Greeting your limited English proficient students in their own language

This page copyright ©2002. Terms of use

Print

• Print

Share

• Email
• Delicious
• Digg
• Facebook
• StumbleUpon

The increasing cultural diversity of North Carolina classrooms recalls our high school or college foreign language experiences. At the time, we may have wondered — as so many students do — if we would ever really need to speak another language. But a glimpse into almost any classroom today reveals at least one if not several students whose first language is not English, and it offers teachers an excellent opportunity to brush off their language skills.

Although it is not necessary for all educators to speak another language, one strategy for working with Limited English Proficient (LEP) students is to try to greet them in their native language. Even a simple "Hello" or "How are you today?" can help to integrate a student into a new environment. It can also provide an opportunity for the student to teach the rest of the class some of his or her language culture.

Educators must be conscious of how LEP students feel about their learning environment. Do they feel comfortable enough to benefit from strategies designed to help them learn? How students feel about their learning environment and how they perceive their role can significantly help or hinder any strategies for instruction.

But, you say, you have forgotten all of your basic Spanish or French. How can you refresh your memory or learn a little of a language that you have never studied without spending money and without taking a class? There are millions of sites on the World Wide Web written in and about foreign languages, and many of them are incredible resources for self-guided learners.

Speaking the language

Of all the language skills — listening, speaking, reading, and writing — speaking is one of the most challenging. It is also perhaps the most important for teaching LEP students. Travlang Travel and Language Services was designed as a foreign language site for travelers. Because the site is free, it is replete with advertising, but is well worth a look. There are numerous useful features here, some that are demo only and others that are software programs to facilitate language learning. For the purpose of hearing a language spoken, Travlang’s Foreign Language for Travelers section is an excellent free resource. This part of the site prompts you for the language you speak and the language you wish to learn to speak. The site then prompts you to select from a menu with categories ranging from basic words to directions. The utility of the site comes from the embedded sound files, which allow the user to hear how words and expressions are pronounced. A quiz section lets you test your knowledge and even allows you to resubmit missed answers. (Note: Your computer must have a sound card and either Real Audio Player or Windows Media Player installed to play the sound files.)

Hearing the language

Prior to the development of the web, the options for hearing a foreign language spoken aside from listening to a native speaker were limited to audio tapes, videos, and, if you lived in a metropolitan area, possibly a foreign language cable channel. There was also the possibility of using a short-wave radio, but getting them to work is not so easy. Most recently, satellite dishes have connected television viewers to channels around the world, but most schools, not to mention classroom teachers, could never invest in that kind of technology.

A simple solution can be now found in Internet radio — broadcast live radio available on the Internet. Not all radio stations use this medium, but Internet radio has become much more common since its inception. Finding stations can be difficult unless you know their URLs or conduct a web search. The easiest method of finding a station is to use Radio Locater. This free site catalogs Internet radio sites from around the world according to location and format, making it simple to find a news radio station in Paris or a talk radio station in Madrid. Like the Travlang site mentioned above, the stations listed here require Real Audio or Windows Media Player to listen to their broadcasts.

During your planning period, it is simple to listen to foreign language radio in the background while you work on other things. A good exercise for both you and your students is to listen to foreign language radio from different countries that share a common language. This will allow you the opportunity to hear different accents. Unfortunately, commercial advertising on foreign language radio is just as annoying as it is on English language radio!

Reading, writing, and culture

Although the focus of this article is more on production and comprehension of a language, it is always useful to be able to read and write just a little as well. In North Carolina, students whose first language is Spanish make up the largest group of LEP students. They are followed by speakers of Hmong, Vietnamese, and Chinese, in descending order. The following resources have been grouped according to language groups and offer an array of tools to help you learn more about the written language and culture of each.

Spanish

Spanish Flashcards. An interactive site for learning basic vocabulary that also involves sound. (Note: uses Flash)

The Spanish CALL Project. An impressive site by Juan Manual Soto Arrivi for practicing Spanish grammar — a step beyond Spanish Flashcards! From the homepage, click on the Exercises button to access a wealth of grammatical exercises and tutorials.

Vietnamese

Say Hello in the Vietnamese Language. Audio links for hearing the language as well as basic grammar tutorials for insight into the sociocultural components of the Vietnamese language.

Chinese

Chinese Language Information Page. A comprehensive site of Chinese language and cultural resources

Ocrat.com mirror site. "Chinese-related web pages with a focus on Chinese Language Learning for English Speakers."

Other languages

For resources in other languages, take a look at eLocale. From the home page, click on Glossophilia to access language-specific resources. If you do have some money available to assist your work with LEP students, you might take a look at World Language.com, which offers a phenomenal array of language learning resources.

To practice your reading skills, consider changing the screen saver of your computer to marquee mode using a new foreign language word or expression as the scrolling text. Similarly, try writing the word on your bathroom mirror in soap so that you will be sure to see it every day. (Well, the last one worked for my students, but may not be appreciated by your significant others!)