Entry 4: Reflection

            After taking this Second Language Acquisition course, I feel a lot more knowledgeable about second language and especially in how to teach my English Language Learners in the classroom. I had no idea there was so much information regarding SLA and my lack of knowledge on the topic drove me to want to understand it much more. My initial thoughts about second language changed each time I learned something new.

For instance, my knowledge was expanded in learning how age doesn’t necessarily play a huge factor when learning about a second language as there have been findings that adults have an advantage over children depending on when the critical period ends (Ortega, 2013, p. 16). With my acquired knowledge on SLA, I can make my classroom more welcoming to ELLs and understand what would be appropriate to teach them and what will help get them to flourish and succeed. Mainly, my perspective changed a lot about this topic as learned more each week in class and it will help me plan out lessons more effectively for my future ELLs. I know now what is in the best interest of those students and what types of factors contribute to their learning process.

Also, something that I learned from this class that I want to ensure my students have would be motivation. Motivation combined with the help of antecedents (attitude, integrativeness, orientations, social support, etc.) make it utmost effective (Ortega, 2013, p. 172). I think it is important for the students to be driven intrinsically as to help further develop their positive attitudes towards learning a second language. According to Ortega (2013), students should be able to develop, “positive attitude towards the L2 speakers and culture, and general high interest in learning foreign languages” (p. 187).

      I really enjoyed creating blog entries and I thought that they were a great way to learn more from my peers, besides just from the textbook. I found this to be an interesting and fun way to interact with my peers and not only teach them something about Second Language Acquisition but learn from them as well. I believe that reading all the information about SLA directly from the textbook and then trying to remember key points is not as effective. I felt like through the video blog entries, I was able to learn more about each of the topics we covered in class. This student-centered activity was probably my most favorite we have done this semester and I never had a class that asked us to create blog entries like this one. However, a downfall I have noticed is that not everyone would get enough comments on their blog. I think there should have been a statement stating that if there are already ___ amount of comments on a person’s blog, they should go find someone else to comment on. I think this would be great to implement for future classes going onward to help even out the comments, so everyone will get an equal, fair amount.

      Overall, SLA is something that I think that every teacher needs to be aware of and understand so that all students are able to achieve greatness. How else will teachers be able to make the classroom warm and inviting for ELL students and have them feel comfortable in that environment? I am glad that I had the opportunity to take this course during my first semester of Student Teaching I. It really has helped me understand how to better educate my ELL students in the classroom and utilize the information I learned from this class.

Entry 3: Second Language Teacher Interview

 

Reflection 

 For this assignment, I was able to interview a bilingual teacher in Alief Independent School District named, Natalia Stewart. She teaches 2nd-grade dual language in Spanish and English. Also, she mentioned in the beginning that she teaches mostly in English so her students will able to write and speak well in English by the time they reach the 4th grade.

In one of my questions, I asked about motivation and what was effective in her classroom. Ms. Stewart told me that she helps motivate her students by explaining to them that they are in a safe classroom environment. Through this, they can express their thinking and not feel like they are being judged. She does her best to help limit that anxiety that students can feel when placed in situations they aren’t comfortable in. Ms. Stewart does her best to increase L2 motivation by helping her students have positive attitudes from learning a new language. According to Ortega (2013), attitudes towards the L2 and its speakers will contribute to increased or diminished L2 motivation” (p. 174). In her classroom, she makes sure there is as much peer interaction involved so her students can also gain more from others when speaking in English. I found this to be quite interesting learning about what types of strategies (e.g. Think-pair-share) she used to have them interact in her classroom. She also makes sure to do a lot of positive interactions with her students as well as reinforcement. It goes along with what is mentioned in our text that helps positive attitudes prevail in her classroom in which behaviors, “…are rewarded and modeled for the learner in the communities in which he or she participates” (Ortega, 2013, p. 174).

Also, I asked her about whether age played a factor on how much L2 attainment a student is able to obtain. Ms. Stewart’s answer was yes because it is more of a natural environment at an early age and research has proved that our brain is wired to learn languages very early. To follow up on her statement about the brain, Ortega (2013) also mentions this by stating, “there is a specific period of time early in life when the brain exhibits a special propensity to attend to certain experiences in the environment (for example, language) and learn from them” and that, “the brain is pre-programmed to be shaped by that experience in dramatic ways” (p. 13).

Overall, I learned a lot from Ms. Stewart and her answers were all very insightful for me. I did not expect some of the answers I have received, and it has definitely made me learn so much more about second language!

Entry 2: Interview

 Reflection

For this assignment, I have chosen to conduct my interview with my mother, Angelita Lopez. She was born in a dual-language household consisting of both Spanish and English speakers. Her father made sure that she was learning English so she will be able to do well in school, unlike her older brother who failed Kindergarten because he knew very little English.

My initial thoughts on my mother’s first language were that it was going to be Spanish. However, I have found out during the span of this interview that instead she grew up speaking both English and Spanish as a first language. From what I learned in her household, she spoke English to her father and Spanish to her mother. My mother would be considered simultaneous multilingual because she began speaking both languages since birth. Rowland (2014), mentions that “Many of these children are from migrant families who have settled in a country where most people speak a different language” (p. 175). My mother’s father was a naturalized citizen while her mother was from Monterrey, Mexico which would make sense as to why she spoke English mostly to her father and Spanish to her mother. Rowland (2014), even touched onto this phenomenon by stating that, “sometimes, both languages are provided by the parents, so the child will be exposed to both languages in the home in roughly equal proportions” (Rowland, 2014, p.175). This would mean that my mother grew up to be bilingual.

According to Ortega (2013), my mother was bilingual in which she was able to, “switch and alternate between two (or more) languages, depending on a range of communicative needs and desires” (p. 4). Moreover, she mentioned that at her workplace she has the ability to switch languages when her patients feel more comfortable speaking in Spanish rather than in English. I have found that she has no difficulty in switching her languages and that she has not faced any imminent struggles to where she would mix the two languages together unintentionally. Whenever she speaks to my siblings and I at home she ends up switching between Spanish and English words with ease. I imagine her doing this at her hospital as well with the babies’ parents.

My mother is a mixture of both naturalistic and instructed learner because she learned both languages through her parents and from studying Spanish I and II in High School. She learned naturalistically through verbally speaking Spanish and not writing it until much later once she began studying the language later in High School (Ortega, 2013, p. 6). Because she already had an aforementioned background of Spanish knowledge, she was able to pair her verbal Spanish vocabulary she knew along with the writing portion with little to no difficulty.

All things considered, compared to how much Spanish and English she knows now she said her proficiency in English would be fluent and her Spanish would be at most top tier but not exemplary. I find this considerably so because my mom usually speaks English in a majority of conversations than in Spanish. I learned so much more about my mother during this interview and am surprised that she ended up growing up as a dual language learner in her household. Interviewing my mother even answered some questions I had and she really knows a lot more about second language acquisition than I realized!

Entry 1: Introductions!

Welcome~😊Check out my video!