Topic Activities Unit 10

TOPIC 1:  Unit 10

Some of the accents were drastically different and other accents sounded extremely similar to me.  I was thinking that it also has a lot to do with the background of the listener.  Maybe some of the accents did not seem that different to me because I’ve been to that area of the country and can more easily understand those speakers.  We have to consider that some of our learners may not have ever heard a certain accent before and it could sound completely different from the English they are familiar with!

TOPIC 2:  Unit 10

1.        I found this to be so sad but I know that this isn’t an exaggeration.  This type of thing really happens.  I’ve been places where some of the conversation in the faculty room suggests that some of my colleagues would not only accept, but support this type of behavior.  If they were a bystander in this situation, I don’t think they would do anything at all, in fact, I think they would encourage it.  What would I do?  I like to think that I would have the courage to stand up for these people I don’t know because it’s the right thing to do…I can’t say for sure that my nerves wouldn’t get the best of me.  I can say that I would stand up for my own students and make sure that they felt safe and supported in my classroom, in school and in the community where they live.

2.        I found each of these websites very interesting.  I was especially fascinated by the website about Eubonics as a foreign language.  I like the comment in that article and agree that it is important to at least recognize the language that students bring with them to school. 

I also found the website that provided the “myth/reality” section very interesting.  My favorite myth/reality was:

·         MYTH: Dialects result from unsuccessful attempts to speak the "correct" form of a language.

REALITY: Dialect speakers acquire their language by adopting the speech features of those around them, not by failing in their attempts to adopt standard language features.

Isn’t that how we sometimes look at it?  We assume they are just “messing it up”!  Very interesting and very eye-opening!