I work in a primary school and will have a polish girl starting tomorrow who does not speak english. I dont dpeak Polish either but am trying to find ways to make it as easy as possible for her.
The initial exposure and confrontation will prove difficult and trying; soon to be replaced by comprehension and mutual understanding. Patience, consideration, exploration, and a good English / Polish Polish / English dictionary, there is one available from Random House, will serve to bridge the gap. Like your new student, I too came into the American School system without speaking English.
About six month is all that is required for your student to learn to understand you. The enunciation may have something to be desired but the understanding is there.
The funniest thing is that I've never met anyone who would like to sent his/her child to english school without any knowledge about this language. It may appear very difficult for you to start.Actually it's almost impossible to learn this child english without any basics. If I was you I'd advise parents to move their child to the school, where it can be taught by polish teachers. I wish you luck:)
[quote=nicoletia, Post #4 ]If I was you I'd advise parents to move their child to the school, where it can be taught by polish teachers.[/quote
Why should Polish children be provided with Polish teachers whilst they are in England...our education system is stretched enough without trying to pander to every nationalities needs...
When the vietnamees came over in the late 70is they were not given any extra help and most were from small villages and didnt speak any english they soon adapted and learnt the language
When I moved From Poland to Florida I knew VERY little English and was not used to hearing it with an American accent. I went straight into ninth grade. Math was a piece of cake. Geography was not too bad because the names of places were somewhat similar. For history and science classes I did lots of vocabulary memorization and I answered questions by copying full paragraph on each topic from my text books. My teqachers were okay with that. My first semester i failed English only. Went to summer school and frm then on had no problems. The best thing I ever did was memorize over 100 irregular verbs on three tenses (ex. know, knew, known), which improved my English a lot. The hardest thing was other students making fun of my accent, my clothes, my hair... No teacher ever stood up for me. I graduated with a 3.5 GPA and the rest is history. So my advice to you as a teacher is to be patient and supportive and PLEASE do not try to send this child to another school. They tried to do that to me. I'm glad my dad stood his ground and I stayed in that school because I don't think I would have received as good of an education in another school.
Actuall, i think you will find that you are gravely worng. I myself went to english school as a child knowing only the phrase : 'can i go to the tiolet please', and right now I am an IB student who got an A in GCSE english. Children grasp language so much quicker than adults do, so dont cripple your children by forcing them to learn a language the hard way: by being taught slowly. They JUST DONT NEED IT.
Im not sure about the education system in the USA, but if a teacher in the UK said that to a 12 year old girl he wouldn't be a teach for very long after ;-)
charris0n, don't worry. At this age children do not LEARN language but ACQUIRE it in a more natural way similar to that of acquiring their mother tongue. Therefore, they learn it fast and relatively effortlessly. I think you should help her by non-verbal communication rather than trying to speak Polish.
I've never met anyone who would like to sent his/her child to english school without any knowledge about this language. It may appear very difficult for you to start. Actually it's almost impossible to learn this child english without any basics.
If you knew some psycholinguistics basics, that wouldn't seem so scary. I even heard an opinion (from a specialist), that if you want your children to speak English better (especially in terms of pronunciation) and you're a foreigner, you should not speak English at home at all lest your children take up your foreigner errors and accent.
I agree with the comments on just being patient and communicate using lots of hand gestures and speaking slowly and clearly (which as a primary teacher you probably do anyway). When I was at primary school in Dubai we had a boy, Bartosz, that started with no english knowledge whatsoever and within a few months he was communicating easily enough and was one of the first people in the class to be reading. I do believe recently he completed his BA in English at a uni in Liverpool.
As has been mentioned...young childred pick up other languages much faster than adults.
I myself have just received 2 Polish children in my class of 4/5 year olds this week. The little boy is at the appropriate age for my class, the girl is 2 years older. So far for the last 4 mornings the little girl has cried continuously and refuses to have a go at anything I try to offer to her. Today she wailed, the noise got louder and louder and the other children's behaviour was whipped up to a frenzy. Her parents cannot speak English and it appears that Mum has a small child at home who she needs to look after and so she cannot stay in school to help support her. what do I do?
Is it possible to get her some polish books appropriate to her age? If she had some (funny for example) stories to read in her own language it might allow her to calm down a bit and not feel so lost. Then she might begin to interact with the others.
If there were any other polish children in the school that she could communicate with it might also set her at ease a little.
