{"id":10542,"date":"2016-01-29T17:18:56","date_gmt":"2016-01-30T01:18:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/?p=10542"},"modified":"2017-04-18T16:15:09","modified_gmt":"2017-04-18T23:15:09","slug":"immigrant-teens-in-the-south-bronx-learn-the-art-of-online-discussion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/immigrant-teens-in-the-south-bronx-learn-the-art-of-online-discussion\/","title":{"rendered":"Immigrant Teens in the South Bronx Learn the Art of Online Discussion"},"content":{"rendered":"

You never know what conversations you might come across on Youth Voices<\/a>, a blog that is home to thousands of teen-written posts and comments on current events, gender inequality, and other topics. Last March, a discussion arose around the novel \u201cSold<\/em>,<\/a> by Patricia McCormick, about a Nepali girl named Lakshmi whose stepfather sells her into slavery.<\/p>\n

A high school student from Senegal named Fatou, who is learning English, brought up the abuse of Senegalese children known as talib\u00e9s<\/a>. \u201cThey force student who’s studying the Quran to go out and beg for money and bring it to their teacher,\u201d Fatou wrote. \u201cAnd that is a type of slavery, just like Lakshmi’s.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ICHS\"<\/p>\n

The students\u00a0discussing Sold<\/em> online attend International Community High School (ICHS)<\/a> in the South Bronx. It is part of a network of 22 unique schools around the country intended for students who have recently entered the United States.<\/p>\n

Jane Higgins, director of the NYC Writing Project<\/a>, said students attending ICHS in the South Bronx experience nearly every obstacle a young person might face living in concentrated poverty while also contending with varying degrees of English literacy. Some students have been in the United States for up to four years, but others are far newer immigrants. More students arrive each week. Most are from the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central America, and some entered the country unaccompanied and undocumented.<\/p>\n

In 2014, ICHS faculty saw a need to ensure that despite their students\u2019 limited English and literacy skills, young learners at ICHS\u00a0could take advantage of the educational opportunities\u00a0online tools afford. Because many of their students lack internet and computer access at home, teachers grew concerned that their students\u00a0could be left out of the literacy-rich online environment most of their peers inhabit.<\/p>\n

So in 2014, the New York City Writing Project partnered with four teachers at ICHS to apply for an LRNG Innovation Challenge Grant<\/a> to extend opportunities for student-driven online writing projects through the Youth Voices platform.<\/p>\n

The LRNG Innovation Challenge grants\u00a0stem from a partnership between the National Writing Project and\u00a0John Legend\u2019s Show Me Campaign<\/a> to help educators extend time and space for connected learning<\/a>.<\/p>\n

After receiving the grant last year, ICHS teachers and students, and two NYC Writing Project teacher-consultants, came together in six afterschool workshops over six weeks as students extended their classwork by writing posts for authentic audiences. After learning more about Youth Voices in the workshops, Nick Deming, an English Language Arts teacher at ICHS, decided it would be the perfect platform for discussing Sold<\/em>, and he prompted students with questions that kick-started a rich conversation.<\/p>\n

Because teachers of English-language learners have a lot to balance, Higgins said, it was important to present Youth Voices as a curriculum that teachers could use rather than as just another layer on top of existing work.\u00a0Higgins said the benefits of a Youth Voices-based curriculum go beyond just providing access to technology and the internet. Educators at ICHS also\u00a0used it in classrooms to expand\u00a0opportunities for connected learning—learning that lets students experience people, places, and things beyond school walls.<\/p>\n

That approach worked during the discussion about Sold<\/em>, as students weighed in on one another\u2019s posts, adding depth and emotion to the conversation. A student named Cristina, for example, wrote: \u201cAs you say, \u2018Human beings have the capacity to survive almost anything.\u2019 I do agree, we always find a way to get over our problems, but I think that life is not only about moving on it\u2019s also about justice and equality.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cYouth Voices is not for word processing,\u201d Higgins said. \u201cIt\u2019s about helping students see beyond the window they look out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Opening new opportunities for that type of connected learning, she added, is important in ELL classrooms, where, because of students’ limited English skills, it can be challenging to move away from teacher-centric curriculum models.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe introduction of Youth Voices attempts to break that down again,\u201d Higgins said. \u201cSuddenly, you have this vehicle that supports students to speak to one another, access language on their own, and engage in learning without it needing to be teacher-centered.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photos\/ New York City Writing Project<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Teachers in the South Bronx extend opportunities for student-driven online writing projects through the Youth Voices platform. The work was supported by a 2014 LRNG Innovation Challenge grant and benefited students who have immigrated to the US and lack the resources that many of their native-born peers enjoy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":10602,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[518],"tags":[619,96,486],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10542"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10542"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10542\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10601,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10542\/revisions\/10601"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}