Category: Unit 1

 

Education has always shown this hierarchy of power, where if you weren’t good or smart enough you didn’t have a certain level of intelligence. It depends on how many degrees and what those degrees are, for you to have any sort of respect and education in the world or life in general. When somebody is in an intellectual sort of debate they list the amount of degrees they have and what schools they’ve attended to classify their intelligence. I’m a very shy person, if I were to have many degrees I wouldn’t be the type to show them off because I don’t believe that throwing my degrees in somebody’s face is a sign of intelligence. When people in middle school or high school would brag about the grades they get on tests I would never join into those conversations because my grades were always either below or average and if you didn’t have a certain grade on your test you weren’t considered smart in any way. There are different ways someone could be smart, it’s not only book smart to show intelligence. I learned English from my family. We speak in the same way in terms of accent but not in terms of how we use the language. Growing up the people around you influence the way you talk or act. but as I was growing up I didn’t say what they said or how they would say them. Although English is my first and only language, I’m really bad at forming sentences in essays or just in regular conversation. I’ve always been shy so that really affects the way I speak to people and the amount of words I use in conversation, so instead of saying a full sentence I give half sentences or small phrases. In doing those things and not having the strongest writing skills I don’t believe that shows how intelligent I am or could be.

Education: (1.) the process of receiving or giving systematic instruction, especially at a school or university, (2.) an enlightening experience. Although my first language was Spanish, English is now the language I am most fluent in and speak the most. Growing up surrounded by immigrant parents and my mom’s non native English speaking friends, my English was spoken in a slight accent and in broken phrases. Though school has always been my main source of English, the conversations I’ve had with my mom had of equal significance to the writings in class. Raised in a house where thick accents and half English half Spanish phrases were extremely prevalent, English sounded like a symphony that came in different notes. English was a song that could be played differently depending on composer. Learning English in two drastic different environments has made it feel like I can speak two different languages. Being able to comprehend both a professor’s lecture and a thick accent is a skill I often overlook. English has always been my favorite subject, being able to change the way I’m perceived simply by my vocabulary. While I look back and think my experience learning English has been mostly positive I also can acknowledge that it wasn’t as great in the beginning. Being “threatened” to be put into the ESL program as if it was a punishment. Ironic considering I was out in a dual language program the following year. I was made hyperaware at a young age that my mother’s English was imperfect and should be constantly corrected. Yet while not perfect it was one of my sources of English for many years and helped create the perfect environment for my ever evolving knowledge.

 

A Rubik’s Cube is a colorful multi-faceted puzzle that can only be solved by manipulating the puzzle to make every face have all solid colors. When learning English there are times when it feels like a puzzle but what makes me think most about Rubik’s Cube is after you decipher the language you start to realize that there are different ways to speak to different crowds. My journey of learning is one that may not be as complex compared to some who did not start in an English-speaking place but basic English was one of the first languages. Although in my house Hebrew was spoken more my parents never lacked when it came to teaching their kids how to speak English eloquent enough to show manners and couth. It wasn’t until later in school that I started to step back and recognize English as I know it today. And much like Amy Tan, I was able to recognize that in different settings you may need to address someone differently and found the need to code-switch. Code-switching is, “the practice of alternating between two or more languages or varieties of language in conversation” (google.com). Growing up I went to school needing to know how to differentiate between an A on a paper while staying up with all the changes in “street talk.” For many parts of my academic career, I had teachers that taught with the thought in mind, my students are like empty bank accounts and it’s my duty as a teacher to deposit facts, and this was beneficial in my opinion. It was the differences in my teacher’s age, race, attitudes, and teaching methods that allowed me to grow my own knowledge and apply it to certain situations. The way they spoke from the time they greeted me to the time they send me off was all a part of my identification of the various facets of the English language, and although they may have thought they were pouring in nothing but facts it was my rationalization of the information that allowed me to learn. Knowledge is only as powerful as the understanding behind it and when you are taught by someone who teaches with their own understandings and experiences that’s when you can truly begin to learn for yourself.