Lindsay Androy July 17th, 2013 ED.

692 Literacy Landscape Reflection Seeing as I have yet to be in a classroom at this point in my graduate program, nor have I subbed in a classroom, so for this paper I will describe the classroom I was in while doing an observation for ED 691. My observation took place in the English Language and Culture Institute, more specifically, in a classroom where students were studying English grammar. I was there to observe the teaching style and the teachers use of sheltered strategies, but upon walking into the room, I was immediately drawn to the dcor of the room. Tables were aligned in rows facing the white board, and the tables were limited to two students per table. The walls in the room were filled with visuals. Posters, signs, flags, and maps all representing the United States and the American culture. I also noticed that the pictures were covered in labels so that students would be able to make connections between the word and the visual of what that word represents. But what I did not see what the representations of any other country or any other culture then the United States and American culture. Every student in the classroom, and the ELCI in general, is from a country other then the United States. In order to create a comfortable learning environment for these students, there needs to be some representation of things that are familiar to each individual student. One change, that will promote a print-rich multicultural classroom, could be displaying a world map rather then limiting the map to the US only. Taking a step farther,

students should be encourage to mark where their home country is so all students and staff can have a better understanding of their background. One other change I would make would be to display visuals from a variety of cultures. Although it is easy to define the stereotypical American society, the United States is a melting pot for cultures and depending on what part of the country you go to, you can be exposed to a number of different ethnicities and cultures. To be true to what America is, all of these races and cultures should be displayed throughout the classroom. The discourse of school can be learned without minimizing or rejecting home culture(p.17), meaning as teachers we should create a classroom which represents both discourses rather then just one. As for promoting biliteracy in the classroom, my first critique would be that there was no language, other the English, represented. Most of these students are new to the United States and have had little to no exposure to English. The best thing to do would be to not limit the labeling to only English, but rather to create multiple labels in all of the students native languages as well as English. Teachers lead students to make connections with their already acquired knowledge and then build on that knowledge for an even greater understanding(p. 17). Labeling in multiple languages could be the visual connections students need and build off of. The last thing I noticed, and that needs to be modified to help promote biliteracy, was the absence of any type of word wall or word dictionary. The students often looked confused when listening to the teacher talk about verbs and the actions going on in their textbooks. It would be more effective if the teacher would have introduced new verbs by having students create a chart in which they

wrote the new word, guessed at the meaning, wrote the actual definition, drew a picture representation of the word, and most importantly, translated the word into their native language. Prior to this observation, I would not have thought visuals and literacy on the wall would be so important, especially at the high school level! But I now understand how visuals and literacy representation in the classroom is important, and how even if both things are present in the classroom, if they are not done right and do not include everyone, the learning environment can be negative rather then positive.