Algebra. English literature. Physics.
School can be difficult no matter who your child is, but for a student who does not understand the language in which these courses are being taught, graduating high school may seem like a near-impossible feat.
For K – 12 students who attend school in the South Colonie Central School District, and for whom English isn’t their primary language, the English as a Second Language program prepares them for education and life in an English-speaking world.
Thursday, June 5, the ESL group celebrated the end of the school year with a picnic in which child-recipients were given awards based on their rate of achievement over the course of the year. Over 60 English-language students and 13 different languages were represented. One of those students was Kay Zhang.
According to Nora Callender, supervisor of ESL, Zhang is in kindergarten at Forest Park Elementary School. Zhang’s mother, Wen Tang, said that her daughter has known English for only three or four months. Zhang was awarded Thursday for her improvement in writing skills, said Callender.
Tang said that over the past few months, she has noticed her daughter’s improvement at home.
When she gets home, I check her books, she has homework too, she said. Tang also said that sometimes Zhang will watch television and that helps her learn English.
`I help her with basic words, like apple and cat,` said Tang.
While students like Zhang are eager to learn the language of the country they just moved to, Callender said it’s a requirement.
`Any English-language learner who’s newly arrived in our country has to receive ESL support throughout the day in all of our subject areas,` said Callender, `Our goal is to see them increase in their skills so that their growth and their rate of development can increase over the course of the given year.`
Callender said a few of the languages represented in the program are Chinese, Urdu (a variation of Pakistani), Vietnamese, Arabic, Spanish and Farsi.
The ultimate goal of the program, said Callender, is to have the students, who begin with no background in English, speak fluently enough to live a full life in America.
Ida Chung, 22, of Colonie, said she went through the program from the beginning and, when she graduated in 1995, had much more confidence in her knowledge of the language.
`When I first got here, I hardly knew English,` she said, `But the teachers were always encouraging me to talk, and I improved.`
Chung said that she is now watching her two younger nephews go through the same ESL program she went through, and that she tries to help them as much as she can. She said she has seen improvement, specifically with her older nephew.
`My older nephew used to not know how to speak up,` she said, explaining that now he is beginning to speak more English at home.
The four main skills the program works to fine-tune, according to Callender, are speaking, reading, writing and listening. Callender said speaking is usually the hardest part for the students.
`I think that kids, not so much at the young ages, are more conscious about their spoken language and they are sometimes not willing to take risks,` she said.
According to Callender, the teenagers in particular, at times, get frustrated and show more resistance, but the ESL teachers are very supportive in helping them work through the language and understand it better. They do so not only in the classroom, but also through programs the department holds throughout the year, including programs at the town library, encouraging students to read.
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