Postcards
to an ESL Tutor
by
Karmyn Dorcey-Jeffries
My husband and I have lived in Pearland, Texas for the last thirteen years.
My son started kindergarten here and will graduate from high school next
year. I have spent fourteen years building a career in the medical field
and my husband has spent thirty in aviation. We have both met people from
all over the world through our work environment and feel fortunate for the
experiences.
My grandfather was only able to get a sixth grade education when he had
to begin working to help support the family due to his father’s untimely
death. Education became an important issue to him and seven of his nine
children hold degrees in higher education.
Growing up, my parents were always reading in
the house. I wanted to read so badly and could not wait for the first
day of school. At that time there
were no children’s educational programs on TV and teaching children
before school started was discouraged. By the time I was half way
through the first grade I had read through reading assignments into the
third grade. I was average in other studies, so
my teacher put me to work as an assistant and I
began working with my peers one on one to improve their reading skills.
Last October I decided to volunteer at my local Adult Reading Center and
attended the teacher training. Shortly thereafter I met my first student,
a young woman from China. Her name is Tina. She is married and has a toddler.
She and her husband own and operate a restaurant here in town. She has been
in the country for nearly six years. She first landed in New York where
she had relatives, then met her husband and moved to Pearland about two
years ago. We struggled to communicate at our first meeting. We were both
determined and were able to express ourselves to each other through drawings,
numbers and pin ups from the walls. Tina had taken English classes in school,
but her teacher had learned the language in China from someone who had never
spoken with an English speaking person. Thus pronunciation was all new to
her. Tina had the advantage of being able to read quite a bit of English,
but the spoken language was very foreign to her. Everyone at the restaurant
speaks Chinese and Chinese is spoken in her home.
I noticed Tina was really excelling in the reading portion, but speaking
and hearing the language was still a big challenge. Her husband had
been in the states for over ten years and speaks very fluid English. I made
a request that they start speaking English at home and when they are out
shopping and running around town. I noticed improvement right away. Tina
is very capable with numbers and already knew her address and phone numbers.
Early spring the lesson book was focusing on address and phone numbers and
Tina and her husband were planning a trip to New York for a wedding. I decided
to give her a homework assignment of sending me a post card. I was
not able to convey to her what I wanted and had to send a message home to
her husband. I checked the mail daily anxious to see if my message was understood.
On day four there was a New York City picture postcard from Tina. It was
so exciting. I brought it to class at our next meeting. Tina’s face
lit up when I produced the postcard and we were both so happy that she was
able to complete her homework assignment. Then she looked at my tutor bag
and inquired where the other one was. I told her it was the only one I had
and she seemed puzzled. She told me she had sent two on the same day. I
went home and checked the mail and there it was. This one had a Chinatown
motif. Receiving those two postcards was a very satisfying, simple pleasure
and a milestone marker to boot!
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