Reflection 1: Multi-Cultural Classroom

During my freshman, I participated in Service Learning, placed at Red Cedar Elementary school in East Lansing. Red Cedar Elementary is a school full of various different cultures, with students coming from all over the world. Students enter and leave the school various times throughout the semester, living with parents who travel for work. Several of the students had parents that were MSU professors, or traveled for work seasonally.

I worked in a classroom with Kindergarteners, and watched several of the students struggle to learn English. Many of the students parents did not speak English, so school was the only time to practice the new language. In a classroom with a teacher who speaks English, many of the students had trouble assimilating into the language. All of the directions, books, and lessons were in a language they were not familiar with. Thankfully, Red Cedar celebrated the several cultures and had the flags of each country represented hung throughout the hallways, and made a huge effort to help students as much as they could. Many of the students would leave the classroom a few at a time to work on their English with a separate teacher, having more personal instruction. 

I had never worked in a classroom setting like this, and having this interesting experience made me want to help students of other languages speak English! Many of the students were open and willing to learn the language, just needed a patient teacher to help them learn. The teacher I worked with did an amazing job helping students, I was always impressed with her willingness to help each student to understand all of the tasks and directions. After my freshman year, I kept in touch with the teacher and ended up helping her again my sophomore year with another group of students. 

Overall, I learned a lot about multi-cultural classrooms, and saw the daily challenges. Each day brought on different experiences, and I found it interesting how each student learned how to adopt the new language.