Last week I had a great chance to visit a local school Community School in NYC. Technically, it was my first time to participate in an American classroom, it went well. The classroom that I participated in is a Pre-K classroom, students age range around 4-5. There are two teachers in the classroom, one of the teachers is a white female, another teacher is Hispanic female teacher assistant. After a few hours in the classroom, I realized the TA\u2019s role in this classroom. I took the subway to this community school, when I was walking from the subway station to the campus, I found out a lot of minorities living around the community, most of them are Hispanic people.<\/p>\n
In this classroom, I see a coupe of races students, there were not any African American students in this classroom. Most students are Hispanic, some of them can speak Spanish. There are also some Asian students in this classroom. During my observation, sometimes this teacher assistant will speak Spanish to some Hispanic students, the white teacher did not have opposite opinions about this bi-lingual education. I feel like those Hispanic very like this TA, maybe because speaking Spanish made their relationship closer. Additionally, for those Hispanic students, their life was surrounded with Spanish language, their parents speak Spanish at home. So, their Spanish proficiency may better than their English proficiency. When teacher assistant spoke Spanish in the classroom, they can easily understand the instruction. However, this teacher assistant did not often speak Spanish to students, I think it was because the leading language of Pre-K program is English, although speaking Spanish is not prohibited, students could be taught under English. Sometimes speaking Spanish is easier for those Hispanic students to understand, to follow and to cooperate.<\/p>\n
According to Oaks (2018), Jane Addams greatly addressed the important of multicultural education that \u201cThey argued that while everyone should learn the common culture-English, U.S. History, and the American political system-immigrants should also retain and be proud of their home cultures\u2026. The schools ought to do more to connect these children with the best things of the past, to make them realize something of the beauty and charm of the language, the history, and the traditions which their parents represent.\u201d (pp. 89). I think the School best applied to this philosophy. Students are not only be allowed to communicate with others by speaking Spanish, but also teachers will help students to build up their Spanish language. This Pre-K program is very beneficial to Hispanic student.<\/p>\n
Right now, we know that Hispanic student can take great bi-lingual education in Community School, what about other races of students? There are still other students who are not Hispanic and other students have different cultural background in the classroom, I think both teachers provide good teaching for others students, but Hispanic students at least have some advantages than others. As I saw on the black board in the classroom, each student will prepare a culture background poster and stick the poster on the black board for a week. Last week was the introduction week of a Korean-American students, from his poster, I saw some culture habits and Korean specialty on it. The white teacher also researched on those culture habits and specialty and briefly introduced during the class time. Besides, I noticed that the white teacher will pay more attention to those students who are not Hispanic because teacher assistant can greatly take care of Hispanic students. I think another reason is the white teacher was trying her best to make up for those races of students who do not have a teacher assistant who speaks their native language and understand their culture.<\/p>\n
I understand that school did nothing wrong, but in this classroom Hispanic students have privilege that they have a teacher assistant who can help them to learn their native language and their culture background. However, for others students, they cannot. Although the white teacher and teacher assistant take good care of every students in the classroom, for those non-Hispanic students, they do not have the chance to learn their native language and culture background in depth, they cannot as equal as Hispanic students.<\/p>\n
Reference<\/p>\n
Oakes, Jeannie, et al. Teaching to Change the World, Taylor & Francis Group, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, https:\/\/ebookcentral-proquest-com.tc.idm.oclc.org\/lib\/teacherscollege-ebooks\/detail.action?docID=5257693.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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