English as a Second Language for Adult Immigrants (The Domain is Adult Education) - Term Paper Example

? English as a Second Language for Adult Immigrants (The Domain is Adult Education) Introduction In the present days, learning English is considered as one of the significant aspects of education for adult immigrants. For immigrants in the United States, English is considered as second language and improper understanding of English creates language barrier for them with those people who have English as their first language. There are several immigrants who have quite less problems to adjust with American workplace because they can express their views in English effectually and recognize the business and social culture as well as environment. However, many other immigrants find it difficult to speak and understand properly in English language. With the increasing number of adult immigrants in the USA and Canada, English language becomes a significant issue for people. Immigrants need to adjust with the foreign cultural environment and with the common language i.e. English. The major dispute concerning the English language within immigrants is that it creates verbal obstructions as well as misinterpretations, and can harm the effective communication within organizations (Charlotte Mecklenburg, 2002). Literature Review According to Burt (2004), knowledge and fluency in English is explicitly connected with financial self-sufficiency. Immigrants who are literate in languages except English are more probable to have temporary work and get less income as compared to those who are well-educated in English and have English as first language. Several surveys on the immigrants’ income in the USA depict that there is positive relations between English learning capabilities and salaries of immigrants. This is one of the major reasons that immigrants want expertise in English language both in speaking as well as in writing. Providing “English as Second Language (ESL)” lessons to immigrants is a useful method to resolve the English communication problem in the workplace. However, it can be observed that companies are reluctant about providing ESL lessons due to problems with regard to planning, expense, and a sense that providing ESL lessons are not their duty (Burt, 2004). Due to requirement of English proficiency in employment as well as in acquiring citizenship, the demand of “English for Speakers of Other Language” (ESOL) in Canada and the USA is increasing constantly, and it is considered as one of the fastest growing constituents for adult education. The admission for English education is also inclined by the way of “Immigration Reform and Control Act” (IRCA) in the year 1986. Presently, the population assisted by English learning programs has changed significantly. The immigrant populations of the USA and Canada in present days are much different than past days with respect to size, origin and financial status. According to a Census survey in the year 2000, the number of Hispanic population was more than 58% compared to 1990. In order to fulfill the emerging requirements of English education for the immigrant population, huge numbers of qualified teachers are required. ESOL classes are often organized to accommodate for initial, transitional, and advanced level of expertise. On the basis of resources of organizations and requirements of students, different approaches, practices and technologies are used in ESL training. The major objective of ESL programs is to assist adult immigrants in accomplishing competency in English language. Majority of classes are developed on the basis of students’ needs and benefits, for instance, the ESOL classes can be aimed towards adult learners who have arrived in Canada or in the USA, and therefore include survival as well as life skills training in their programs. Other classes may incorporate ESOL guidelines with professional education and family knowledge, as well as citizenship and academic training. The governments always help immigrant learners to obtain necessary skills and knowledge so that they can become active performers in workplace and in society (Tolbert, 2001). The most common types of English education for adult immigrants in the USA are: 1. Common ESOL Programs: Common ESOL programs concentrate on improvement of overall English language abilities. These courses usually emphasise on English language skills improvement in the framework of subjects or functions of everyday life such as getting a job or managing customers among others. 2. Family ESOL Classes: The family ESOL classes aim towards the family of immigrants as a whole and thereby, offer English education and literacy training to the adults as well as kids. These classes include childcare basics and information that parents can apply to improve the literacy and general education for their kids. 3. Civic Classes: Civic classes incorporate English language training with prospects to learn about civil privileges, civil involvement and duty, and citizenship. 4. Professional ESL: Professional ESL courses support in preparing immigrants for getting suitable jobs. These courses concentrate on developing overall pre-employment skills and knowledge such as searching for jobs in particular areas or preparing for interview. 5. Office ESOL Courses: Office ESOL courses are provided to the immigrant employees in work environment. These courses target for English language improvement which is directly pertinent to the work environment of people (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). English Education for Adult Immigrants in Canada and the USA In Canada, immigrants are growing significantly. In the year 2001, almost 25% of school students in Canada were immigrants, and among them almost 20% could speak other languages except English language. According to analysis of “British Columbia” (BC), almost 50% of immigrants who have arrived in British Columbia in the period of 2000 were unable to speak English properly (Beardsmore, 2008). Governments recognize that in order to make immigrants properly assimilate into the Canadian civilization there is need for understanding and speaking English efficiently. Therefore, they provide several training programs for adult immigrants in order to teach them about English language. However, in spite of those programs, the English language training efforts are inadequate. Thus, even if immigrants are well-educated, they continue to confront with larger literacy challenges compared to other Canadian inhabitants (The Centre for Literacy of Quebec, 2008). In the USA also, the English language immigrant students comprise a substantial segment of the total population. These students desire for improving their professional as well as social life. Many of them are adjusting to American communities which require proficiency in English language. Nowadays, the alterations in federal strategies demanding stringent responsibility for people are impacting on the adult students in relation to speaking in English properly (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). The federal government of the USA seeks to eradicate the incapability of adult immigrants to communicate and to write English properly. The succeeding regulations of the USA continue to support the need for language training programs for immigrants. As the number of immigrants is increasing, several states and territories have started appointing English language specialists to perform adult education classes. According to “US Department of Education”, almost 42% of applicants in the federally sponsored adult learning program are learning English, which indicates growing demand of English learning among people. Within 42%, several people are immigrants such as Hispanic, Latino, African, Asian and Indian. The report of “Laubach Literacy” in 1999-2000 denotes that majority of ESL lessons are provided to adult students. The participants of Adult “English Language Learners” (ELL) enroll for English language training for several reasons such as to develop overall English language capability, to address private, domestic, or community necessities, to satisfy employment requirements, to get better job, and to progress in education. ELLs usually exhibit high level of interest for learning English and stay in the course for longer time compared to other educational lessons. ELLs have improved life practice, maturity, and high level of inspiration which assist in their learning experience. However, there are several barriers for adult students to participate effectively due to lack of time, money, awareness and transportation facilities. In the year 2000, the total immigrants in the USA were almost 28.4 million which represented 10.4% of total population. Among them almost 9 million did not have English learning abilities (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). In the USA, adult education faces several challenges due to constant rising of immigrant population. There is need for better infrastructure, higher funding and increasing number of classes and teachers to satisfy the growing demand of English learning among adults. A typical English learning education class includes language and learning guidelines. It provides adult students with wide access of information, activities, and thoughts which they require for surviving and accomplishing success in professional as well as social life (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). Significant Aspects of English Language Lessons in Canada and the USA There are several difficulties for implementing English language practices and designing appropriate programs. One of the most significant aspects that should be considered for providing English education is financial aspect in term of funds. Huge funding is required for providing appropriate amenities, giving salaries to the educators, attracting specialized personnel, increasing the resource base, providing pertinent continuing training, and developing prospectus for English lessons. With several requirements of students about English learning, developing an appropriate curriculum is quite difficult. Therefore, certain English learning programs provide comprehensive curriculums and materials in order to satisfy the biggest possible learner inhabitants. The complexity in adult students is the other challenging issue for English learning lessons. The immigrant population has different culture, varied language, and various educational backgrounds, and therefore it is a difficult task for educators to train them equally with several learning backgrounds. Finding or developing a learning design which can acknowledge or accommodate these particular challenges is a substantial aspect for English learning program. However, the skill of teachers may not integrate with particular learners’ requisite. Manipulating the requirement of students increases the liability of teachers (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). The time required for learning English properly for ESL is the other aspect for English language lessons in Canada and the USA. Both companies as well as employees have improper concepts regarding the amount of time required for learning English language. For children immigrants, it takes almost 5 to 7 years to become socially familiarize with their second language i.e. English. For an adult immigrant, it takes approximately 500-1000 hours to reach to the satisfactory level of expertise in English language, capable of fulfilling the basic requirements and helping to survive in the job. As unlike kids or teenagers, adult students are unable to continue school for six hours in a day or five days in a week, the forecasted time for learning English completely is quite difficult. The time requirement can vary depending on the program aspects (such as strength of courses and experience of teachers) and learner influences (such as educational background and age) (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). Adult ELLs are the most determined students who either take classes consecutively, or attend classes only when responsibilities towards employment and family allow them. ELLs are often confronted with English education programs with inadequate vocalization which makes it challenging for them to progress from one level to the other level. Well-structured English education programs are organized in such a way so that ELLs can continue to do employment or academic programs along with learning English and they also provide educational and employment advises to the learners. Adult ELLs with lack of literacy or interpretation problems have different requirements for English learning programs compared to other natural English speaking adults. For instance, an inborn English speaking adult generally have a vocabulary of almost 100,000 words, while an adult immigrant may only have vocabulary of approximately few thousand words (Stockwell & Minkova, n.d.). It generates conception problem for adult ELLs which is not faced by inborn English learners. Hence, the English learning programs need to be designed according to the strengths of learners. It can be stated that expanding vocabulary knowledge is one of the most significant aspects for English language lessons for adult learners. Issue of Teacher in English Education for Adult Immigrants in Canada and the USA With increasing number of ESL students in Canada as well as in the USA, the teachers are facing difficulties to fulfill the requirements of diverse students ranging from mainstream to ESL students. As ESL learners represent significant amount of students in district schools, it has created noteworthy changes in the demographic characteristics. As a result of demographic alterations, it has generated a gap between requirements of students and realities. The ESL experiences of teachers are recognized as an authorization or as a supplementary certificate along with overall teaching certificate. However, the ESL certificate only is not enough to demonstrate ESL training in the community schools. From several studies, it can be defined that the support required for capable ESL expert teachers to provide training about English language to the ESL learners are scarce in the USA and Canada. In the year 1997, only 2.5% of teachers of the USA who tutored English language learners possessed ESL certification. Additionally, only 30% of all teachers who had ESL learners attained professional improvement in ESL training. The professional improvement is always considered as one of the most significant issues of teacher related problems in ESL learning (Beardsmore, 2008). Adult English learners often recognize their teachers as influential to their education. Yet, the teachers of ESL in Canada are often paid quite low. They work as part-time in swarming classrooms without suitable instructional resources. They receive slight or insignificant professional improvement opportunities. There are slight formal acknowledgements about ESL training as a discrete field of education (The Centre for Literacy of Quebec, 2008). In adult English learning, there is need for qualified personnel to fulfill the increasing demand of English language education. While the necessity of English lessons is high, the shifting immigration has put significant impact on the demand of teacher development. Several ESOL teachers feel that this area has low prominence and therefore majority of teachers are freelance or hourly employees with slight otherwise negligible service advantages. The turnover rate of this field is also much higher compared to other professions. This field is characterized by ranges of instructional background and content (such as workshop, life skills, and academic experience among others), which makes the constant professional improvement quite difficult. Documentation and training obligation for teachers differ from state to state, and occasionally from program to program in same states. The funding prospects are also much limited which restricts professional improvement in this field (Center for Applied Linguistics, 2003). Personal View about Teacher Related Issue in Canada and the USA One of the most significant issues of ESL for adult immigrants is lack of professional development of teachers which results in high level of attrition among teachers. The important concerns for teachers are program structures, amenities and supports from management. Apart from retiring, the major reason for leaving from the job of English teaching is low income, lack of facilities, inadequate working time, low professional improvement and lesser job security. Though several teachers have the desire to stay in the field, due to the above circumstances, they probably cannot sustain for longer time. A well supported job comprises of living wages, adequate benefits, job security, more working time, and program stability which is absent in ESL training job (Smith & Hofer, 2003). As the outcome of students is mostly dependent on teachers’ proficiency, there is need for incessant professional improvement to cope efficiently the constant changes of immigration population and develop the education quality. Strengthening the internal educational context is considered as one of the most important requirements for addressing an unceasing stream of English language training demand in Canada and the USA. Additionally, encouraging professional development of teachers is also expected to reduce the isolation of immigrants. From this point of view, for the professional improvement of teachers it can be inferred that they would take their obligation and obtain essential knowledge, skills and list of activities to raise their contribution in the workplace atmosphere. By partaking in several professional activities within the educational setting, teachers can encourage both their personal improvement as well as development of educational system in school. Therefore, professional improvement can help to make significant contribution for developing educational practice. Professional improvement is vital as it can allow teachers to cope up with the prompt changes they confront in order to stay up-to-date with new knowledge, reflective practices, and innovation in English education (European Union, 2010). The insignificant funding is also a critical issue which has led to high attrition rate of teachers in ESL training. The amount of money needed for finding and employing new teachers is quite high for a typical educational budget. It is being expected that the budget of recruiting, hiring and retaining teachers can cost almost 7 billion USD in a year. Utilizing this huge amount of money on book, technology and other types of funds is regarded as more beneficial for certain people instead of spending on employing new teachers. This kind of thought not only increases the high turnover of teachers from their profession, but also impacts on the adult immigrants who seek to learn English. According to the observation of Jalongo and Heider, several students are experiencing inferior education in large number of regions in the USA because of high teacher attrition rate. Apart from lack of professional improvement, there are other reasons which lead to high rate of leaving of educators from teaching profession, such as challenging work assignments, insufficient resources, and remoteness among others. For the beginners in teaching, these kinds of issues are generally excruciating, therefore majority of teachers view leaving the profession as the only method for sanity (Boyer & Hamil, 2008). According to the observation of Duck, one significant way to solve the teacher issue in ESL learning is to provide support to the teachers. Mentoring, coordination, on-going training programs, and real-life professional improvements are vital mechanisms for providing necessary support to the teachers. Generally, large numbers of teachers are not provided with these kinds of support. It is imperious for the commissioners and supervisors to realize and to comprehend the significance of supporting teachers in every possible aspect; otherwise the low teacher quantity can become much worse. Teachers in the ESL learning field must be respected and appreciated so that they can feel a sense of worthiness and good status. According to Cochran and Reese, the turnover rate of teacher is higher in middle as well as high school (Boyer & Hamil, 2008). Relationship between Professional Development and Teacher Issue Offering professional development to the teachers can be challenging. The English learning education field is part-time in nature and is characterized by inadequate incomes, insignificant certification requirements, and high level of turnover. These characteristics generate difficulties for professional development of teachers, and at the same time, it can complicate the plan and application procedures for professional development organizers. Therefore, several English language teachers find it difficult for searching prospects for training in fields which are significant for providing adult immigrants instructions such as second language achievement philosophy, teaching practice, and use of technology in teaching (Hawk, 2000). The teacher education program is regarded as the initial stage in professional development procedure where certain knowledge sources and practices are familiarized and applied in fundamental ways. Through continuing professional development, the teachers can enhance capability in areas such as scheduling, teaching, evaluation, and understanding of adult English language development. Literatures advocate that professional development standard is much supportive in managing the ESL learning program plan and implementation. For instance, in Alberta, the “Teaching Quality Standard” (TQS) helps to guide the teachers for training, administration, assessment, certification and long-run professional development. In Canada, the teacher education courses provide an outline to critical knowledge sources, abilities, and practices which support potential teachers to develop a central understanding of learners’ quality and performance. For resolving the issue of teacher in ESL learning, the compensation of teacher is the other significant aspect, because, it is frequently connected with continuation of the teaching occupation. Although due to high turnover of teachers, there has been growing consideration towards professional development during the career life of teacher, consistency remains a critical challenge in several organizations. Furthermore, there is need for satisfactory balance between consistency and diversity requirements in professional development. The teaching in schools varies according to educational background of students, configuration of educational system, and requirements of students. Therefore, the professional improvement classes must be flexible which lets opportunities for adapted, thematic, background oriented professional learning (Gambhir, Broad, Evans & Gaskell, 2008). Furthermore, technology can be used in ranges of different backgrounds for distant learning of educators. Utilizing technology in professional improvement of English educators is a latest trend. Use of technology in professional development can offer methods for experts to connect with each other and integrate knowledge effectively through their own instructional exercise. The important advantages of using technology in professional development are flexibility of real-time communication and convenience of communication within extensive geographical distances (Hawk, 2000). Conclusion It is an undeniable fact that learning English is one of the most vital elements of education for adult immigrants in Canada and the USA not only for getting better job prospects but also for familiarizing themselves with the social culture. There are several issues for English learning programs and most important of them is teacher issue with aspect to lack of professional development opportunities. With constant growth of immigrants in Canada and the USA, the demand for expert English teachers is also increasing. The issue of lack of teacher in ESOL program cannot be solved instantly, but governments can put considerable efforts to reduce those issues. It can be observed that several adult education learners are critically dependent on the federally funded English education programs. English education is a valuable and necessary tool for immigrants and lack of funding and expert teachers can impact on their learning. Retaining teachers though providing appropriate professional development training can help to decrease the gap between requirements of students and realities. As a result, it will help immigrants to remove the barrier of communication in term of verbal obstacles and misinterpretation within organizations. References Burt, M. (2004). Issues with outcomes in workplace ESL programs. Retrieved from http://www.cme-mec.ca/download.php?file=ga91zhnk.pdf Beardsmore, B. (2008). Exploring ESL specialist teacher preparation and professional development in British Columbia. Retrieved from http://www.sd64.bc.ca/staff/action/beardsmore.pdf Boyer, A., & Hamil, B. W. (2008). Problems facing American education. Focus on Colleges, Universities, and Schools 2(1), pp. 1-9. Charlotte Mecklenburg. (2002). Cultural and language barriers in the workplace. Retrieved from http://www.charlotteworks.org/clbpositionpaper.pdf Center for Applied Linguistics. (2003). Adult English language instruction in the 21st century. Retrieved from http://www.cal.org/caela/esl_resources/languageinstructionEng.pdf European Union. (2010). Teachers’ professional development. Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/education/school-education/doc/talis/report_en.pdf Gambhir, M., Broad, K., Evans, M., & Gaskell, J. (2008). Characterizing, initial, teacher, education in, Canada: Themes, and, issues. Retrieved from http://www.oise.utoronto.ca/ite/UserFiles/File/CharacterizingITE.pdf Hawk, W. B. (2000). Online professional development for adult ESL educators. Retrieved from http://www.cal.org/caela/esl_resources/digests/pdQA.html Smith, C., & Hofer, J. (2003). The characteristics and concerns of adult basic education teachers. Retrieved from http://www.ncsall.net/fileadmin/resources/research/report26.pdf Stockwell, R. & Minkova, D. (n.d.). English words: History and structure. Retrieved from http://assets.cambridge.org/97805217/90123/excerpt/9780521790123_excerpt.pdf Tolbert, M. (2001). English literacy and civics education for adult learners. Retrieved from http://www.cde.state.co.us/cdeadult/download/pdf/ELCivicsForAdultlearnersNIFL0801.pdf The Centre for Literacy of Quebec. (2008). ESL and literacy: finding common ground, serving learners’ needs. Retrieved from http://www.nald.ca/library/research/esl_lit/est_lit.pdf Read More