Aria and Teaching Multilingual Children

Aria by: Richard Rodriguez
Teaching Multilingual Children by: Virginia Collier



Talking Points #2

Argument:

In my opinion, Collier argues that you should not take away a child's first language to try and get them to understand a public language. For example, if a child's first language or the language they speak at home is Spanish, don't make them stop speaking it just to learn the public language of English at school.  It has its pros and cons.  It is a good thing to become a better English learner because you will be able to understand and be able to participate more in school.  It can also be bad because it can take away the communication you have with your family if your parents can only speak Spanish.  In Collier's article Guideline #3 states, "Don't teach a second language in any way that challenges or seeks to eliminate the first language." What this is trying to say is by teaching students a second language, don't take them away from their native language.  In school, it should be okay to be able to speak more than one language.  Being bilingual or multilingual can be very important to a child's future and it may even help them.  In the article Aria, Richard was told he could only speak a public language which was English.  It got him and his family away from his native language, so he could only be fluent in one language.  When he went to school and learned only in English.  What happens in this article is exactly what Collier argues.  He shouldn't have been taken away from his first language just to speak English and make the nuns happy.  He lost his individuality by doing that.  Overall, Collier thinks that children should not be taken away from their first language to learn a public language it could hurt them in the future, and it could also take away their individuality! The link there goes to another article about how learning a second language means losing the first language, and I thought it was very interesting. 

 

Comments: I think knowing more than one language is really a better thing for most children.  In America, we are starting to use more and more Spanish in everyday life.  So, if you are able to speak both English and Spanish in America it can be very useful to you nowadays.  Also, I was surprised when I read that becoming stronger in your primary language was better than becoming stronger in both your primary language and a secondary language.  Apparently, being strong in your primary language can help transfer to a secondary language. Was anyone else surprised by that?  Lastly, just being strong in a secondary language can be the worst thing for a child, and I completely understood that.  Overall, this article was very interesting to read and I learned a lot about multilingual children, and how their primary and secondary languages affect them.