How English-Language Learners Have an Edge

During my first year of teaching, Samantha sat in the back of my first-period American government class. Having moved from Mexico, she had only been in the United States for two years. Her oral English comprehension was moderate, but she spoke rarely and was embarrassed to speak in front of native English speakers.

Overwhelmed with the task of teaching anyone anything as a first-year teacher, I felt that reaching Samantha was a Herculean task. Describing the challenge in one of my graduate courses, I mentioned that Samantha hardly ever spoke. When she did, it was always in "broken English." I lamented that she seemed to understand next to none of the material, and I received commiserative nods from other new teachers in the room.

But the professor burst into tears.

Face flushed, our professor related her journey to the U.S. from Hong Kong as a child. She told us about the trauma of entering a new school and a new culture with no support from parents or teachers in learning English, and she recalled a time a stranger had ridiculed her for her "broken English."

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Advice for Native English Speakers

Whether or not you think learning a language other than English is valuable, it's true that English has become the language of international communication. But that doesn't let native English speakers off the hook. In order for them to really benefit from the status of English as a global lingua franca, they still have linguistic investments to make.

It helps to learn how to hear around accents, word choices and grammatical patterns.

Namely, they could learn from instruction in linguistics and the history of English, which would expose them to the varieties of English that are spoken by people with another mother tongue. At any given time, the vast majority of English used on the planet is spoken and written by people who aren't native speakers and who may have learned it as adults. It may be their second or third language. Their interactions will tend to be with other non-native speakers. They'll say things in ways that you don't say them in your version of English.

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Visual aids and repetition are keys to building vocabulary

Students in Darota Haber-Lehigh's English as a Second Language (ELS) class at Seaside High School take turns repeating in Spanish, then English, a list of animal terms, each with its own picture for example. Lehigh crisscrosses the same group of terms with her students, in nearly every sentence construction imaginable.


The visual aids and repetition are key to students building a vocabulary before they go more in-depth into a subject, said Lehigh.

She and almost all other teachers in Clatsop County use the visual aids and repetition as part of the Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) teaching strategy, one piece of a continuing effort to seamlessly integrate English instruction into the more common curriculum.

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Digital Learning Day opens up opportunities

Skyping with the Packers, using Twitter in English class, they were all reality Wednesday at one local high school


Governor Walker declared Wednesday Digital Learning Day across the state.

In business teacher Mary Byrns classroom, students used Skype for the first time to connect with Packer's public relations pro Aaron Popke.

“I thought it was a great opportunity to use Skype as a tool to connect the students with a business that we normally wouldn't get to speak to. And I just thought the Packers would be something they’d be very interested in,” Byrns tells us.

The Skyping session was all part of a national initiative to showcase technology projects in the classroom
“I think it shows them the power of technology, it just opens up new doors for them, versus when I was in school we just didn't have those opportunities,” Byrns explains.

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Mariela Dabbah: If You Don't Speak English, Don't Run for Office

When I read that Yuma County (Arizona) Judge John Nelson ruled that Alejandrina Cabrera couldn’t run for councilwoman of San Luis given her insufficient English proficiency, I had all sorts of mixed feelings.

On the one hand, the woman was running for a City Council seat in a border town where 90% of the population speaks Spanish. The New York Times reported that initially Cabrera’s opponents spearheaded the effort to block her name from the ballot. This move soon became a divisive issue given the lack of clarity in the law regarding how much English politicians must speak.

Cabrera has maintained that she communicates with the community in Spanish and that she speaks enough English for her work with the council. She was, however, unable to answer some questions the judge asked her in court in mid-January. Whether it was because she was nervous, as she said, or because she didn’t understand, is anyone’s guess.

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When a Textbook Is Online, Not on Paper

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

Electronic books have changed the way many people read for pleasure. Now online textbooks are changing the way some students learn and some teachers teach.

More than one hundred seventy-five thousand students attend the public schools in Fairfax County, Virginia, outside Washington. Last year, the school system used digital books in fifteen schools. This school year, middle schools and high schools changed from printed to electronic textbooks in their social studies classes.

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Self-analysis key to learning English

“When it comes to learning English these days, it’s a jungle out there,” quipped Kim Tae-ho, a 26 year old architect, studying English to meet the demands of his job.

“There are so many options now; I think I have wasted lots of time doing the wrong thing.”

Kim’s frustration is common. Today’s tech-fueled industry includes mobile devices, e-learning, interactive tables, and, as is the case at Hagjeong Primary School in Daegu, talking robots. These are in addition to traditional mediums like human beings, English TV, and good old fashioned books.

With the recent decision to phase out native speakers in public schools, Koreans are asking what is the most efficient and cost-effective way to learn English.


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