After searching through many sources on the internet, I found some interesting thoughts about how a student's culture affects their learning. In Ani Derderian-Aghajanian and Wang Cong Cong's article, “How Culture Affects on English Language Learners’ (ELL’s) Outcomes, with Chinese and Middle Eastern Immigrant Students” (2012) it is pointed out that there are vast differences in cultural values and education in the home country from that of the United States and Canada. These differences often negatively impact students' learning. Clearly, traits that are characteristic of a culture, such as participation styles, can make success in the classroom difficult. It's important to be aware of these traits, but be careful not to forget to get to know the child as an individual. I thought it was interesting that they pointed out that often the children have difficulties in American classrooms because of stereotyping. Teachers often "mistakenly assume that all Chinese students come to their country with special academic skills" and don't see the child's real situation. (Derderian – Aghajanian and Cong Cong, 2012)
Obviously, if culture has such a huge impact on learning, then teaching has to be affected by it also. Teachers have to use everything they know about a child to teach them effectively. I think that showing students that you are interested in learning about their culture, and teaching the rest of the class some things about it, can help a student feel important and build their self-esteem. Also, any teacher of a culturally-diverse class will have to use specific strategies that will allow all students to acquire new information, especially in a Science or Social Studies classroom. For example, when presenting new vocabulary the teacher should make connections to known vocabulary, use pictures, and possibly cognates from the children's language.
References
Derderian-Aghajanian, A. and Cong Cong, W. (2012). How culture affects on English Language Learners’ (ELL’s) outcomes, with Chinese and Middle Eastern immigrant students. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(5), 172 - 180
I am so glad you mentioned the use of cognates. It is important to explicitly teach the use of cognates. Students are so used to associating only English with school that they are often amazed when cognates are pointed out. I had one group of students tell me that they thought they were cheating by using cognates because the other students were able to use them!!
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