Acculturation of English as a Second Language Learners

On top of learning a new language, English as a second language learners are also faced with adjusting to the new culture they find themselves living in. Learning to navigate new social and political institutions and situations is daunting. ESL teachers can help students with their adjustments by appreciating the factors in English students' lives that help determine how well they will adapt to their new environment. Understanding students' particular backgrounds can help a teacher create a learner-centered classroom where students drive the direction and content of curriculum, which is vital to a successful ESL course.

Immigrant and refugee students all acculturate to their new lives in the United States at different rates and to varying degrees. Acculturation, according to Betsy Parrish in Teaching Adult ESL: A Practical Introduction (p. 3), is "the ability for minority cultures to adapt to the dominant culture, which involves an understanding of the beliefs, emotions, and behaviors of the new culture without letting go of the first culture." ESL students learn to live in the new culture, but they still retain aspects of their identity as defined by the culture of their home country.

For instance, adults often find it more difficult to acculturate than young people, and this often leads to some hard situations in family life. Children are often more exposed to English speakers throughout their days than their parents are, who may only interact with other non-English speakers at their jobs or in their homes and local communities. The children feel that they are able to navigate their way around the new society perhaps better than their parents, and children are often called upon to translate for their parents when they go out into the community and interact with English speakers. This latter instance gives children some more independence and discretion in making decisions than they have perhaps had in the past. Parents may feel a lack of control in their home, and this can contribute to some problems in the ESL classroom. Parents are also faced with finding child care when they want to attend ESL classes. They may be holding down two jobs, work late and long hours, and just be too tired to consistently make it to ESL classes.

Other considerations related to students' background and how it affects their learning that ESL teachers can think about are where the students are from. Are they refugees? If so, what kind of turmoil did they flee from? Why did the student come to the U.S.? What is the student's immigration status? Is he or she legal or illegal? Has the student ever lived in another country? Does the student have family in the U.S.? What is the educational background of the student? Has the student faced a decline in social status, perhaps due to a lower-status job, upon arrival in the U.S.? (Parrish, p. 5)

Steven Mondy, in his "ESL/EFL Ideas and Issues" blog suggests correctly in his posting on acculturation that students should be given opportunities to share their culture with other people. They should be encouraged to maintain their culture, and the classroom is the perfect place to do that. Teachers can have measuring/following directions/cooking lessons in their class where students write a recipe for a dish from their country of origin, explain how to make it to the class, and then share the dish with the class. There are so many other ways to bring students' cultures into the classroom to share, and it is important that students have the chance to celebrate who they are in a safe environment. Acculturation of the minor culture to the dominant culture is all well and good, but acculturation also involves the dominant culture changing to adapt to aspects of the minor culture.