Entry #4: Reflection

Hello all! (-:

First of all, I would like to say that I have really enjoyed taking this Second Language Acquisition class with you all! This course has taught me so many amazing things in the little time allotted (this semester went by so fast). I learned from my friend Albagir during his interview that his young age made a huge difference in his acquisition to English. If he would not have learned English between the ages 4 and 10, he said it would have been much more difficult to learn. I also learned a lot from the interview with my cousin Denise who mentions that as long as Second Language Learners are exposed to meaningful and supportive instruction, they will be motivated and encouraged to be successful. Reading the textbooks by Ortega and Gass as well as being a part of these interviews has shown me that a lot of what we have read links up to real world processes that English Language Learners as well as ESL teachers must go through. Being motivated as a young child to learn a second language must be difficult but I have seen it happen time and time again. If I had to change anything about how this course could be more productive in the future are very small, nit-picky things, such as: put an exact date on the syllabus of when assignments are due (e.g. Sunday, 4/8/2018, by 11:59pm) and/or let students know that there is a free pdf versions of the textbooks online before they buy them so they can save some extra money.

Secondly, developing our blogs throughout the semester was such a fun and interesting way to share our assignments so that not only Dr. Avellaneda could see them, but my classmates could see them as well. I believe these blogs played a huge role in the learning process for everyone because we got to share our ideas and bounce off real world experiences that were connected to the theories we’ve learned. I definitely learned so much more by creating and sharing my blog entries because I got to see what my classmates thought about my individual findings and I could compare mine to theirs. Especially because this was an online class and we never saw each other face to face, this was a great way to create a community with everyone in the class. It helped us to re-connect with old friends as well as create new ones.

Lastly, this class has really helped me to open my eyes and to realize that teachers play a huge role in a students’ second or additional language acquisition. Teachers-in-formation, like you and me, might not have realized before this class that English Language Learners depend on their teachers for a lot, including motivation, a safe environment, a role model, and the list can go on. As future teachers, it is our job to prepare ourselves with this course in order to be ready for our students who are learning a second language. This class has helped me to see that my professional teaching philosophy will be aimed towards providing my students with meaningful instruction that is differentiated towards their second language acquisition. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this class! Feel free to leave any comments! (-:

Entry #3: Interview with Denise!

Hello all! I had so much fun interviewing my mom's cousin, Denise Rodriguez, who has been an ESL teacher for several years now. She has taught all elementary grades from first grade to fifth grade in a few districts in San Antonio, Texas. Sadly, since she lives a few hours away, and we are both very busy women, we could not meet up in person. So, I hope everyone can hear our conversation loud and clear. However, I still had lots of fun talking to her and connecting what we talk about in this class with her experiences. First of all, her experiences actually don’t quite mirror the research that we have discussed about in this class so far. For example, when talking to Denise about her English Language Learners’ motivation to learn English, she says that their motivation has never been an issue for her and her students. She claims that all of her students have been highly motivated and that they are willing to put in the time and effort to learn English. As mentioned by Ortega (2013), this might be because her students’ are most likely interested in learning a second language in order to become closer to their L2 community (p. 170). For first through fifth graders, they might have multiple reasons, or orientations, for learning English. These might consist of integrating themselves to become more like the members of their L2 community and/or to strengthen their friendships with their peers who speak their L2 (Ortega, 2013, p. 173). Denise also talks about how age does not really play a role in Second Language Acquisition, except for the fact that younger learners are indeed sponges to new languages. This is because in her experience, as long as English Language Learners are exposed to meaningful and supportive instruction, they will be motivated and encouraged to be successful. According to Ortega (2013), a second language learner may be an exception to the pattern of young learners experiencing easier acquisition because they, “appear to be related to unusually high motivation and high quality of instruction,” (p. 29). I hope you enjoy my video as much as I did making it! (:

Entry #2: Interview with Albagir!

Hello and welcome back to my blog for entry #2! I really enjoyed the opportunity to interview my good friend from high school, Albagir Mohamed Elmahdi Elmalik. His first language is Arabic and he started to formally learn English when he was around four years of age when he started school in Sudan. He moved to the Unites States when he was around six years of age, which is when he started to learn even more English informally while in school.  Albagir says he did not consider himself completely fluent in English until he was 10 years old, but that it was very easy to learn English as a second language while he was young. According to Ortega (2009), "learners who began acquiring the L2 before a certain age, which these studies locate to be around puberty, will tend to exhibit intuitions that are very close to those of native speakers of that language" (p. 19). Albagir was very fortunate because he learned English so young before puberty, which made it easy for his brain to act like a sponge, absorbing English like it was nothing. Therefore, he was engulfed in the culture of Houston, Texas so young that he may seem as if his native tongue may be English. Furthermore, because Albagir mentions that English was so easy to absorb as a child, this must mean that in his case, he was not bothered by any cross-linguistic influence or interference. Ortega (2009) also mentions that, “crosslinguistic influences can have positive as well as negative consequences for L2 learning” (p. 31). So, in Albagir’s case, he was blessed with an easy and positive transition into the United States from Sudan. I hope you enjoy our video! Leave any comments below (:

Entry #1: Self Introduction

Hello, this is Haley and welcome to my blog! I am a senior at the University of Houston and I am a teaching and learning major, specifically 4 through 8th grade mathematics. I can't wait to finish out my last semester as an undergraduate and get to work! I hope my first video can help you to learn more about me. (: