Let's Cover My Preach First

"If adolescent English language learners are to possess the sustained engagement, fortitude and motivation necessary to fully access school curricula, then educators must develop instructional approaches and strategies that take advantage of any and all resources at their disposal."

As I wrote all this last month, I felt my preach about English language development becoming concrete, documented...becoming…hey…my mission statement. Seriously.  The problem is that as much as friends, neighbors and colleagues might tolerate our flashes of inspiration, they get very tired of our various personal manifestos.  However, I find I must keep writing.

I am a middle school teacher in rural northern California.  Our district org chart lists my teaching position as English Language Development(ELD)/Reading, but in reality, I'm a coach.  A life coach, a cheerleader who spends her days showing kids they can.  Our rural community of 5000 has established a reputation on the world map as a place where some of the world's finest wines are created.   My San Francisco-based architect cousin, fluent in five languages and working for a multi-national corporation, claims our town is the most cosmopolitan place on earth, but my English Language Learners (EL) students grow up wondering where they fit into a world curated by The Robb Report.

I have known most of my EL students since they were babies.  Their Moms, Dads, adult brothers and sisters work in the wine or service industries.  Year after year, as they see their more affluent classmates go off to promising futures assisted by their college educated parents, my students wonder how they can share in that.  Is the "The American Dream" just a story we tell to keep hope alive?  I have watched years of compensatory education initiatives attempt to level the playing field, with not much sustained result.

If this post ends up being my ELD manifesto, here it is: The ability to speak the language of instruction is not an indicator of a student's level of cognitive function.  Our students are now gifted with the ability to access any information, any daya or lore the human race has ever known.  They can reorganize anything imaginable and express it in new ways.

We are preparing every student for a future beyond our comprehension.