question

[Sarah Braun Hamilton]

Hi Tammy,

I don't know of any specific research off hand about this, but you
might check the general heritage language literature, as I know that
programs teaching majority languages like Spanish and Russian to the
children of immigrants have worked a lot with this issue. One thing I
have tried to help "understanders" recognize their language knowledge
and move them towards speaking confidence is having them translate
from the language into English: listen to someone speaking (in person
or a recording), and then tell what they said in English. Then they
can work with the English to "back translate" into the language,
accumulating a set a phrases that they know they can understand and
recognize in the language, and work on reproducing them. I haven't had
the opportunity yet to experiment extensively with this method, but
what little I have done does seem promising.

I'd be interested to know if you find any good research in this area.
I'll let you know if I come across anything.

Best wishes,
Sarah Braun Hamilton
Portland State University

2009/10/9 Tammy DeCoteau <tdc.aaia at verizon.net>:
> Han mitakuyapi,
>
> I have a question.  Does anyone know if any research has been done on how to
> help the people who "understand but don't speak" to become speakers?  In my
> tribe we could probably quadruple our number of speakers [or more] if we
> found a way to accomplish this.  Most of those people are a generation away
> from our fluent speakers so it would not only dramatically increase the
> number of our fluent speakers, but it would also include many people who are
> yet young enough to become the teachers of tomorrow.
>
> Tammy DeCoteau
> AAIA Native Language Program