I thought that the original idea of having a school where some of the students were taught in English and some of them were taught in bilingual classrooms was interesting. I was very curious about what all was surrounding the circumstances. How were the students selected to be in the different classes? Was there a test? Was it this way for all of the subjects? How proficient were the teachers who were teaching in Spanish and English at both languages? This may be part of my over reactive brain and my need to ask a lot of questions, but I found them all to be valid.
A second part that I found to be interesting was the section where they described the different cognitive functions that the students would need to be able to answer a seemingly simple math question. It also listed the questions that would be asked as means of scaffolding to assess what parts of the question that the student did not understand. This was something that I had never thought about before, asking specific questions to understand what part of the problem that the child does not understand. I hope that one day I will be able to have the same understanding of what I am teaching so that I can help my students in the same way.
After going over this week’s readings, I found that I also have very similar questions pertaining to how the classes were specifically split up. I feel that the concept of an English classroom and a bilingual classroom is a good idea, but I feel we weren't given enough information on it to really put into perspective the way the class was set up. I have a classroom where there is only 1 student that has a second language presented, but English is her first language. My CT went on to tell how although she keeps to herself for the most part when it comes to schooling, it's more because she has a sort of language barrier. She has shown proficient knowledge and has excelled in her Math skills though which I found interesting because of how the article presented it to us. I think that the idea of having a separate class is a good one for the most part. When comparing the articles back to the girl in my class, I feel that understanding and explaining different cognitive levels really gives a good insight to learning for students with language barriers. As a future educator, understanding the needs of my students is going to be the most important aspect. If i can't get into my student's mind and understand what difficulties they're going through, it's going to limit myself and the student. I hope to gain experience and instruction in understanding more of learners that English is their second language because I have not had much experience with that.
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