The CMC Education Department staff would like to thank Amber Goostree and Lauren Kramer for their work this past spring. Amber and Lauren are both students at Mount Mercy University. They worked at CMC through Mount Mercy’s federal work-study program.

Lauren Kramer graduated from MMU in May.

Lauren graduated from Mount Mercy in May with a degree in secondary
education. Lauren did her student teaching last fall in the Marion High School English classroom of CMC’s Sherryl Gaffney-Paige. Lauren spent her spring semester at CMC
teaching and doing administrative work. We wish her the best in her future
career as a teacher.

Amber Goostree will study English & Creative Writing at UNI this fall.

Amber is finishing up her junior year of college at Mount Mercy. She
will transfer to the University of Northern Iowa to study English and Creative Writing in the fall. Amber was the childcare guru in the evening at CMC. We wish her the best as she
continues her studies in Cedar Falls.

Click Here for a PDF of the Education Department Newsletter June / July 2013

ESL Tutoring Tips

Your student’s English mispronunciations might frustrate you. But their mispronunciation is natural and will improve with time. English mispronunciations often originate from a lack of those sounds in the student’s native language.

In Spanish, the “b” and the “v” are pronounced the same. “Vamos,” Spanish for “we go,” can be pronounced “bamos.” When a Spanish-speaker learns English, differentiating between the names of the letters “b” and “v” presents s/he with challenges. If you ask your Spanish-speaking student to spell “boat,” they might write “voat,” since the “b” and “v” are the same in Spanish.

Spanish-speakers learning English also struggle with “th.” In English, we have both a voiced “th,” as in “the,” and an unvoiced “th,” as in “thought.” Spanish has neither of these sounds. So when Spanish-speakers say “the,” it may sound like “duh.” When Spanish-speaker say “thought,” it may sound like “taught.” This mispronunciation is simply the product of never having made the English “th” sounds before.

A common pronunciation problem for speakers of Kirundi (language of Burundi) and Asian languages is differentiating “L” and “R.” We make the “L” sound in English by placing the tongue behind the top front teeth and vocalizing. We make the “R” sound in English by placing the tongue on the roof of the mouth and vocalizing. Linguists call these sounds “liquids or liquid consonants.” Kirundi and many Asian language speakers tend to have trouble differentiating or making these sounds because their language only has one. This can make “light” sound like “right,” or vice versa.

Speakers of tonal languages also struggle to perfect their pronunciation. Vietnamese, Lao, Chinese, and other languages are tonal, which means that many vowels are pronounced in ways that alter the meaning of a word. Vietnamese vowels, for instance, have six tones. The six distinct pronunciations of the Vietnamese word “ma” each mean something totally different. Tonal language speakers have difficulty mastering “tone-less” English pronunciation. Here is a list of suggestions:

• Growing up speaking a language physically forms the muscles of the mouth to make the sounds common to that language.
• Teaching one’s mouth to make new sounds as an adult can prove difficult.
• Better pronunciation comes with practice and time.
• It is best not to constantly correct students’ pronunciation unless their pronunciation changes the meaning of the word.
• Hyper-focusing on pronunciation only causes anxiety and stress for students.
• You should not expect lower level students to have perfect pronunciation.
• Higher level students should have better pronunciation.
• As a general rule, only correct your student’s pronunciation if it is unintelligible.
• Students will imitate correct pronunciation from tutors.
• Patience is the best method of teaching pronunciation.

Immigrant/Refugee Coordinator Greg White, CMC student Alice and her son Jack walk to the performance of the Royal Burundi Drummers and Dancers.

Education Times newsletter for December 2012 / January 2013

Click the above link to read the full Education Times newsletter. Calendars, photos, and announcements are included. Here’s a teaser story:

Thanks to tutor Mary Bradley for informing CMC Education Staff about a local cultural event. Greg and Wendy were able to take thirty-five students and their families to the Royal Burundi Drummers and Dancers performance at Coe College on October 29.

John Chaimov (a professor at Coe College, CMC tutor, and board member) helped CMC attain thirty-five tickets, and the rest were provided through a collaboration with Rama Muzo, an Intercultural Resource Liaison working for the Cedar Rapids Community School District.

The Education Department currently has twenty-six students from Burundi, and many students from other African nations as well.

For some of the Burundi students who attended the performance, it was simply a reminder of culture and life “back home.” But for many, it was the first time they or their children had seen such a showcase, since they had grown up in Tanzania in refugee camps, thereby losing formative cultural experiences.

The all-male group of drummers entered the theater with the 3-foot-tall wooden drums on their heads, then set them in a half circle and the thunder began. Each performer wore a red, white, and green regalia resembling togas. At the beginning of each new “song,” the front drummer called out in Kirundi (language of Burundi), and the others responded with a half-step forward and a yell, “YAY!” Eventually the children in the audience joined in the shouting.

The constant rhythm demanded stamina. At times, they tapped the low wooden sides of the drums, then the hide drum-head, then raised their arms above their heads and rapidly pounded for a 10-second battery of deafening volume. The drumming was matched with dancing featuring impressive jumps. Many times they “ran-in-place” with their feet while slamming out a well-coordinated rhythm with the mallets.

The drum and dance ensemble is centuries old, and remains in use today for Burundi national celebrations such as Independence Day.

Each performer cycled through dancing, drumming or resting off-stage.