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MULTILITERACIES AND EQUITY (HOW DO CANADA SCHOOLS MEASURE UP? - Coggle…
MULTILITERACIES AND EQUITY (HOW DO CANADA SCHOOLS MEASURE UP?
TECHNOLOGY
Literacy as it is taught and tested in our schools is still conceived as linear, text-based reading and writing skills.
Many significant financial and technical challenges to using computers effectively in schools
Only a relatively small fraction of students use computers regularly at school for meaningful or substantive academic work.
Technology use in Canadian schools is sporadic and unconnected to coherent pedagogical philosophies and practices.
Students typically still have only sporadic access to computers and other forms of new technologies within schools
It is
often not clear either to them or to their teachers what they should be doing with these technologies
There has been minimal discussion of what forms of pedagogy are required to maximize the potential of new technologies
LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY
Home languages other than English or French are viewed as largely irrelevant to children’s schooling
At best, they are treated with benign neglect and ignored
At worst, educators consider them an obstacle to the acquisition of English or French and discourage their use in school and at home
“multiculturalism” : a guiding principle for promoting tolerance and non-discrimination
Very few ministries of education or school systems have generated policies that articulate the intersections between “multiculturalism” and linguistic diversity and explore what this might mean for pedagogy.
ELL students in Canada typically require at least five years to catch up to native English speakers in academic English
Many teachers in Canadian schools lack the knowledge base and qualifications to teach ELL students has obvious implications for equity
Students frequently internalize a sense of shame in relation to their home language and culture.
Language loss, where the home language is replaced by the dominant language, occurs rapidly (within a few years)
A squandering of linguistic resources that are highly valuable within a globalized economy for the country as a whole
Frequently an interruption of communication and cultural transmission within the family.
Loss of opportunity and linguistic capital for the individual child
DIVERSITY AS A RESOURCE WITHIN SCHOOLS
Several months after arriving in Canada from Pakistan,Madiha, a Grade 7 student in Michael Cranny Public School of the York Region District School Board, coauthored with her friends Kanta and Sulmana a 20-page English-Urdu dual language book titled The New Country
In a “normal” classroom, She certainly would not have been in a position to communicate extensively in English about her experiences, ideas, and insights
The social structure of the classroom have been changed in simple ways by their teacher (Lisa Leoni), Madiha’s home language, in which all her experience prior to immigration was encoded, became once again a tool for learning
ELL students’ cultural knowledge and language abilities are
important resources in enabling academic engagement
ELL students will engage academically to the extent that instruction affirms their identities and enables them to invest their identities in learning.