VBLOG: ENTRY 2

THE TONG FAMILY

The individual I chose to interview is Dave Tong. I met Dave and his family through our church. Dave and his wife, Sue, are my small group leaders and over the past year and a half an amazing friendship has blossomed. Dave and Sue were both born in Taiwan and moved to the United States as young children. 

CLICK HERE to hear Dave's story!

REFLECTION:

First, this was an amazing experience! Meeting with Dave and inquiring about his past helped me gain valuable insight in culture as it relates to SLA and methodology. As mentioned, Dave was born in Taiwan and came to the United States at the age of five. According to Ortega, the biological window for children to acquire their complete L1 is between the ages of four-six (Ortega, 2013, p.12). Dave's language during this time-period was Mandarin Chinese. Therefore, his native language is Mandarin Chinese. 

As a person who has been in the United States for the past forty-five years, Dave shares with us that he does not remember much about his experiences in the schools here in the United States as a child. However, the experience Dave does remember, he describes as "scary." Although Dave left Taiwan with his family, he was still immersed into a world, which the only language he understood was Mandarin Chinese. Dave says that when in Kindergarten he recalls not knowing "a lick" of English. He explicitly recalls a memory of the way he felt everyone "stared" at him "kind of strangely." That appears to be a powerful, yet, very sad, memory.

By listening to Dave's morphosyntactic and phonological competence, it is evident that it is very similar to those of native speakers. Ortega states that learners who began acquiring their L2 at such a young age tend to exhibit intuitions that are very similar to those of native speakers of that language (Ortega, 2013, p.19). From the age of five until adulthood, he has shared some of his language experiences, describing what it was like to be immersed in a language that he did not understand. Dave does not recall the rate at which he picked up on the language nor strategies which assisted him in learning the L2. However, Dave did stated that he recalled a teacher of "some sort" who would come into the class and work with him one-on-one in learning the target language. Dave also states that kids are resilient and that this one-on-one assisted him in adapting fairly quickly in communicating with his fellow classmates and teacher! Wright states that in the past, ELLs were assigned to ESL teachers. These teachers/specialists would pull students out of their classrooms a few hours a week and provide our ELLs specialized instruction and support (Wright, 2015, p. 2).

I found our conversation very intriguing when we discussed and compared his L1 to his L2. At this point in his life, Dave states that his L2 has become his more "dominant" language. Dave learned to speak Mandarin Chinese as a young child but learned to speak, read, and write in English as a young child and throughout the majority of his life. According to Rowland, bilingual children are affected by the amount of language that they hear. The more a child hears in a language, the more that language develops (Rowland, 2014, p. 193). With that in consideration, it helps explain Dave's descriptions of feeling more dominant in his L2, while describing the feeling of his L1 fading due to the lack of use.

In other words, Dave's native language was his dominant language at the age of five. Most children are entering school at this time. Dave did not have an opportunity to develop the reading or writing skills in his native language. Over the years, he has experienced a gradual fading of his native language partly due to the consistent increase of exposure and input in English. It is the English language in which Dave feels he can fluently speak, write, and read.

Wright discusses the importance of educators becoming knowledgeable of their own students' cultural backgrounds and how culture influences learning at school and involves much more that "food, dress, art, music, and holidays of an ethnic group" (Wright, 2015, p.17). When asked, Dave responds that he does feel that culture has been taken away from due to the lack of use of his native language. Dave tells us that his parents still speak Mandarin Chinese, however, their L2 has also become more dominant. Dave tells us that his three children grew up with their L1 being English. Dave states that although he wanted his parents to teach his children Mandarin Chinese, his grandparents thought it was just "easier" to teach them English. Along their generational journey in life, there has become a shift in their dominant languages and a part of their cultural identity suffers because of that. As Dave states, there is just so much embedded in language that culture seeps through the language and "you really get a chance to see how the thinking process works through the language." Furthermore he states that if you "don't speak it your not really following some of the thinking processes that they have for that specific culture." Dave ends his thoughts about losing a part of his culture with "IT IS WHAT IT IS." This is a powerful statement. A statement that made me think about our schools. "It is what it is" is something I use when I feel like I just have to accept it, that there is nothing I can do to change the situation. Hearing him state, "it is what it is" made me feel like he just accepts that for what it is. I get that, but can't we create a different end result for our ELLs. Wright states that it is important for educators to understand their students' cultural backgrounds and be diligent at avoiding stereotypes and generalizations (Wright, 2015, p.17). However, avoiding these stereotypes and generalizations is only one step. This assimilation ideology that immigrants who come to the United States must "willingly abandon their language and culture to become Americans" is absurd and damaging to one's culture identity (Wright, 2015, p.19).

I hope that our educators, our schools, our country can assist our ELLs in learning the L2 while still keeping their L1 intact while simultaneously encouraging and providing ample opportunities to have ELLs excel in their L1 alongside the L2.

I want to personally thank the Tong family for not only sharing their story with me, but also allowing me to share their story with others! Hearing first hand has helped me gain a better perspective outside my limited personal experience in second language acquisition and methodology!

REFERENCES:

Rowland, C. (2014). Understanding child language acquisition. New York: Routledge.

Ortega, L. (2013). Understanding second language acquisition. London and New York: Routledge.

Wright, Wayne (2015). Foundations for Teaching English Language Learners: Research, Theory, Policy, and Practice. Philadelphia, PA: Caston, Second Edition.