The Kubota article “Unfinished Knowledge” was particularly interesting because it links really well with another course I am taking. The story of Barbara starts out by talking about the expectations she had for her new ELL students. It said that her students were from Japan, China and Korea and that Barbara was relieved because she thought they were going to be able to pick up the material quickly. I thought that this was interesting because in Special Education course that I am taking, we learned that ELL students are more likely thought to have a learning disability or an intellectual disability because teachers have these expectations for students. When the students do not perform as the teacher expects them to, then the teacher then asks for a referral. This shows that we need to be even more careful as educators because these generalizations made about ELL students can land them in a program that they should not be in, which could be detrimental to their education. What I think is great about this article that it shows how Barbara reflects on her own teaching and is making attempts to learn. It is extremely important that we reevaluate our teaching strategies many, many times throughout the course of our careers.
Kubota’s articles in general show how a student’s culture and background can affect their writing and their learning in general. Students come from different backgrounds that influence their mindsets and outlook on education. I found it very interesting that Kubota stated in his “Japanese Culture Constructed by Discourses” that students from Asian backgrounds may struggle with group or peer writing because they will feel more inclined to help come up with a group goal than to criticize the work of their peers; this comes from their collectivist views that their homeland teaches them. I do not believe this is something I would have ever thought about had it not been mentioned in this article. Peer editing and literature circles are very common in elementary classrooms, but I never thought about how a student’s learning style or outlook can affect these activities.
Connor’s article can be linked to the other ones because it talks about writing styles and systems that other countries use that may be different than what we are used to here in the West. All in all, I feel that these articles show us that as educators we must be mindful of where are students come from and what they might be used to. My question then is as educators we are still trying to teach a curriculum; is this saying that our curriculum is wrong and that we should not teach them our writing system? I guess I am just confused as to how to approach teaching writing or any other subjects for that matter. How do we know what curriculum to enforce and what to change to be more accommodating?
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