Week#1
We didn’t do a lot of things in the first class. The main thing was that we talked about syllable and the precautions for class. I am actually a little excited about this course, because I think the English class will only allow students to read and write essays, but this English class is about multilingual in classes.
Week#2
There is no class in this week, since this day is Labour Day, but we did some of slef reading by oueselves: Read Introduction and Chapter 1 in Coelho 2012 and Garcia 2017, pages 268-272.
Canada is a country of immigrants, and people from all over the world live here. Therefore, in the same classroom, there may be students from all over the world whose first language is not English. As a teacher, we need to quickly adapt to the classroom environment and respect the culture of all students.
Most immigrants move is because they want to find a better future for themselves, and their children, and some countries recognize the importance of immigrants to economic stimulus, set standards to recruit and attract immigrants and provide them with language Courses to help them better integrate into the local area.
In Canada, the most common immigrants are: refugees, workers on work visas, students on study visas, and investors. As for me, I am an international student who is hold on study visa.
Differences in culture and habits will bring tremendous pressure to immigrant families. Teachers must understand the adaptation process experienced by immigrant children and young people and provide them with the welcome and support they need so that they can become full members of society.
Most immigrants will go through four stages:
First impressions-at this stage, they will be curious about all new things, it may be a period of relief and euphoria. At this stage, teachers need to provide students and parents with initial and ongoing guidance in the school system, and clarify the norms and expectations
Culture shock-At this stage, students will experience cultural shock and face the challenges brought about by immigration. These challenges may include language, cultural differences and conflicts, financial difficulties, and loneliness. This stage will last for a different time, and different members of the same family may have different experiences. At this stage, teachers need to establish a supportive learning environment for students and feel that their own culture is valued
Renewed optimism-At this stage, students have overcome the cultural shock and regained their optimism, and made progress in work or school. Teachers can use appropriate assessment tools to monitor students’ language development and they can also provide positive feedback and help students set further learning goals.
Integration-At this stage, students have completely adapted to the new life and established a new identity. They may choose to retain the original culture or abandon the past. As a teacher appreciate the diversity of languages and cultures and welcome and support newcomers
In the article of Garcia 2017, I learned a word that I am not familiar with: “Language Awareness”, which means “explicit knowledge about language, and conscious perception and sensitivity in language learning, language teaching and language use”.
Language Awareness is very important in education, especially in Canada, a multi-ethnic country. It helps improve students’ multicultural and global awareness, while promoting academic success and broadening their career horizons, so that students have a deeper understanding of each other. Promote community friendliness.
Week#3
This week we discussed language awareness a little more dipper.
First, we previewed Dagenais et al. (2009). In this article, we talked about linguistic landscape (LL), which means “the visibility and distinctiveness of language on public and commercial signs in a specific area or region. Such as billboards, traffic signs, and billboards.” Observing the linguistic landscape is an exercise in language awareness. It helps students to view the diversity of languages and practical methods from a critical perspective. At the same time, paying attention to these linguistic landscapes can help students better understand their the social and political background they current lives.
Unique languages and cultures have created different nationalities, cultivate students’ language awareness, understand the language environment and cultivate their critical reading and writing skills
Writing is the most important way to preserving and disseminating culture. No one knows who was the first to start writing records. The earliest sumerian writing appeared in 3500-3200BC. The five existing writing systems currently used the most in the world are: Abjads, alphabets, Syllabic alphabets, Syllabaries and Semanto-phonetic writing systems.
In class, the professor divided us into small groups and gave us some small sentences written in different languages, so that we could guess the meaning of the sentences.
For example, I was try to translate the sentence “De taart heeft suiker”, “de” reminds me of French, so I will treat this sentence as French first. “Taart” reads like tart, a kind of dessert. I didn’t figure out what “heeft” means, so I skipped it for now. The last “suiker”. When I read this word aloud, I found that its pronunciation is very similar to sugar, so this sentence means “the tart has sugar”. When the professor gave the answer later, I found that my translation was correct, but it was not French but Dutch.
There are similarities and differences between languages, and understanding each other’s languages and cultures helps to improve students’ understanding of each other and their own communities.
Week#4
In the world have all kind different people and their own culture and language. All the clture are equal important. As teachers, when we welcome immigrant students, we need to respect their culture and traditions, and respect their names. When introducing their names, we need to write them on the blackboard so that all students know the name， and you need to know which one is the last name and which one is the first name.
Many immigrants have lived in Canada for a long time. They work here, get married here, and have second-generation immigrants here. Unlike the first-generation immigrants, the second-generation immigrants lived in Canada as soon as they were born. They did not understand the history and culture of their people, which may cause these histories and cultures to be forgotten.
In order to protect the inheritance of culture and history and maintain cultural diversity, Heritage Language Schools was born.
Regina Heritage Language Schools：
- fit for anyone who is familiar or not with this language
- normaly it only study at weekend
- their fee are free
- purpose is to let their cluture been know for the second-generation immigrants
this link show the all the Heritage Language Schools in Regina, this is the first time I know there are so many of them in just regina. The government will provide some subsidies to Heritage Language Schools, but the size of the school is also determined by the number of people who speak the language. For example, the Haritage Language Schools in Regina website shows that there are four Chinese language schools, while the Greek language school only One, the need for language learning also determines the size of the school.
Heritage Language Schools helps second-generation immigrants understand their own national culture and history, promote the maintenance of cultural diversity in Canada, and jointly promote the prosperity and progress of human civilization.
For students whose English is not their native language, teachers will use the Common Framework of Reference (CFR) to measure the English level of these students to ensure that their language level can adapt to English-based courses. CFR is just a language reference tool. Its main function is just a standard reference, not for a specific group of people or a list that must be completed.