Posted on 06/04/2006 8:37:55 AM PDT by wagglebee
NEWPORT NEWS - A student says, "Janae need a marker."
How does a teacher respond?
Usually this way: "We don't say, 'Janae need a marker.' We say, 'Janae needs a marker.'"
What the teacher needs is a new approach, according to two local educators promoting an alternative way of teaching grammar.
"I would say, 'We're in school right now. We're speaking formal English. How would you say that formally?'" said Rachel Swords, a third -grade teacher at Newsome Park Elementary School in Newport News.
Swords and Rebecca Wheeler, an associate professor of English at Christopher Newport University, have co-written a new book, "Code-Switching." They advocate a shift in teaching standard English to speakers of what is known as African American vernacular English - or what they prefer to call "informal English."
The old approach "demoralizes the child, and it's not effective," said Wheeler, who is on leave from CNU to work as a research scientist for Old Dominion University's Darden College of Education.
Instead, they said, teachers should recognize that those students speak a valid language at home and must learn how to translate "informal English" into "formal English."
"We don't correct," Wheeler said.
"There's no reason to correct," Swords said.
"We move from correcting to contrasting," Wheeler said.
The book includes several charts, many created by Swords, that illustrate the difference between informal and formal English in areas such as subject-verb agreement and past tense. One chart hanging in the back of Swords' classroom last week covered "possessive patterns," such as "The dog name is Jack" versus "The dog's name is Jack."
"I'm still teaching standard English," Swords said, "but I'm going about it in a way that respects the language of every child in the classroom."
The traditional techniques damage self-esteem, she said, and "put the child in a horrible situation where he has to choose between 'the teacher is right' or 'the parent is right.'"
Even more important, the educators said, the "code-switching" approach works better. Since she adopted it, Swords said, the racial gap in her students' test scores has disappeared.
However, the educators acknowledge that their technique is slow to catch on, both locally and nationally. "People are very resistant to going against the traditional way" of teaching English, Swords said.
Karen Aita , an eighth-grade teacher at Northampton Middle School on the Eastern Shore, has used the new technique for nearly two years. Early indications show that 97 percent of her students passed the state Standards of Learning writing exam this year, the highest ever at her school, she said.
"The thing I like about it is, it gets us away from the textbook," Aita said. "Instead of just hearing rules they don't retain, they can visually learn to recognize patterns in their writing. ... They're much more engaged in learning."
Althea Joyner , the senior coordinator of English for Norfolk Public Schools, has met with Wheeler and observed Swords' class. She said she came away impressed and wants to introduce their philosophy in the city's classrooms.
"This is starting in the earlier grades," Joyner said, "and is giving students confidence and an understanding of why they speak certain ways at certain times."
Two Virginia Beach school officials said Friday that they could not comment on Wheeler's and Swords' strategies until they read the book.
Rhonda "Nikki" Barnes , a former English teacher in Chesapeake who now serves as a senior liaison to minority communities for the National Education Association, expressed a mixture of praise and hesitancy.
"It shows that they are culturally sensitive to the students," Barnes said. "... But I think an English teacher should be able to say, 'This is wrong in terms of grammar.' " Colloquial terms such as "cat" and "big man" are not incorrect, Barnes said, but phrases such as "We be" or "I is" are ungrammatical.
Wheeler's response: "Yes, it's not standard English. It's something else."
She and Swords emphasized that they are not teaching students African American vernacular English and that they ask them to translate only from informal to formal English - not the other way around.
The approach, Wheeler said, also benefits students already fluent in standard English. They sharpen their critical thinking skills, she said, and erase misconceptions that their black classmates are uneducated.
Their book was recently published by the National Council of Teachers of English. The subtitle is "Teaching Standard English in Urban Classrooms," but Wheeler said the strategy could just as well apply to "Appalachian-speak or Brooklyn-speak or Pennsylvania Dutch."
And it doesn't take longer to teach. "I would say it takes much less time," Swords said, "because now my kids get it."
You idiot! You are a teacher, your job is to teach these children proper grammer, not "validate" them.
Ebonics is so 90's, Spanglish is the wave of the future.
We da People o' da United States, in Order ta form uh mo' perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide fo' da common defence, promote da general Welfare, an' secure da Blessings o' Liberty ta ourselves an' our Posterity, do ordain an' establish dis here Constitution fo' da United States o' America.
I'd say there is nothing wrong with this approach at all, most especially if it works. English has already undergone tremdendous grammar simplification from its German roots - no gender, almost no cases, simplification of verb conjugation - Black English just goes a tiny bit farther in that regard.
I change the way I speak depending on who(m) I'm talking to. It makes sense.
Mrs VS
yeah, go to the doctor's office and have him say "yo,yo, check dis out, yo your appendix be illin yo! we gots to cut that mufa out boy!"
Wonder why these children are having a hard time succeeding. /s
NAW!!! Let them speak and teach the language of the ghetto. See how far that gets them in the job market!
What BS. Try to get a job with that "valid language."
You're probably on the right track, but the part about "general welfare" would probably need to be expanded on to talk about more entitlement programs.
But the difference is that you can change your language and make the distinction when necessary. These kids are learning grammatically incorrect English as their root language, and they'll be at a disadvantage if they ever have the desire to leave their racial enclave and interact with others.
I like the idea. She is getting the kids to learn proper english, faster, and with more success - the lady ought to get an award.
I lost my Ebonics translator link. I thought that that whole thing got laughed off the stage five years ago. Whaddy no.
That depends on who be axed.
*Lamont Sanford
Two plus two is...is...five? Six?
Close enough Jamal, here is your public school high school diploma.
They are being taught standard English in school by this approach. Plenty of black Americans speak both, switching fluently, in spite of being raised on Black English. I doubt it is difficult - people on FR seem to have no problem translating to ebonics with little practice.
To say this is what we use in school, in applying for a job and at work, in dealing with other people - if the teacher can get this across, more power to her.
Mrs VS
If these kids learned a form of math at home that taught them that 2 + 4 = 7, would that be "valid" math?
Yo! It be here.
Exactly what I told my students in English class: that they can speak as they wish in the locker room or w/friends and family, but woe unto them if they can't speak grammatical English when they interview for a job or on the job or in public anywhere. Therefore, they NEED to know and use grammatical English if they are to succeed.
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