Write Out Loud!

Englishes

Throughout my reading of Carillo, I found myself agreeing to the authors statements and relating to the events on how the English language arts are taught in grades k-12. I began to feel understood, being limited in my writing when growing up because it didnt meet the Common Core State Standars caused me to doubt my writing capabilites because I didnt meet these standards. When I was reading a text in middle school we were all asked to participate in a big group discusison afterwards. I realized that the first person who participated in this discussion was then met with agreements from our classments. However, the teacher decided to give her imput on the classmates statements and began to quesiton their opinions. She gave her own opinions on the text from her perspective that was diffent from the students. This cause me to agree with the teacher and disagree from the other students opinions earnign a nod from my teacher. This simple act speaks a lot of volume on how we are influened as children to think a certain way and not quesiton the things we are taught. I felt proud of myself in this moment because I said something that the teacher approved of but now I feel angry with myself that I let someone else influence my own opinion. I have thought about the difference of knowledge and understanding, both are very important in todays world because you can be intruduced to all the knowledge in the world but it wont have a impact on you if you dont understand it. Thats why its important to understand what you are learning whether its in school or your own.

I have experienced what Lysicott and Tant mention as various “Englishes”, my mother knows how to speak english and to me I think her english is perfect but to other people her english isnt consitered great. Whenever my mother needs to go to the doctor or the pharmacy she always bring me with her. I realize its becasue somtimes she encounters people who dont completely understand her when she talks and needs me to speak for her. This made me relate to Tan and her experience with her own mother because she alos served as a translator for her mother when people didnt understand her. In the text “Mother Tounge” by Amy tan, the line ” It has always bothered me that I can think of no way to describe it other than “broken”, as if it were damaged and needed to be fixed…” stayed with me throughout the reading because to me my moms english is great but I can see how different we speak english. I realized that just because her english sounds different than mine dosent mean there is something wrong with the way she speaks. The word broken, fractured, or limted is used to describe these various “englishes” because it dosent meet the ideals or standards for what people expect english to sound like, which is unreasonable.

1 Comment

  1. Jacquelyn Blain

    It’s really kind of terrifying the power a teacher has over a student’s willingness to think for themselves, isn’t it? This would make a good Education Narrative, by the way – that story about being in discussion groups, I mean.

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