Report advocates bilingual education to promote Kurdish

Hi everybody,

this is an interesting article about the Kurdish students in Turkey, who have to go to school without or some Turkish language experiences. This research figured out that immigrant students or students with dialect spend their first years in school trying to learn a new language instead of new academic subject.

www.todayszaman.com

http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/news-225344-report-advocates-bilingual-education-to-promote-kurdish.html

Kurdish children who start school with poor Turkish are facing many difficulties and usually are not able to continue their education, a report issued by Diyarbakır Political and Social Research Institute (DİSA) pointed out. The report, prepared by Vahap Çoşkun, Şerif Derince and Nesrin Uçarlar following face to face interviews with students, their families, teachers who do not speak Kurdish and teachers who do know Kurdish, suggests a bilingual education system as a solution.

The research, which came about with the cooperation of the Heinrich Boll Foundation, Chrest Foundation and Global Dialogue, notes that that one of the very first Turkish words that Kurdish children learn in the school is “be quite.” According to students interviewed in the study, they quickly discovered that they were not allowed to speak in Kurdish even during breaks and had a strong feeling of alienation and desire to return home as soon as possible. First graders especially face many psychological hardship, such as not being able to express themselves, being unable to even ask permission to go the toilet, learning to read and write quite later, and even when they do learn, not understanding the meaning of what they are reading and writing. Most children also complained about the negative attitude by teachers and said they felt humiliated. The children also felt that when they improved their Turkish, they were afraid of losing fluency in their native language and facing communication problems with their parents. The teachers who don’t know Kurdish also face similar problems. The interviewed teachers pointed out that they are unable to enjoy teaching, disliked having to make hold students back to repeat the year and they too had feelings of alienation. Teachers that also spoke Kurdish are not immune from those feelings as they could not speak in Kurdish during class, but did so during individual conversations with their students. Parents of the children who don’t know Turkish said they found it difficult to participate in school meetings and were not able to help their children, but that they still tried to encourage their children to learn Turkish. The report stresses that the first years of school are significant for many communication problems between the students and the teachers. “Many teachers pointed out that the students are willing to learn and trying to learn but as their Turkish is not good enough they miss the opportunity to continue to their education. Most of the children felt stressed due to their language difficulties and felt they were considered as less intelligent, lacking motivation and not studying hard enough,” the report pointed out. According to the research, children face the feeling of being a loser from the very start of their school life and they try to cope with feeling of being behind because they spend their first years in school trying to learn a new language instead of new academic subjects. The students complained that as they didn’t know Turkish they felt stigmatized and subject to physical violence not only by their teachers but also from their peers. The students also complained that some teachers forced some of the students to submit reports about who is speaking in Kurdish at school and after school thus creating further pressure on the students. The report discusses these problems and provides international examples of bilingual education; however also points out that it is not easy to develop a model for this kind of education. Other solutions that the researchers point out include transforming the dominant teacher/submissive student relations; creating university departments that educate teachers on bilingual education; training teachers on diversities of the languages and cultures; allowing Kurdish speaking teachers to specialize in bilingual education methods; encouraging teachers to learn other languages spoken in Turkey; opening reading and writing in Kurdish courses for the parents; raising awareness in society of languages other than Turkish and TV programs for bilingual students.

"Waiting for Superman" a true story

Last week I saw the documentary “Waiting for Superman” directed by Davis Guggenheim. I really wanted to see this movie. /I wanted to learn more about the educational system in the USA, it’s the problems and lacks. Also, I have only spent time here in New York and I am very interested to see the other states because everybody is telling me “New York is New York and not USA”. I was thinking that almost everybody in the US goes to high school and maybe doesn’t have 10 % a high school degree.

But “Waiting for Superman” opened my eyes. I saw in the movie two boys and a girl who were hoping to get a place in these special schools. The girl wanted to become a doctor and help other people. Her whole life was dependent on a lottery.

By the end of the documentary, I tried not to cry but then I saw a lot of people had been craying. I saw their red noses and wet eyes.

And surprise surprise, the USA does not give everybody the same chance and choices. Now, I am wondering what is the role of the teacher? Could teachers be the supermen? I think teachers are the supermen/women and therefore we need sacrificing teachers to close this gap in the education system.

Barbara Johnson and "Deconstruction"

I read an interesting article written by Barbara Johnson. This article is about deconstruction. Deconstruction is a theory of literary criticism and philosophical movement which questions traditional assumptions about certainty, identity, and truth.

In The article of Barbara Johnson “Writing and reading differently” mentions that the reader interprets and reads the literature from his personal view and experience. In this case each reader will understand the literature different. The understanding will be depending on the reader’s social background, knowledge, religion, political attitude and so on. However, privileging commonality and simplicity and seeking unifying principles deconstruction emphasize difference, complexity, and non-self-identity. A deconstructive reading of a text, or a deconstructive interpretation of philosophy (for deconstruction tends to elide any difference between the two), often seeks to demonstrate how a seemingly unitary idea or concept contains different or opposing meanings within itself. The elision of difference in philosophical concepts is even referred to in deconstruction as a kind of violence, the idea being that theory's willful misdescription or simplification of reality always does violence to the true richness and complexity of the world. This idea can be taken as a rejection of the philosophical law of the excluded middle.

If we combain this with the quotion of Barbara Johnoson

“…Deconstruction is first and foremost a way of paying attention to what a text is doing – how it means, not just what it means…”

She is trying to say that it is not just the text (vocabulary) it is also important how the writer tries to demonstrate his purpose. This kind of writing verdures that there are not one right interpretation. We can say that a text is not passive it is active. It does something with the reader. Because the text is influencing the reader how he she has to understand it. She says that reading is not the task of churlish the true single meaning of the text, but of churlish its multiple meanings, which are often unstable and conflicting. This ambiguity has allowed readers to enter texts at the locations where the author tries to erase, or distort the various claims that are made through language their identities.

AM I Superman/woman ?

Are teachers Superman/woman? Is this really how society, especially the students see teachers? First, to answer this question, I want to explain what Superman/woman means for me and secondly, how I thought in my childhood, were my teachers my Superman/woman?

Superman/woman is a person, who has magical powers, fights for the rights of the innocent, poor and underdogs. Superman/woman fixes all problems and tries to make the world a fair place. He/she is always there, when people needs his/her help.

My elementary school teacher was like an angel. She was an old woman and she never got married. Her students were all she had. She worried about us more than our parents sometimes. And yes, she was my Superwoman, because I knew, she would help me with my problems and she would help me, when my classmates bothered and made jokes about me.

In middle and high school everything change rapidly. New school, teachers and classmate. It was a big change in my life. My Teacher was a young woman and she was full of life. I was looking for my Supermanwoman Teacher, unfortunately, she was not be there. 30 Students in one classroom. It was too much for my Superman.

I felt so uncomfortable, that I could not speak in class and my grades, become worse. I was really waiting for my Superwoman, that she would say something and take care of me.

I think yes, Teachers are like Superman/woman. We are not in class because we want to teach them, science, language or literature. No, we are there, because we want to “create” a person, who can survive in society. We have to teach these kids, how to do well in life, in their relationships, families, careers and so on.

When I think of my immigrant students in Germany I knew, I was there Superwoman, because I was one of them. We had the same background and my students knew that I went through what they were going through.

I was able to see in their eyes what they expected from me. Therefore, it was never important for me, how much money I would make as a teacher because what I gave to my students is to valuable to give a price.

Waiting for “Superman” (2010) is a documentary film from director

Davis Guggenheim and producer Lesley Chillot.

The film analyzes the failures of American public education by

following several students

trough the educational system.

Waiting For Superman’ is a look inside the education system of America,

its flaws and what’s being done to fix the problems inherent to the system.

Many people know that the U.S. education system has flaws,

and this movie does a lot to bring out and highlight the problems.

The text “What no bedtime story means: Narrative skills at home and school” written by Shirley Brice Heath explains an experiment called “Maintown ways”.

After I have read this article I was very upset. Children, with educated mothers have more chances to become good students and go to a good college and what about children, whose mothers do not know this kind of information? How can we fix this situation?

Teachers children become teachers, and doctors children become doctors. We have to discuss how we can close this gap between students from educated homes and non educated homes. My parents are workers, and my mother has only completed elementary school. In elementary school I worked hard to close this gap because my parents knew and were worried about this gap. And additionally, I grew up bilingual, which is still not excepted and viewed as a positive thing in Germany.

When I started to teach in an “afterschool program”, I have tried to close this gap by my immigrant students. I knew, their parents were not well educated but they spent a large amount of money to join my “afterschool program”. I have worked with the parents. I knew, that I had to guide the mothers first and then I can teach their children.

First, I visited my students in their homes. I saw their environment. How is the communication between the families. My main interest was, where was the TV placed in the house? On the basic of the placement of the TV, I could see how often the family watches TV. I talked to the mothers and convinced them to put the TV not on the “main place” of the living room.

My second step was, to talk to the fathers. I told them, if they do not read books or newspapers to educate themselves, then they cannot expect their children to read a book while he is watching TV. So, the fathers agreed and the made a subscription to a newspaper and they promised me to go with their children once a month to the library.

After I talked to the parents, I could now start my teaching with the kids. I bought diaries for my student, ice cream in summer and hot chocolate during the cold winter time. When they did their homework very well, I always had a gift in my bag. All these motivated my students and they felt comfortable in school and they earned very good grades. Some of the teachers called me and they asked me for more advice, so they can use my techniques for the other immigrant students. By the end of the school year almost all of my students got the right to visit the “Gymnasium”, which is the best school system in Germany. Only when you graduate from this school system, you can go to college.

Twice a week for ninety minutes I taught them. Once a week I called their parents and asked how their children were doing at home. When the parents are not well educated, then we need teachers, who can sacrifice more than they should do. For me is teaching is a holy job. When I want our society should become more open minded, tolerant,and so on, I know, the best way to improve our society is to teach and create “good people”.