Delivery

Description

The artifact I chose for C&T 898 1B-Teaching and learning is a lesson plan and description that was created to be used in the Cherokee Language Master Apprentice Program (CLMAP) to teach English first language (L1) speakers about the Cherokee game of stickball with Cherokee as the targeted language of medium. The artifact “Stickball for Everyone” was chosen because it demonstrates how content was planned and implemented for appropriate and varied strategies, methods, and instructional practices. The goal of the lesson was to engage and improve their learning in both content areas and language proficiency using context, targeted lexicon, and conversational language methodologies. The artifact was the thematic unit final project for C&T 820 Teaching ESL/Bilingual Education, and I believed it to be the best representation of the lesson building skills I have learned during my coursework. It targeted Cherokee language as the medium for instruction with the intention to incorporate cultural themes in context while it addressed the overall language focus by increasing the use of learning objectives for our program participants. Prior to C&T 820, I had struggled with meeting those challenging goals and communicating the need for that level of rigor to our Cherokee Master Speakers, first language (L1) Cherokee speaking teachers in the CLMAP program without concrete examples.

“Stickball for Everyone” began by describing the setting for the lesson, the CLMAP program and the social context of that space. It explored the location of Tahlequah, as the capital of Cherokee Nation’s reservation, and the classroom structure within the CLMAP offices as well as its proximity to the historic courthouse square, with culturally intensive resources, as the primary sites of instruction for this thematic unit. Learning resources like smart-boards, personal dry-erase boards, and supplementary videos for educational media were outlined. The selected videos for supplemental instruction were content focused and integral to the artifact’s Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) lesson plans. In the artifact, I described the process of learner selection to allow for a more comprehensive understanding of both the L2 Cherokee language learning participants as subjects and to deepen the overall understanding of the CLMAP’s purpose and design. The Cherokee Nation’s (2018), website explains that CLMAP’s primary goal was to create teachers that could go into an immersion or enrichment learning environment to teach the Cherokee language in our local institutions and communities.

In the instruction and assessments stages of the unit, I wanted to illustrate the philosophy and methodology of language acquisition through conversational language. One of the mantras we often use in our adult immersion programs like CLMAP is “ᏗᏕᏲᏙᏗ ᏣᎳᎩ ᎬᏗᎾ Use Cherokee to teach Cherokee,” or to explain ideas using contexts, simple explanatory language, and visual aids. When possible we use natural language, however we adapt to the proficiency level of the language learner. These methods were initially influenced by Dr. Stephen Krashen’s Natural Language Approach (1982[2009]). However, the rubric CLMAP uses to evaluate oral proficiency was developed from the American Council of Foreign Language Teaching (ACTFL) Proficiency Guidelines (2012), and have been modified for an Indigenous language L2 context for the purposes of the CLMAP program participants. Overall oral proficiency is the focus of the initial first year of the CLMAP program, but the encouraged use of Sequoyah’s Cherokee Language Orthography, the Cherokee Syllabary (ᏗᏣᎳᎩ), was also discussed in the artifact. With such a limited focus on oral proficiency, I also wanted to include additional rubric to strengthen the depth of the assessment modality, and the artifact went into some detail about how Alvermann and Phelps (2002, p. 312), materials were used to guide the assessment process: through attention to having drawn examples of multiple sources of information for the assessment, having ensured the results were of benefit to both L2 learners and L1 teachers, and that we have had optimal conditions for allowing the learners to show their capabilities, as well as other important factors. Finally, the artifact provides a suggested timeline for implementation of the thematic unit taking into account cultural context, student readiness, and material resources associated with the natural seasonal cycles that are regarded for the harvesting of materials for stickball.

Rationale

One of the key reasons that stickball was selected for this thematic unit was its cultural relevance and social salience to historical as well as contemporary Cherokee population. Stickball was a ceremonial replacement for warfare historically, not only among the Cherokee people, but also among the various populations of Southeastern Indigenous people. Even in its various contemporary incarnations, as they were discussed in the artifact, stickball is still a social tool for conflict resolution, the transmission of cultural values, and highly valued to encourage character development in areas of sportsmanship, accountability, and compassion. The teaching methodology for the artifact was heavily influenced by Krashen (1982[2009]), and open discussions about the content were necessary for a cultural understanding of stickball. There is a strong spiritual association with the Cherokee traditions surrounding stickball and its application. There were also traditional stories and teachings that were showcased within the artifact. The spiritual and cultural value of the stickball game was thoroughly explored and discussed within the framework of instruction. The instructional content targeted grammatical forms, structures and functions of key culturally relevant vocabulary words and phrases, as well as integrated targeted vocabulary using sheltered instruction that was useful for academic language usage (Echevarria & Graves, 2003). There was also special attention given to learning preferences in the unit as well as accommodations for those learners that had a fund of knowledge backgrounds in culture in general, or stickball in particular (Moll, 1992 p. 133). Differentiated instruction was a key component of culturally situated conversations in language sessions with constant and overt comprehension checks used by the L1 Cherokee teachers. This ensured that an inclusive group spirit was maintained which encouraged collective growth and underpinned the cultural framework that was simultaneously being taught through the content of the artifact, teamwork and solidarity. This was ultimately a learning project, the thematic unit allowed the program participants to grow and explore the process of learning about stickball but what was not written into the initial artifact was how this thematic unit created future learning scenarios where the program participants treated the lesson as a learning project (Dίaz-Rico, 2013).Then by taking the content that they had reviewed repeatedly and turning the cultural values and philosophies that underpin the stickball game, presentations were created for each other and then those same ideas were reintroduced in new contexts to other, later CLMAP learner cohorts.

English as a tool

The initial challenge with the “Stickball for Everyone” thematic unit was tied to the idea of using English in any capacity to aid in teaching instruction. CLMAP is ultimately an adult language immersion program, however before engaging in C&T 820 Teaching ESL/Bilingual Education, I had come to realize that limited L2 proficiency in the target language of Cherokee was holding back the transfer of abstract and complex cultural concepts from being a part of content in CLMAP for the first year program participants. However, Moll’s (1992) funds of knowledge concept clearly showed that we should use every aspect of a learner’s background to ensure their success, and as a community of L1 English speakers, our program participants shared a community wide skill, English. With prayer and consternation, the goal to use English in limited formats was accepted and we proceeded to make clear limits of English usage for strategic cultural content instruction with the immediate aim to return to Cherokee as a language medium whenever possible. This allowed us to push Cherokee as a target language in all appropriate forms of communications and immediately transition from English language vocabulary to Cherokee language discourse as soon as the Cherokee L2 learners could demonstrate familiarity with those same concepts in the target language. By the time we had reviewed the key vocabulary terms from lesson one to the start of lesson two, we were certain to have already made a functional shift into the target language of Cherokee to ensure those initial English lexical items were then transferred with mastery into the target language. The English terms for content in lesson two were summarily replaced with Cherokee by the review at the beginning of lesson three. The thematic unit didn’t go into descriptive detail about lesson four, however lesson four was completed almost entirely in the target language and aside from viewing some of the stickball video content that was primarily in English, everyone in the classroom stayed in the target language with rigor, and maintained classroom discussions were conducted primarily in Cherokee.

This process of using the English L1 program participants’ shared language skill to contextually build cultural content knowledge, then swiftly replacing key themes with the target language allowed a level of confidence among the learner that facilitated, with ease, a better engagement with cultural activities. It also allowed them to showcase their own cultural experiences to one another in an English friendly but limited environment. These concepts were communicated both orally and in writing in both English and Cherokee in the same fashion as biliteracy programs (Schwing, 2008 p. 56). All English instruction was relegated to a breakout room set aside for an English safe zone. All other forms of communication conducted onsite at CLMAP and offsite at the courthouse square were in the target language. The ability for program participants to share their stickball cultural background experiences in English allowed them to build up confidence and a sense of community with less experienced learners, which allowed all of the participants to have an extra intrinsic motivational push to engage in something that became more and more of interest to the shared group, the cultural teachings and values behind stickball. The process of creating materials for the game and the exact protocols and procedures of stickball became much less important in context than the overall cultural values and philosophies that were initially expressed in the learners L1 and subsequently converted to the target language. Those values have become strong intersections between that 2019 cohort of learners and have spread out to other program participants in the program as well as the Cherokee L1 Master Speakers (teachers) and program administrators.

Cultural Infusion

Being open to change and allowing shifts in instructional design opened the door to learning opportunities, media about culture that could be used as teaching material despite its English content, and a greater sense of shared values and cultural philosophies was communicated openly and clearly then absorbed in the target language as well. Over time, the learners sought out the deeper Cherokee meanings of those values and developed a deeper etymological understanding of those deeper cultural teachings in Cherokee on their own time. This allowed them to engage in academically based grammatical concepts in the lessons by initially using English which was then translated into Cherokee. This idea was used by Echevarria and Graves (2003) to teach academic English to E2 learners. This increased their overall interest and motivation to not only speak Cherokee for communicative purposes but also to have a deep etymological understanding of the root meanings behind key Cherokee lexicon tied to philosophy and worldview. ᎣᏏᏳ

ᎠᏯ ᏩᏕ ᎦᎵᏍᎨᏫ ᏥᎪᏪᎸᎦ Ryan M.

References

Alvermann, D., & Phelps, S. (2002). Assessment of students. In Content reading and literacy: Succeeding in today's diverse classrooms.

Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon.

American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. (2012). ACTFL proficiency guidelines 2012 [Electronic version]. Retrieved

from www.actfl.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/ACTFLProficiencyGuidelines2012_FINAL.pdf

Cherokee Nation. (2018). Cherokee Language Master/Apprentice Program [Data file]. Retrieved from

http://webtest2.cherokee.org/Services/Community/Community-And-Culture/Language-Program-CLMAP

Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment System. (2008). CASAS Competencies: Essential Life Skills for Youth and Adults. Retrieved

from https://www.casas.org/docs/pagecontents/competencies.pdf?Status=Master

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