Critical Thinking and Writing
It’s been said that English is one of the hardest languages to learn; between there and their, to and too, or through and threw. Whether seeking a career in the corporate world, general labor, or the Arts, the language English, in its purest form, will be needed basically every day. In America, it’s our national language, the language commonly used to share or convey information and ideas; accordingly, why would one need a multicultural English course; why learn about ‘others’ culture in an ‘American’ English curriculum? What does another’s culture ought to do with ‘my’ nouns, verbs, and prepositional phrases? By answering the first two questions of ‘why’, the ‘what’ fell into my lap while slapping me upside the head.
When communicating with another, be it verbally or in writings, we are conveying our understandings and beliefs. However, a passion, an emotion, a feeling, the descriptors of some sort, is needed to illustrate and take hold of a full understanding of what is being communicated, and in the context it is being used within. Imagine a brain surgeon never using the words lightly, carefully, or gently; does one obtain a correct sense of what information or idea he/she may be conveying? I think not. The words we chose, their order, and context, have a large
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I have to learn how to live with them, find a common ground. It is my fear that I have to yield too much of my own ground that fills me with such a passionate energy of rage.’ From this thought of Hoffman’s, who must ‘adapt’ to who? What happen to the concept of a country that promotes all freedoms, of different thoughts and beliefs, background and cultures, the one place on the face of the earth where every person can be anyone? Hoffman’s rage now is making sense, and justified to say the
Lisa Delpit’s book, “The Skin We Speak”, talked about language and culture, and how it relates to the classroom. How we speak gives people hits as to where we are from and what culture we are a part of. Unfortunately there are also negative stereotypes that come with certain language variations. There is an “unfounded belief that the language of low income groups in rural or urban industrial areas is somehow structurally “impoverished” or “simpler” than Standard English” (Delpit 71). The United States is made of people from various cultures and speak many different variations of languages. As teachers we must be aware of some of the prejudices we may have about language and culture.
Words are instinctive—the fundamental expression of thoughts secondary to thoughts. They are, indeed, the translations of thoughts, the inexact and practical interpretations of them. They communicate.
Daniels, Harvey A., and Urbana, IL. National Council of Teachers of English. Not Only English: Affirming America's Multilingual Heritage. 1990. ERIC. Web. 28 Nov. 2014.
For the first section of my Inquiry Article, I posed the question: "How Does an Educator Teach Standard English in Urban Schools, and is it Necessary? I chose this question because I plan to teach in an urban school district, and I know urban students often have a difficult time learning to speak Standard English. I also know that speaking non Standard English can affect a student's acceptance and advancement in society. However, while completing my pre-teaching field experience, I did not have the opportunity to put my theory of teaching Standard English into practice. Instead, I was able to help students understand first, the immigration experience; second, the idea of language, and how difficult it is to learn a secondary discourse; and finally, why many individuals use dialects that differ from that of Standard English. I taught a two-day immigration and speech lesson that required students to become immigrants and learn a new language, and helping students understand another student's perspective was just as intriguing and rewarding as teaching students to speak standard English.
Sleeter, C. (2004). Critical multicultural curriculum and the standards movement. English Teaching: Practice & Critique, 3(2), 122-138.
The cultural and linguistic student is a resource of knowledge and information many educators do not utilize. Understanding the student’s culture, beliefs, and experiences is important when structuring lessons, which assist in the success of the language learner. The classroom teacher accomplishes this through reflective action as teaching methods and strategies are revisited and evaluated to match the ELL student’s capabilities. The ELL student is not only intelligent, but he or she has many interesting things to teach us explained Berg (2014). Dr. Strickland asserted a child’s diverse language does not relate to competence (Laureate Education, Inc. 2014s). As diversity is the new norm, the educational setting must be prepared to be as well.
Unit 1 taught me to focus on each step in the writing process. Approaching the task
To be completely honest, this year has been nothing short of a disaster. Partially due to this class, which it is my fault for taking the class in the first place when I was obviously not qualified to take an AP Literature class. It started out fun, but became more and more stressful as the year went on. My mental capacity has reached its limit, and my physical health isn 't in the best condition either due to the late nights I have spent on homework. However, despite it all, I have learned a great deal from this class. Not only from the curriculum, but I have also learned some of my own limitations and realized some faults that I need to mend. This class tested my patience and my temper, which I had only discovered
this area but I’m going to improve on it. The process of using multiple drafts has
Writing papers has been one of my biggest fears as a student. High school English class prepared me for the editing of my essays, for example, grammatical errors, spelling, font errors, and things that were under the category of fixing my paper. I realized that the writing process requires more than just editing, you have to understand that the paper is like a human body, it cannot function if every single part is not effective. I can certainly say that I have improved as a writer a great deal and this portfolio and the final revised drafts of my work certainly can argue for that. English 101 was certainly different from my other English classes; we actually focused on different parts of the writing process in each class instead of wasting our time discussing the same components of the process over and over again. As I reflect on my experiences throughout the semester of English 101 I am aware that I have met very important requirements of writing that I feel were very valuable for me as a student and my writing has improved progressively.
Writing for me has always been a love and hate relationship since I could remember. Depending on the subject matter that I was writing about I would enjoy it because it suited my style or I loathed it because that specific style was uninteresting and boring to me. Learning certain writing formats were absolutely the worst part about writing when I first started learning in high school. As time pushed on and I grew older I began to develop an appreciation for writing that I did not have before; which is what led me to taking Writing 101 as my first full-fledged college course. I began this course with minimal writing experience because of what I failed to retain before, but now I am a stronger writer than I could have imagined with new skill sets that enhance my professional portfolio.
Sharma, B., 2008. “World Englishes, English as a Lingua Franca, and English Pedagogy”, Journal of NELTA 13 (2), pp. 121-130. Available from
On the first day of class, I was not confident in my writing. I was in honors english last year, however, I did not do too well on essays. Being that I never received an A, I assumed my writing was not as good as it should be. Now, I earned a 6, almost 7, on the 9 point scale and am beginning to feel more confident. I do feel that I have been appropriately challenge this semester. I did not find any of the assignments to be too easy. I have definitely felt challenged this year, I have learned multiple techniques that I never knew prior to taking this class. As a whole, I am happy with the experiences I was provided in this class. The last essay I wrote, I was given the opportunity to meet with Mr. Perry after school one on one for help which was extremely beneficial. Also, I appreciate the fact that Mr. Perry reads our entire essay commenting on what went wrong or suggests ways to improve it. Revising essay really helps not only my grade, but also my overall understanding of what I did incorrectly. Overall, I am extremely happy I took this class and I continue to benefit in multiple ways.
Our world is constantly changing and it requires a society that is well versed in understanding the problems deriving from culture differences and tolerance of one another’s beliefs and perceptions. We are dealing with systemic problems in education, economic, government, religion and culture differences.
Kachru, B. B. (1992). Teaching world Englishes. The other tongue: English across cultures, 2, 355-366.