Blog #3 – Continuation: The Second Day and Visits After

           After the first visit, Kelly, the World Relief coordinator, was no longer going to be at the family’s home with us. Although this fact made me feel a little bit uneasy once again when we met the family for the second time, the continued friendliness emitted by the refugee family made me feel welcomed. We continued the strategies we employed on the first day – using the flashcards to teach the family basic vocabulary that are, hopefully, useful to them. Words that we taught included grass, shoe, knob, shorts, stove, clock, and rug. Although the flashcards had pictures on the opposite side of the words, we tried to also point out real-life examples as much as possible. For example, when we came to the word rug, we pointed and patted the rug that we were sitting on while saying the word so the family can make the connection that it is a rug.

            On the second day, the family was still getting used to the flashcards, so we went over them at a slow pace. I had cut strips of computer paper to bring for the family to use. We had the family guess the words while showing them the picture sides, and then we had them try to spell out the words onto the strips of paper provided to them. I recognized that the expectation that they would be able to spell the words without problem was farfetched and unrealistic, but we incorporated spelling along with the sight recognition and pronunciation of these vocab words because I had learned in my education classes (I am an education major) that writing helps ELL, English Language Learners, learn and remember vocabulary easier and more effectively (this is also an effective method for native English learners). Sometimes, the family was able to guess the first letters of the words, but they usually did not know how to spell the rest, so we would patiently spell them out for them to write onto the strips. We kept the strips to use for sessions after the second day.

            Instead of always doing the flashcard one-by-one, we tried changing it up by lining up the cards in rows and columns in front of them, the picture sides up. Then we would hand them a strip of paper that they had written a vocab word onto and ask them to find the flashcard that the vocab word called for. Sometimes, they were able to find the flashcard really quickly. Other times, it took them several guesses before they figured it out, or we gave them the answer. My partner had brought flashcards of colors and shapes (although we focused mainly on colors), so we also incorporated those into their vocab. Once again, we pointed to real-life examples, especially for the colors vocab by pointing to the colors on our clothes or objects surrounding us.

            We saw that the members had troubles with the phonological and semantic rules of language. Phonologically (dealing with speech sounds), the family continued to struggle with some vowel and consonant letters differentiation. They still sometime hesitated when saying the letters u and v or n and m because they could not tell which was which. They had this same problem when writing them, sometimes writing one instead of the other. Semantically (dealing with meaning of words), the family continued to struggle with differentiation between words that have similar spelling like plane and plant. They also had phonological problems with the pronunciation of these words. It was really difficult for the mother to hear the difference when we said it, no matter how much we seemed to emphasize the different sounds between those words. The son was younger, and he seemed to be attending school, so he had an easier time hearing the difference.

Even though our teaching was not intense, the learning was still difficult because it is a whole new language to them after all, but the family helped each other out often. They displayed a collectivistic culture aspect when they helped each other match the word strips to the flashcards, and also when they helped each other spell words or pronounced the words so the other could hear it from someone besides my partner and me. We continued to work at the problems, and even though they were persistent, some of them decreased over time. The mother learned to utilize the strategy that plant ended in a t and plane ended in an e. This rule helped her differentiate between them. She also wrote the pronunciation onto the paper strips, which really helped her both pronounce and identify the corresponding flashcard easier.

The formal atmosphere between my partner and I and the family also decreased over time. They seemed to have become more and more comfortable with our presence. I assumed this because they began to act more casually and informally around us. The first day, they sat straight up, and the son was very quiet, but on the second visit and afterwards, they began to sit comfortably, relaxing their body and slouching a bit. The son was more talkative and playful. He talked to his mother casually and sometimes became distracted by his little sister. It was understandable that he would get bored sometimes since he was still young. The mother was very serious about her learning, and sometimes she would signal for the son to come back to learning (sometimes to no avail), but she was also very easy-going.

             We found ourselves laughing (politely) more often at the phonological and semantic mistakes. We could tell she thought it was ridiculous how similar plane and plant sounded to her. The intercommunication between us was going well. The family seemed to enjoy themselves more, and it felt good that they trusted their time with us. With my specific refugee family, I learned that although they went through many experiences that I will never know, they are also very normal people who just want to live safe and normal lives. When and if I meet more refugees or refugee families, I will be respectful, of course, but I will also treat them like I treat everyone else, with politeness and patience.