Ila Hyams

Interview with Nathan! This interview features my dear friend, Nathan (Nate), who moved to Texas at a young age. Nathan and I discuss a variety of subjects, from the role age plays in learning languages to the types of influences English Language Learners (ELL) will face in their daily lives. Nate mentions that learning the language was easier when he interacted with his friends who were also learning the language. Similarly to a scholar by the name of Ortega, Nate believes that naturalistic learning - a style that heavily uses immersion - leads to more success in learning the language (2011). Unfortunately, Nate mostly used instructional learning - a style based on traditional teaching methods - and as such, he had to rely on his social groups to supplement the lessons (Ortega, 2011). Nate also explains his thoughts on content areas, and how certain subjects may require additional ELL differentiation for instruction. I agree that, in regards to my future content area,...

Hello again everyone, and for those of you new to this blog, welcome! My name is Ila, and I am a senior in the teaching education program here at UH training to become a middle school math teacher. I have used this blog for previous classes related to second language acquisition and ELL-centric study. Feel free to browse previous entries for additional resources and commentary. I have a few unique experiences with learning new languages. Formally, I took Spanish and French in school. However, I am much more comfortable with my Spanish-speaking abilities as my French has not been used frequently enough for me to be comfortable calling myself a conversationalist in the language. I also have family who speak Spanish as well as people I worked with who do as well. I took Spanish first, and the teacher focused mostly on workbook activities and vocabulary lessons. The routine was good for me, and I learned common phrases quickly. However, the experience felt lacking, and had...

Hi Everyone! I suppose I should start this section by thanking everyone for participating on this blog! I loved hearing your different points, and enjoyed reading your comments and answers to the many questions I posted on your own blogs. This was an excellent experience, and I hope to see many of you this coming fall semester! Now, although this class was condensed into 4 short weeks in comparison to the nearly 4 month long course during the academic year, I still enjoyed the content. I am currently working on a senior thesis for the Honors College, and seeing as diversity is the main theme of the research paper, this class had invaluable knowledge for me to access. Ortega, Gass, and Rowland were the main researchers I connected with in terms of their ideology and contribution to my own experiences (2011). However, I was also able to branch out and find other researchers, such as Frankl, who have such universal concepts that I can apply to my teaching as well as my personal li...

Hello Guys! This is my mother, Amy, who has years of experience in teaching 4th grade math and science. Ortega and Gass both have many points to say concerning immersion teaching, and the importance of motivation for students to succeed in learning second-languages (2013). Personally, there are few things better than motivation when it comes to academic success. I have always thought that motivation - either internal or external - where key to accomplishing academic goals. As a future educator, I have found several interesting ways to incorporate motivations into other aspects of my teaching besides simple grade-incentives. By integrating second-language acquisition into my daily teaching styles, I can better motivate my students. My mother mentioned how vital motivation was for her students to feel confident and succeed in her classes. I find that, when students feel motivated and confident, they tend to become high performing students rather than low performing ones. Add...

Interview This interview between myself and one of my  friends, Nathan, contains a discussion of Nate's experiences with being recessive bilingual. He moved down from Canada in elementary, and gained a fl uency in English at the cost of his fluency in Canadian-French. From Nathan’s interview, we know he learned Canadian-French naturally, as that is is native language - despite not having a large proficiency in it any longer. Ortega discusses naturalistic learning as a learning style based on immersion that does not depend on instruction (2011). Comparatively, from Nathan’s accounts, he gained his English-speaking skills from school - an instruction learning style - that Ortega mentions as a common method of second-language acquisition (2011). This makes sense, as it was the language he learned predominantly in school, not at home. Nathan moving here in his 2nd grade of school meant that he had far more opportunities to have a guided instruction than those who may have le...

Hi guys! After reviewing comments from others and making my own, I have developed a few more ideas concerning teaching second-languages in our current environment. Firstly, I briefly mentioned that I have no other languages in my repertoire, however my family is rather large. I have friends that might as well be family and family members themselves who speak Spanish fluently. I know phrases and have a basic understanding - enough to know when I am being scolded - however that is where my understanding stops. I was never pushed or encouraged to learn languages outside of English, nor was there ever a great desire to. This mindset is both ignorant and lazy. These are bad habits that I think we should curb before they get out of control in our students. Especially the lack of motivation. An increase in motivation has tremendous benefits, and not just for the concept of second-language acquisition, but overall academic performance as well. Secondly, there must be a dramatic...