Language In Schools

In most countries around the world,the issue of which dialect or language should be used in schools is not a big problem. However, as this thesis shows, dialect and language can be a major issue and problem in several countries around the world. These dialect and language issues negatively affect their educational systems, especially in places where the standard dialect is very different from the other dialects. Some countries have dealt with this issue by implementing several different types of programs including the use of a method known as bidialectalism. These programs help students who speak dialects different from the standard one learn through the use of their own dialects. However, in some countries, such as Kurdistan, this issue has

The debate about this issue and about whether or not these dialects should be brought into schools dates back to the 1970s and 1980s. The debate reached its peak in 1996 when the Oakland School Board of Education passed a resolution asking the government to recognize AAVE as a tool to be used in schools with large numbers of AAVE speaking students (Baron, 2000). Consequently, now there are many programs available in America helping AAVE and some other Creole Language speakers in schools learn ASE. One of the most important programs designed for this issue is the Academic English Mastery Program (AEMP) in Los Angeles, California. Another program which is also important is the Bidialectical Communication Program (BCP) in Dekalb County, Georgia (Denham &Lobeck; Siegel, 2006b, 2007). These two programs place a great emphasis on the Contrastive Analysis Approach. These programs also include some aspects of sociolinguistics. Further, they teach students language and dialect awareness. This approach allows students to consider important aspects of language, and gain a greater appreciation of how dialects function. Moreover, these methodologies help students recognize that all dialects are equal. In other words, through these two programs, students learn that no dialect is greater and more developed than the other. Students are

For example, literature is employed to help students of other dialects, such as AAVE, learn the differences between formal and informal English. Through this technique, students learn grammatical patterns belonging to GAE and also learn how to distinguish GAE patterns from patterns of their dialects (Jones, 2013; Wheeler & Swords, 2006). Another technique used is a method called Journaling. In this technique, students are required to write about topics assigned by teachers, such as a story, poem, etc. They are sometimes asked to write about topics of their own interests. Then the students should read aloud to each other the things they write in their class. This “increases the possibility that they will be able to detect deviation from Standard English” (Jones, 2013, p 115).

Another important technique utilized by these schools, such as AMEP, is the use of a Dialogue Journal. This technique creates a situation in which both teachers and students feel relaxed in classrooms. Their interaction with each other in class is based on a “non-threatening context” (Jones, 2013, p.113). In this technique, students are required to talk about their feelings about a poem, story, movie, topic, etc. to each other. They do this by writing their feelings on a note card (Linnell, 2010). For example, Jones (2013) shows us an example to illustrate the use of the dialogue