language education – Educational Sociolinguistics

Simplified Chinese characters and Traditional Chinese characters, what is the future of the Chinese writing system?

Xavier Xia

Traditional Chinese characters and simplified Chinese characters are two types of standard Chinese character sets of contemporary written Chinese. Traditional characters had taken shape since the Reform of Writing and have largely maintained the same structure as when the regular script was introduced in the 2nd century. Since then, traditional characters were regarded as the only standard form of Chinese characters until the middle of the 20th century. Traditional Chinese characters are officially used in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau. Since the 1950s and 1960s, the government of China has introduced and promoted simplified Chinese characters to encourage literacy. Several decades later, they are officially used in mainland China, Malaysia, and Singapore.

I want to discuss the ongoing debate on traditional and simplified Chinese characters in this article. Even though with exposure and experience, people educated in one writing system can quickly become familiar with the other, it is challenging to convert an entire document written in simplified characters to traditional characters and vice versa. That is why some people argue Sinophone world should use only one type of character. Advocates of simplified characters argue that simplified characters contain fewer strokes, which means they are more accessible for people to learn the writing system and faster to write. The proponents also point out that the population of simplified characters users is much larger, and it is tough to convert all these people to another writing system. Nevertheless, the users of traditional characters claim the speed advantage of simplified Chinese has become less relevant in the internet age. They also state that the aesthetic continuity of China’s immense heritage of art, literature, and calligraphy is diminished by supplanting characters in common use for centuries.

Simplified characters inside and outside of the People’s Republic of China

Why do people keep dropping out of the Francization program?

Yurun Zhang

One of the things that most people would do when they arrive in Quebec is to learn French. When I first arrived here, I was really excited to take the free French courses and expected to speak fluent French.

However, my expectations and feelings changed after I stayed in this full immersion program for one year. I felt that the course did meet up my expectation and finally decided to drop out. Apart from me, I also saw many of my classmates drop for different reasons. Generally, there are some reasons for quitting:

Financial assistance for courses is not sufficient for living in Montreal. As their financial needs increased, they needed to start working, even though they haven’t reached the threshold for linguistic autonomy.
The language benchmark needed to obtain Canadian citizenship is proficiency level 4 (d’Haese, 2018).
French is too hard to learn, and people cannot see their progress in French and start to forget English words.
Certain professors treat students impatiently or intentionally target certain students.
People are too busy with school or work, so they have to give up learning French in class.
Some want to have courses but just cannot register because there are no available seats.

Here is a video about one student who dropped out of the francization program and talked about his reasons:

Can those concerns be solved? Probably, learning French during working hours can be a solution. Denis Hamel, vice-president of workforce policy development for the Conseil du patronat du Québec (CPQ), believed that teaching and learning French in the workplace during working hours is the best and most efficient way to learn French.

He said,

“You cannot expect either an immigrant or a Canadian-born person to follow courses in the evening or on a Saturday morning above all the duties we have in our lives.”

Providing opportunities to learn in the work place can solve many of those concerns, such as not having enough financial assistance, no time to learn, and no available seats to register. More flexible learning opportunities can be offered after working hours. Besides, instead of sitting in the classroom for 4 hours every day, some activities can be organized to practice French in real life, so people do not feel tired but still have to sit in class to learn. People can also see the progress of their French when using in real life.

Questions

If you are taking or once took a Francization program, what are the reasons that make you stay or drop out?

How can the Francization program be improved to keep students staying and learning French?

Reference

D’Haese, S. (August 20, 2018). Francization in Laval: The state of the issue. Government of Quebec. https://www.noslangues-ourlanguages.gc.ca/en/blogue-blog/francisation-francization-laval-eng

Translanguaging pedagogy in second language teaching

Jundong Ma

Translanguaging can refer to a pedagogical process of utilizing more than one language within a classroom lesson or it can be used to describe the way bilinguals use their linguistic resources to make sense of and interact with the world around them. The term “translanguaging” was coined in the 1980s by Cen Williams in his unpublished thesis titled “An Evaluation of Teaching and Learning Methods in the Context of Bilingual Secondary Education.” Williams used the term to describe the practice of using two languages in the same lesson, which differed from many previous methods of bilingual education that tried to separate languages by class, time, or day. More information about translanguaging can be seen in this video:

There are many advantages to using translanguaging pedagogy. First of all, the goal of including translanguaging as an aspect of second-language acquisition pedagogy is to move beyond sentence-level and grammatical concerns in second-language teaching strategies and to focus more heavily on discourse issues and on the rhetoric of communication. Students should be focused on the real applications of language that suit their purposes of communication based on the context in which they are communicating, rather than a one-variety-fits-all mode of learning the language. Reinforcing only English in academic situations is disadvantageous for students since students will ultimately encounter many varied communicative contexts, and as society becomes more digitally advanced, many of those communicative contexts will be transnational.

Apart from this, students will always reference what they already know from their first language when working with a second language. This helps students process the information and improve communication in their second language. Take me as an example, my mother tongue is Chinese, when I tried to learn Japanese, translanguaing is of great help to me. Since Chinese and Japanese share many similarities in vocabulary, like 手纸vs手紙，人间vs人間，翻译vs 翻訳, I can use my L1 knowledge to better understand my L2 language. As a result of using this translanguaging pedagogy, I become one of the best Japanese learners in school.

Question:

Are there any teaching strategies can teachers use to better facilitate translanguaing pedagogy?

References:

Wei, L. (2017). Translanguaging as a practical theory of language. Applied Linguistics, 39(1), 9–30. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amx039

Students’ Language Influences: to Accept or to Reject

Alison D.

As we are all aware, many teens use social media outlets for multiple hours, daily. From scrolling through TikTok, to watching endless YouTube videos, Twitter, Instagram, you name it, they’re on it. Upon the topic of teens time spent online, an interesting question to raise is how their language skills may be influenced by social media and whether this influence is something that teachers should shut down or use to learners’ benefit.

Based on my experience teaching English Language Arts to learners aged 13-16, it has come to my attention that many students speak and write in their ‘online literacy’ language. The most notable part of it is the use of acronyms and shortened words for writing in class. Words such as through are written as thru, to be honest as tbh, okay as ok, going to written and spoken as gonna, etc. The list can indeed go on. All of this to say, students are thus using a new form of language online that is not always translated well into the school curriculum.

When reading through my students’ final responses I was quite shocked. I was wondering what I can do to address my students needs as digital media users for them to understand the difference between informal online language and language that is expected in formal writing in class. I started with a discussion of comparing some of the acronyms that I found in their responses as well as their proper form. The thing is students say they are aware that they are using their online lingo in class. All this said, is it just a habit then, that influences their use of online language in class?

In addition to the shifts in writing skills from the influence of social media, I have noticed that students use the slang in their daily conversation approach with their peers as well as me, their teacher. Though, where am I to draw the line? I often get “Yo, Miss Alison!” Although I am not bothered by it, being a young teacher, I know it is not meant to be disrespectful. Whereas other teachers that I work with may be bothered by students’ current methods of speech and are unaware of the fact that this is indeed how teens speak to each other online and in person.

This discussion of specific forms of language belonging to either online or in school can be tied together by exploring the idea of style. According to Van Herk (2018), language users often shift the way they speak depending on the context. Typically, individuals evaluate the situation in which they are participating in and decide which language style is best fitting to the particular situation (Herk, p. 126). Moreover, the degree of formality is the focus that is being changed when discussing the topic of internet slang VS. academic writing as well as informal chatting and greeting with teachers such as “Yo, Miss Alison”. That said, the ability to shift depending on context is a skill, thus, a skill to indeed be practiced.

That said, where should the line be drawn? Am I to expect students to speak to me the same way they are expected to write in formal English? Also, how has their social media experiences influenced the way they speak and is this where the shift is coming from?

Questions:

Does social media influence teen’s language in the classroom? How can teachers promote students multiple literacies? Is there a form of language that should be solely used in school?

Source:

Van Herk, Gerard. (2018). What is sociolinguistics? 2e Chichester, West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.

Language education and social reproduction

Elisa Xu

Supporters of neoliberal economics believe that property rights and “the natural order of things” are important (Orlowski, 2011), so they just let the “invisible hand” of the market to influence economic arrangement. In this case, native-speakerism will win the game, and language education will become more and more market-oriented too.

Language education, especially English education in non-English-speaking countries will become a commodity which only the elites can buy and consume well. Take private schools in mainland China as examples. There are three types of private schools in mainland China: international school (IS), non-governmental private school (NGPS), and public high school international division (PHSID). Among these, the first two types are more expensive as they are totally private and have much affiliation and cooperation with western universities and institutions. For example, the total tuition fee for first year kindergarten children at Dulwich College Beijing (IS) is 241500 CNY, and the tuition fee at YK Pao School (NGPS) is 156000 CNY. The tuition fee will be even higher at junior and senior high school level.

Comparing to public language education system in China, which may cost only thousands per year, the language education in private schools can be considered as a “luxury product”. As we are in a neoliberal economics, access, networking, and experiences are paramount. (Rifkin, 2000) The new generations of social elites may build their networking in these schools and keep their identity through this system. In this sense, English, native-speakerism, and language education may be related to wealth and power, and finally link to social reproduction.

REFERENCES

Orlowski, P. (2011). Neoliberalism Laissez-Faire Revisited. Explorations of Educational Purpose.

Davies, B. & Bansel, P. (2007). Neoliberalism and education. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 20(7), 247-259.

Olssen, M. & Peters, M. A. (2007). Neoliberalism, higher education and the knowledge economy: from the free market to knowledge capitalism. Journal of Education Policy, 20(3), 313-345.

Promoting inclusivity in Francization courses through plurilingualism

Xavier Xia

The Quebec government provides free French courses to recent immigrants or study/work permit holders as part of its Francization program. These courses aim to improve the students’ proficiency in French and their ability to integrate into the Quebec society (Amireault, 2011).

I have been taking one of these courses at the Chinese Family Service Centre of Greater Montreal since January. My classmates, age 16 to 55, come from many places in the world. They have different L1(s), education background, and have been living in Quebec for varying lengths of time. They also have different motivations for learning French: some plan to immigrate to Quebec permanently, while others might decide to move to another province or another country entirely. However, despite the diversity of the class, my teacher insists a “French-only” policy.

As we know, learning a new language is akin to learning a new identity. The “French-only” policy, which forbids students from using other languages, is very predominant. Even though French is the only target language in this context, this policy is highly problematic because it creates a learning environment that solely encourages students to build their Quebecois identity, often at the expense of their original identities.

Instead, I think the Francization program should take a plurilingual approach (Marshall & Moore, 2013), like encouraging students to use their L1(s) in class. In addition to facilitating French learning, a plurilingual approach would also make the course more inclusive and reflect the multicultural and multilingual reality of the province we live in. For instance, my class comprises students from China, Hong Kong, Iran, Australia, Chile, and Mexico. I would like to see my teacher encourage the students to help each other in their L1(s) instead of interrupting them, saying “Parlez en francais!”. Not only is it an excellent way for us to learn French and build Quebecois identity, but it also reinforces our original identities by speaking our L1(s) in the classroom. Nevertheless, I suppose teachers who were taught to use monolingual methods and had been teaching in this way could find difficulty adapting or even resist this new educational methodology. Furthermore, students who have learned other additional languages in a monolingual environment could also question the benefit of plurilingualism.

Question:

Do you agree that plurilingualism can promote inclusivity in Francization courses?

What other challenges face the adoption of plurilingualism in Francization courses?

References:

Amireault, V. (2011). Identity construct of adult immigrants learning French in Montreal. Canadian and International Education/Education canadienne et internationale, 40(2), 61–74.

Marshall, S., & Moore, D. (2013). 2B or not 2B plurilingual: Navigating languages literacies, and plurilingual competence in postsecondary education in Canada. TESOL Quarterly, 47, 472–499. https://doi.org/10.1002/tesq.111

How does society influence Chinese and Canadian language education?

Yi Hu

I have lived in Montreal for more than one year. In February of this year, I chose to learn French at the language centre in Montreal. Since I have studied some French before I came here, I could deeply experience the differences in language teaching between these two countries.

In China, teachers were more likely to teach us some grammars, like conjugations and some words that were related to the texts. However, teachers in Montreal are different. They prefer to teach us some useful knowledge that we can apply in our daily life. For example, we have already learned the vocabularies about clothes and food. They also teach us some grammars but that is not the main point. Students can improve their French skills more easily here. I think the reasons that cause these differences are the different social cultures and surrounding environments. I will explain these in more details in the following paragraph.

*French Syllabus in Montreal (left)*
VS
*French Syllabus in China (right)*

China’s current social context of education is test-oriented. Teachers excessively pursue students’ academic performance but ignore the practical application of language, and simply indoctrinate teaching with Chinese thinking mode based on exam-oriented education, which will lead to ‘Chinglish’. Meanwhile, China is a monolingual country, meaning learners are in a group where all their classmates are proficient in the same L1 and share the same cultural identities (Thomas, 2022). Outside of the classroom, they usually speak Chinese, so there is no foreign language environment for students to practice.

On the contrary, teachers in Montreal pay more attention to the practice and the cultivation of students’ autonomous learning abilities. Students are usually asked to try to do one task in class, and then study and answer questions by themselves, to become their own knowledge. Teachers do not pay much attention to the test scores, but to the cultivation of students’ individual abilities. Meanwhile, students have a real language environment in Montreal. They can have many opportunities to try to put what they have learned into practice. In this article https://www.ednewsdaily.com/five-major-differences-between-the-chinese-and-american-education-system/, the author also gave us some other educational differences between Eastern and Western countries which are influenced by government policy and cultural norms.

I do think that one of the ways to show good performances in French or language learning is to get a ‘good’ grade, but it is not enough. I still remember what Professor Mela Sarkar said in class at that time, ‘many students with good grades cannot successfully order a cup of coffee in the coffee shop’. Therefore, our ability to communicate smoothly and comfortably with others is also a sign of good language learning; these two need to be integrated.

Last but not the least, I want to say that there is no best language teaching model, only the most suitable. After all, our social environment is different. However, do you think it is necessary to integrate these two different educational models together?

Reference:

Thomas, E. (2022). Issues and ideas for a monolingual context. International House. https://ihworld.com/ih-journal/issues/issue-48/issues-and-ideas-for-a-monolingual-context/

Reflecting on my experience and Kubota’s article—language is only a tool

Chingheng Chang

From my experience, I guess I have something to tell about the transcultural working context.

The first thing is about a person’s ability to accomplish a task. I am pretty sure that a person’s English language proficiency is not equivalent of the ability to do a good job in the workplace settings. I could still recall my experience working as a part-time server in a world trade centre in Taipei. When I was an undergrad, I grabbed every opportunity to work and learn something outside of the class because I knew it’s important to accumulate working experience and accommodate to the workplace environment. I will always remember one of the co-workers on my group, which consisted of more than 50 people. She was a student from the best university in Taiwan, and I overheard other co-workers’ conversation that her major was foreign language and literature. So, I guess her English was not a problem at all. However, she was the only person who got into big trouble, and our manager even yelled at her in front of everybody for her arrogance, awkwardness in doing something, and repetitive mistakes. To simply put, although English is definitely a must in such a workplace setting, a “pure linguist,” as mentioned in Kubota’s article, does not necessarily meet the demands of any job.

Why only now?

Géraldine Gras (post #3):

For my third and last blog post, I wanted to focus on an issue that was made evident from our second class of Educational Sociolinguistics: the lack of teacher preparation for second language teaching (beyond the second language itself). My group and I presented on the second week, on the topic of language identity amongst others. “How embarrassing! I knew nothing about language identity as a language teacher”, I thought to myself. This was followed by a ton of readings, hundreds of questions and self-doubt. It wasn’t until I spoke with teachers around me (from my schools and other graduate students) that I realized, my lack of knowledge was shared. Why is it that many of us, teachers, have never heard of certain concepts in our second language education despite completing an undergraduate?

Continue reading “Why only now?”

The Choice of Language

By Jia Pu——the third post

A couple of days ago, I happened to watch a video on YouTube, which inspired me to say something about immigrants and their choice of languages. The video is actually a pretty short interview of several second generation immigrants, whose parents speak broken English and suffered all kinds of difficulties due to their low proficiency. The link of this video is attached in the reference section so that anyone interested can have a look. It is touching and it reminds me of the language maintenance in immigrant families.

Continue reading “The Choice of Language”