Rodriguez/Collier-Extended Comments



In Brigette’s blog she discusses Richard Rodriguez’s article “Aria” and an excerpt from Virginia Collier’s book “Teaching Multilingual Children”.  Brigette brought out some points that I also highlighted in my reading of these two pieces.  While reading these two texts by Rodriguez and Collier I made connections to Lisa Delpit and the “culture of power” that she discussed in her article “Other People’s Children”.  I then read Brigette’s blog and noted that she made the same connections.

Brigette discusses in Rodriguez’s “Aria” that he felt English was a public language and Spanish was a private language.  I also highlighted this while reading because I had never thought of that before.  I guess if you grow up speaking a language in your home but outside of your home you only hear a different language that as a child you may make the connection that your home language is your private language with your family and the language spoken in the rest of your community is the public language.  Rodriguez wrote, “Because I wrongly imagined that English was intrinsically a public language and Spanish an intrinsically private one, I easily noted the difference between classroom language and the language at home.”  Brigette also discusses that Rodriguez felt a loss of closeness when his parents switched over to speaking English in their home.  He must have felt that their private home language or their private connection was gone and their relationship was now more formal with the change to the public language in their private space.  Although Rodriguez felt this loss, he felt it was necessary for the change to take place if he was to learn the language of the “culture of power” as Lisa Delpit would describe it.  Brigette points out in her blog that “Collier, Rodriguez, and Delpit do agree on the aspect that students need to be taught the values (for example, the English language) of the “culture of power” in order to be successful within it.”  I agree with this connection and the need for explicitly teaching the “culture of power” in order for all to be successful.

Brigette discusses the challenges of a bilingual teacher that Collier examined in “Teaching Multilingual Children” and writes in her blog about the guidelines that Collier presents.  A few of the guidelines really struck me while reading the text because I had never thought about them before.  “2. Do not think of yourself as a remedial teacher expected to correct so called “deficiencies” of your students.”  When teaching language to a native speaker many teachers feel comfortable to teach them as a foreign language.  But Collier says, “Second-language or foreign-language methods are inappropriate for native speakers.”  Collier’s third guideline was, “Don’t teach a second language in any way that challenges or seeks to eliminate the first language.”  It’s important to teach children the dialects of the standard form of the language but to also teach them the value of the dialect that they grew up with.  Brigette connects this view to Lisa Delpit’s article “Other People’s Children.”  Delpit agrees with Collier that “teachers should value and appreciate the student’s own language and culture, and also agrees that students should be taught the values of the “culture of power” in order to be successful in society today.”  I also made this same connection while reading Collier’s text.  Delpit maintains that students need to hold onto their own culture as they learn the rules of the “culture of power” so that they too can play the “game” and be successful.