Mr. P's Pedagogical Workbench

I wrote this poem in bed the morning before my second lesson of my unit. The first lesson went fine (actually, pretty good), but those perennial spirits of anxiety and low self-esteem creeped into my head; I found myself falling into the jaws of some dark foe. This poem is a response to that feeling. The metaphor of the tiger not only extends to our teaching lives, but also our day-to-day interactions. Let us beware those creatures that stalk in the brush.  Let us hold onto our roar. The Tiger By Ashton Pacholski Class, you are dismissed. You walk out the door, looking up to see the darkness surrounding you. You tread lightly to your car aware of the icy path in front of you. At home, you throw the backpack down anxious to pick it back up. At your desk, you smile briefly thinking of your coronation: The black and yellow crown, the pendulous tassel, the adulation of peers. In bed, you hide beneath false security, blankets of tears....

Reading through Robertson and Ford’s article on Language Acquisition for English Language Learners (ELLs), I couldn’t help but think about an insightful point from Randy Bomer: “...students need to learn ways of thinking about language...that will allow them to respect other citizens across differences” (2011). The key word from the aforementioned quote is respect . As future educators of ELLs, we need to establish on the onset of instruction that learning English does not allow for the denigration of other languages. Historically speaking, the lingua franca of English has long since held a prestigious banner over all the other languages. Due to its universality, and power (due to socio-political reasons), English has been thrusted on a pedestal as the language that is synonymous with social—upward—mobility. Although I agree English is the language of global business, educators need to come together to bring light to the fact that Standard American English (SAE) is simply a dialect ....