This paper has two parts to it: Part One- Language & Culture Paper #3. Part Two- Language & Culture Discussion Post #3.
PART ONE: To fulfill the requirements for this third language and culture activity, I would like you to interview someone who has worked directly with English Language Learners so that you can learn a bit more about engaging with a diverse population. Ideally, I’d like you to interview someone who is working in the field of Education; however, if that is not possible, you may talk with someone who has engaged with English Language Learners in a different profession or service. In your interview, you should find out what challenges your interviewee has faced when interacting with members of this population (you may want to ask about both language and cultural difficulties), as well as what benefits your interviewee has gained through these interactions. Your specific assignment is as follows:
(1) Select a person who has worked directly with English Language Learners through his/her work, volunteer position, or service organization. While I would prefer that you talk with someone who is working in the field of Education, this is not absolutely necessary. What is most important is that you find someone who has had extensive experience with diverse populations and who can provide you with good information about this experience. This person can be of any age or any background, and this person can be of any relation to you (e.g., friend, family member, boss, neighbor, mentor, etc.).
(2) Come up with a list of questions and present them to your interviewee. While you can ask whatever you want, some of your questions must be focused on content relevant to our course. Here are some examples of questions you might want to ask your interviewee:
How many years have been working in this position/capacity?
How many English Language Learners do you interact with on a daily basis?
What are the main backgrounds (i.e., language & culture) of the learners you interact with?
Have you encountered any difficulties when it comes to working with a diverse population of learners? If so, what? (Here you should clarify whether the difficulties were linguistic in nature or cultural in nature.)
Have you found any benefits to working with a diverse population? Explain.
What challenges do English Language Learners face in your particular school/work/situation? Have you developed any strategies to address these challenges?
What advice might you give me as a future teacher when it comes to working with English Language Learners?
(3) Summarize your key findings in a short but informative paper. (See below.)
Once you’ve “participated” in your language and culture activity, you must write up your observations in a short paper. Your paper should be no longer than 2 pages and it should be typed and double-spaced. In this paper you should do three things: First, tell me a bit about the person you interviewed and why you selected this particular person. Secondly, tell me some of the interesting things learned from your interview and why these things stood out to you. Finally, tell me what you—as a future teacher—learned from this activity and how you can incorporate that knowledge into your future classes.
PART TWO: Finally, in order to document your event for your classmates, all students must accumulate a short descriiption of your activity or event to later submit to our class discussion board, sharing with your classmates what you’ve learned from your event and/or what you found particularly interesting. Write this discussion post on the last page of the paper to submit to the board later.
