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<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>Earlier, there was a message sent
around about a Dine language site. A wonderful person sent me the following
link, and I would like to send it around to the others on this list,
specifically under the topic of "immersion". The article is entitled Literacy in
America: <SPAN class=header><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" color=#000000
size=2><A
href="http://www.bookmagazine.com/issue24/literacy.shtml">http://www.bookmagazine.com/issue24/literacy.shtml</A></FONT></SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>The following is a brief clip from
the section entitled How We Got There:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>"In a 1999 report titled "How People
Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School," the National Research Council put
it this way: "In the early part of the twentieth century, education focused on
the acquisition of literacy skills: simple reading, writing, and calculating. It
was not the general rule for educational systems to train people to think and
read critically, to express themselves clearly and persuasively, to solve
complex problems in science and mathematics. Now ... these aspects of high
literacy are required of almost everyone in order to successfully negotiate the
complexities of contemporary life." We can't settle for the standards of a
generation ago."</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>These ideas should be
considered seriously by people engaged in language revitalization efforts. A
living language is used for many functions, and these include newsletters,
tribal business documents, learning materials for science and mathematics. If
the learners do not have a place to use the language, it will not be as valuable
as those languages that can be used in a broader scope. We don't want to devalue
Indigenous languages by restricting them to reduced forms of use or venues of
use. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>No one doubts that there are ways to
teach content without reading and writing, as this second excerpt shows:
</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>"In the current climate of
accountability and big-stakes tests, teachers have received a clear message from
school boards, politicians and the press: Teach the content. And that they do.
Many have become quite ingenious at using lectures, handouts, class projects and
activities to convey content about history and science and government without
requiring kids to read. In some classrooms, the textbook is an occasional
supplement. In many, it isn't used at all. "As students come in less and less
literate, we have gotten better and better at teaching around the text," says
California teacher Gayle Cribb. But if kids are never asked to read complex
material, how will they learn to read it?" <BR></DIV></FONT>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>Many revitalization efforts, and I
know this from personal experience over and over and over, are slammed by the
active idea that there is only one way to say something. Arguments break out,
consuming the entire time allotted for a task, because the way one person said
something was not the way someone else would have said it. Those of us who are
academics, who have read thousands and thousands of books, papers, articles,
transcripts, summaries, abstracts, and mailings realize that there a many, many
ways to say any given thing, and that this is what we should be looking for in
our revitalization efforts. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>I know I sound a bit soap-boxey, but
it is hard not to when time is so short for these languages, and the people who
want to learn them, and because I care so much. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>Mia Kalish</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>NMSU & Red Pony Heritage Language
Team :-)</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>----- Original Message ----- </FONT>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>From: "Christensen, Rosemary"
<</FONT><A href="mailto:christer@UWGB.EDU"><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>christer@UWGB.EDU</FONT></A><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>To: <</FONT><A
href="mailto:ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU"><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU</FONT></A><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>Sent: Monday, June 30, 2003 11:05
AM</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>Subject: Re: Immersion
Programs</FONT></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"><BR><FONT size=2></FONT></FONT></DIV><FONT
face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>was there a listing attached to your message. I
could not find it.<BR><BR>-----Original Message-----<BR>From: Akira Y. Yamamoto
[mailto:akira@KU.EDU]<BR>Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2003 8:19 PM<BR>To: </FONT><A
href="mailto:ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU"><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU</FONT></A><BR><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>Subject: Re: Immersion Programs<BR><BR><BR>I have not updated this for
several months, but you may want to check<BR>this against your list.
Akira<BR><BR>>I'm helping to compile a list of current Native language
immersion schools<BR>>in the U.S. While the list we have seems pretty
comprehensive, I thought I<BR>>should ask here, too. If you know of any
immersion programs, I'd<BR>>appreciate if you emailed me.
Thanks!<BR><BR><BR>--<BR>Akira Y. Yamamoto<BR>The University of
Kansas<BR>Department of Anthropology<BR>Fraser Hall 622<BR>1415 Jayhawk
Blvd.<BR>Lawrence KS 66045-7556<BR>Phone: 785/864-2645<BR>FAX:
785/864-5224<BR>Anthropology: </FONT><A
href="http://www.cc.ku.edu/~kuanth/"><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>http://www.cc.ku.edu/~kuanth/</FONT></A><BR><FONT
face="Bookman Old Style" size=2>Linguistics: </FONT><A
href="http://www.linguistics.ku.edu/"><FONT face="Bookman Old Style"
size=2>http://www.linguistics.ku.edu/</FONT></A><BR><BR></BODY></HTML>