Where ESL and LIteracy Meet...

It seems from you blog posts that you go a lot out of Dr. Grove's visit. I am really glad. I also think it is interesting to think about the connections between the ways ESL students are struggling with literacy in a second language, and the issues that face people struggling with literacy in their native language. Some of you may know Professor Hoyle in the Business School. He has an interesting post this week about the struggles in Afghanistan, and the long term cost of leaving a generation of people without education.

Instead of producing doctors, engineers, accountants, and the like who could serve as the leaders to help pull the country out of poverty, an entire generation basically went without education.

And then he goes on to say:

There is a lot of criticism of the educational system in the US and, most certainly, improvements can be made. However, regardless of what you think of US education, no one can deny how important it is to the growth and prosperity of our country. Sometimes it is easy to say “oh, I’m just a teacher” and view the job as unimportant but those of us in education need to constantly remind ourselves of how essential our job is.

And this made me think of Meghan's post about her third grade teacher and also about many of your posts this week (Kaitlin, Gyra, and others)about how overwhelming it can feel to work with an ESL student who has so much to learn! You may end up feeling the same way about the kids you are helping at the Boys and Girls Club--some of them may not be able to do the kind of work you hope they will do, and you might wonder if you have been any help at all.

Teaching can be hard because, as many of you have noticed, you rarely get to see the "final" result. (Is there a "final" result?) It is slow, one step at a time business. As consultants, it can be frustrating to not get to fix all of the things that you would want to fix in a paper that you see. But never forget how important your real work is: spending time with the writer, paying attention to details, asking and answering questions. That is where learning happens. It builds up slowly, day after day. And on our campus, a writing consultant may be the only person who ever does this for a student writer! Your work is VERY important.