amazing when children from a monolinguistic household learn another language basically by themselves. As someone who also learned English practically by themselves, I completely understand how confusing and difficult it was the first few years of learning a new language while at home, a completely different language was spoken. According to Brown and Lee (2015), in order to become a successful learner, a child should learn how to learn and therefore become autonomous. Since you taught yourself English, you became autonomous in order to learn the best way you could learn English.
Learning French sounds great especially since you are part French. I did not have to take any foreign language classes in high school, so I do not really know how most of the classes are taught. I guess you can't really learn how to speak a new language if you don't know the proper format, so it makes sense that they put so much emphasis on the grammar part of a language. However, I'm sorry to hear you were not really taught how to really hold a conversation with someone who is more fluent.
Hi Erika!
DeleteI also think it is so amazing that children are able to learn another language, even while living in a monolinguistic home. I wouldn’t say that I learned by myself, but that I was submerged in the language through my day care and elementary school. I also had help from my ESL teacher, but I did have to learn to go back and forth between the two languages and remind myself when to use what language and not to mix them up. I think you are right in that I did learn to become autonomous in order to learn the best way that I could learn English. I think it is interesting that you didn’t have to take any foreign languages in high school since I know it is required nowadays. I think learning French was a great experience and although I did not retain much of the language, I have a goal to try and learn it again and pick back up where I left off! Thank you for commenting on my blog!
Hi Jenny!
ReplyDeleteI really like how you put your personality into your video, which made it really fun and interesting to watch. I can see why you felt confused between the two languages. When you were barely developing your Vietnamese, you were exposed to English at a very young age. In contrary, I never really felt confused between Vietnamese and English as I used it interchangeably. Also, my parents would settle in places where we would be surrounded by a huge Vietnamese community. I grew up seeing and hearing Vietnamese through street signs, markets, and even restaurant menus. It’s so interesting that you are one-eighth French! I learned from my father that a lot of Vietnamese people spoke French back in the days because there was a time in history (the mid-1800s) that the French had colonized Vietnam. In high school, I learned Spanish instead of French. You were mainly taught through the Grammar Translation Method, where the class “focus on grammatical rules as the basis for translating from the second to native language” (Brown & Lee, 2015, p. 18). This showed that there was more emphasis on vocabulary and grammar than oral production, which doesn’t allow you to apply your knowledge to the real world. All in all, I enjoyed your video and find it neat how you would like to open up your own boutique someday.