{"id":18616,"date":"2018-06-22T10:34:06","date_gmt":"2018-06-22T14:34:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/voxy.com\/?p=18616"},"modified":"2021-04-30T13:13:20","modified_gmt":"2021-04-30T17:13:20","slug":"immigrants-top-10-language-learning-needs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/voxy.com\/pt-br\/blog\/immigrants-top-10-language-learning-needs\/","title":{"rendered":"Immigrants’ Top 10 Language Learning Needs: One Size Does Not Fit All"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are over 43 million immigrants in the U.S., and more than <\/span>20 million<\/span><\/a> are adults who are what\u2019s called \u201cLimited English Proficient,\u201d or LEP. \u00a0This means that on top of all the struggles they face to provide for themselves and their families, they have a huge and staggering additional barrier–not understanding English. <\/span>There is no national system to teach English to adults; classes are offered in church basements, community centers, and public libraries by a hodge-podge of organizations that mean well, but often have untrained, volunteer teachers using a one-size-fits-all curriculum–something that we know is inefficient and unlikely to yield effective results. \u00a0There are waiting lists for these classes, and when learners get to them, we aren\u2019t teaching them what they need to know in order to survive in the U.S, with potentially disastrous consequences.<\/span>Here\u2019s a clear example: several years ago, I had the opportunity to work with a group of researchers to conduct a needs analysis for an ESL program offered by <\/span>CASA de Maryland<\/span><\/a> (CASA), a community organization working to \u201cto create a more just society by building power and improving the quality of life in working class and immigrant communities.\u201d \u00a0Our task was to ensure that their ESL program offered instruction that would help solve the real problems faced by their learner population.<\/span>We began this needs analysis by conducting in-depth, focused interviews in students\u2019 native languages, and we uncovered thirty-five different reasons why they needed to learn English, from being able to talk to the police to understanding the directions on medicine bottles. \u00a0We then created surveys and distributed them over two semesters to 360 different students, asking them to rank-order the tasks identified by the focus groups in terms of their importance.<\/span>While all thirty-five tasks were important to some of the survey respondents, the top ten were rated by nearly the entire population as extremely important:<\/span><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Read official letters in English (from my bank, companies where I have accounts, from my doctors, from my children\u2019s schools)<\/span><\/li>\n
  2. Fill out job applications<\/span><\/li>\n
  3. Communicate with the police during a vehicle stop<\/span><\/li>\n
  4. Communicate with my boss<\/span><\/li>\n
  5. Understand a doctor\u2019s diagnosis<\/span><\/li>\n
  6. Read legal documents<\/span><\/li>\n
  7. Read the instructions on medicines and vaccines<\/span><\/li>\n
  8. Get a driver\u2019s license<\/span><\/li>\n
  9. Attend job interviews<\/span><\/li>\n
  10. Talk to representatives from my bank when there\u2019s a problem with my account<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Parents were worried about not understanding how to give medicine to their children or how to help them with their homework. \u00a0People were desperate to be able to explain things to their bosses and understand why they were being stopped by the police. They wanted to understand the dozens of letters, handouts, bills, and contracts that are part of life in the United States. \u00a0These students came to classes at night, after having worked all day in physically demanding jobs, because they wanted to learn the English that would help them solve real problems. <\/span>Unfortunately, though, most ESL programs aren\u2019t designed to do that. \u00a0Instead of relying on one-size-fits all textbooks that teach the days of the week, colors, and how to order coffee, ESL programs need to be using authentic materials to teach people how to understand a court summons or a doctor\u2019s diagnosis. \u00a0Giving practical, needs-based instruction is important for all language students, but it\u2019s absolutely critical for adult immigrants. It\u2019s scary enough to get six pages of discharge instructions after a visit to the ER; imagine what it would be like if you didn\u2019t understand the language in which they were written. \u00a0<\/span>These students have told us what they need to learn, and we know how to do it. \u00a0The list of top ten needs would be the perfect way to organize a task-based syllabus for adult ESL instruction. \u00a0If we had a national initiative to offer accessible, relevant instruction to these LEP immigrants, we would be able to help them with many of their problems. \u00a0Isn\u2019t it time to help newly-arrived Americans and their families succeed?<\/span>
    \n<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    There are over 43 million immigrants in the U.S., and more than 20 million are adults who are what\u2019s called \u201cLimited English Proficient,\u201d or LEP. This means that on top of all the struggles they face to provide for themselves and their families, they have a huge and staggering additional barrier–not understanding English. Yet our ESL programs often don’t address the multitude of needs of this population in solving the real-world problems they face in their daily lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":23774,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[743,748],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-metodologia-de-treinamento","category-voxy-engen"],"yoast_head":"\nImmigrants' Top 10 Language Learning Needs: One Size Does Not Fit All - Voxy<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There are over 43 million immigrants in the U.S., and more than 20 million are adults who are what\u2019s called \u201cLimited English Proficient,\u201d or LEP. 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