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Shixian Sheng, Asian American Civic Association
The students have lived in the States for about five years. Five years may be long enough for young people to adjust to the new life, but not enough for old people who came with no language skills and no opportunity to work in an English speaking environment. So I teach both classes bilingually, in Chinese and English. What makes my job more difficult is that the majority of the students are from Guangdong Province. They don't understand Mandarin. Sometimes I, the teacher, need an interpreter to make sure that they get the message.
I have tried to bring more information that's beyond 100 Questions to my classes. To be honest, my students are not aware that we are doing something out of our citizenship curriculum. To them, everything that helps them to know more about American people, American history, and American culture is worth learning. They are very cooperative, and student consistently attend until they pass the naturalization interviews.
Here are some of the things I tried in my classes.
• Instead of training them to remember the answers to the 100 Questions,
I told them the stories associated with the question. For example, for
American holidays like Thanksgiving, they not only learned how the tradition
came into being, but also learned early immigrant history, and how the
Pilgrims sowed the seeds of the American Dream, which has been keeping
generation after generation of American people fighting for a better life.
For Martin Luther King Day, I not only told them who King was, but also
told them about civil disobedience, and the dream that Martin Luther King
had for the United States and the world.
Then I asked them what their American Dream was. At first, they didn't
want to share their dreams with other people, which is quite understandable
for Chinese people, for in their tradition a "dream" would never
be fulfilled, and a dreamer would be looked down upon as an unrealistic
person. When I asked them, "Aren't there opportunities for you to
fulfill your dreams in America? Don't you enjoy the liberty to choose
what to do and what to be in America? Why do you bother to learn English
and 100 Questions if you don't have a dream for your future?" They
started to talk about their dreams, and understand the American tradition
and spirit better.
• Talking about why they want to be U. S. citizens, the students
are ready to answer "Because I want to be able to vote." They
know they are expected to answer this way. I tried to tell them how voting
is important for a citizen. The right to vote shouldn't be taken for granted.
American history shows that it has taken generations for minority groups
and women to get it. I used our Chinese experience to help to explain
it. In China, we were natural born citizens. We enjoyed our right to vote
when we were 18. We kind of took it for granted. But it was often the
case that instead of voting as we wanted to we voted as we were told to.
Now, if you have the right to vote in the States, you can vote as you
want to. Isn't it something that we should value and appreciate? I think
my statements are convincing to my students.
• We participated in AACA's Client Questionnaire, which asks them about their need for services. We talked about what was going on in the Chinese community. They are informed of all kinds of workshops concerning public health care, family violence, new immigration laws, and financial aid.
• For this cycle, we have four volunteer tutors for our program. The students see them as good role models. They learn from them what a good citizen should be. I understand my students' limitations. They haven't been informed of enough information of what a citizen should know yet. How can we expect them to tell what a good American citizen would be? Besides, they have very little access to get to know Americans, and they assume that American citizens all know what they should know. Anyway, having volunteer tutors to come to our classes is a wonderful experience.
• In the last couple of weeks, I have been working on Part 7 on N400 form with my "intermediate" students. We had very interesting discussions about the questions on this part. First, I introduced my students to the new words in this section, key words such as Communist Party member, habitual drunkard, prostitute, mental illness, polygamy, illegal gambling, etc. The students realized that this part of the questions will help the INS interviewer to decide whether to let them pass the naturalization interview. They became very serious with every question. They wanted to know what would be the expected answers to the questions. Basically, it is easy to tell them that the answer is "No" to all the questions. They realized that these are the requirements for the citizens-to-be to have good moral character.
But later, some students started to ask questions
like, "Are these requirements just for new citizens-to-be? Aren't
there other political parties in the U.S.? How about those American Communist
Party members? How about those habitual drunkards outside the liquor stores
in the streets? How about the business people in the "Red Light"
area in Chinatown? I found it beyond my knowledge to answer them. It is
embarrassing on the one hand, and on the other, I feel proud of my students.
They are only limited by their language skills. Their critical thinking
and profound understanding of a society in general make me feel that I
should be their student.
New
England Literacy Resource Center
World Education
Boston, MA
(617) 482-9485
