As I began reading “Made in America”, I was really excited to see what Laurie Olsen would do with her research and how she would address the issues of racism, prejudice, and multiculturalism. I am really interested to see how Madison High School is representative of our nation and how, as a future teacher, I can use this knowledge base and Olsen’s experiences in both my ESL and mainstream courses. I just finished re-writing my teaching philosophy and incorporated the issue of multiculturalism. As I stated in my philosophy, teachers are now faced with a global classroom and the challenged that accompany it. I really am looking forward to seeing how Olsen’s research and experiences pan out.
Chapter 1
The first thing that struck me when reading Chapter 1 was the student Patty’s comment about the Chinese students and their game. I thought it showed an interesting dynamic within the school – students might be interested in other cultures and languages but do not actively engage (or attempt to engage) in the other cultures. Patty could have asked to learn the game, or asked more questions about why they play that game, but chose not too. I’m not sure if this is setting a general tone for the entire student body/school, but It made me stop to think about how I would actually address and embrace a multicultural learning community.
I think that it is extremely important to understand the history of the cultures in my room, and their stories of immigration. I really enjoyed the brief history lesson on California immigration and changes in the schools. I’m fairly unfamiliar with the history, so it was a nice background to the dynamic of Madison High School.
Chapter 2
This chapter really hit me. It was incredible to read some of the stories and experiences that these newcomer students had. For example, one of the students, Carolina, talked about how she had been laughed at when she first moved to America by the “native-borns”. She felt completely isolated and ashamed of who she was because she hadn’t yet learned “how to be American”. After reading this, I completely changed my idea about the experiences immigrant students have – it isn’t just about learning to speak English or write in English, it is about learning how to be American (what to wear, how to act, how to play sports). All of the things that native-born students think are inconsequential are actually a really big deal for immigrant students. It was so powerful to read that the students were so afraid of the laughter. Being made fun of seemed to be a bigger concern than making errors on homework. It was cause for much of the immigrant students’ anxiety, silence, and isolation.
I really struggled with this chapter because it was difficult for me to imagine what this sort of self-induced separation would look like. At the high school that I went to, almost all of the groups were interracial and multicultural. It was almost shocking to me to read that some students felt so isolated. I’m not sure if this is because we had a low level of ELL learners, or if I was just unexposed to and unaware of this separation and isolation.
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