Heritage language maintenance and loss among the children of Eastern European immigrants in the USA

Nesteruk, Olena

doi:10.1080/01434630903582722

Cited by 110 publications

(79 citation statements)

References 22 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Although parents play a pivotal role in the process of HL maintenance, teachers' recognition of the importance of the HL is critical to the empowerment of the child (Lee & Oxelson, 2006). Research supports this notion, showing that a lack of support from schools, communities, and society often jeopardizes parents' intentions for maintaining the HL (Nesteruk, 2010).…”

mentioning

confidence: 76%

“…Parents' positive attitude toward Li, 1999;Nesteruk, 2010). These opportunities include reading children's books and folk tales in the HL, utilizing support within the ethnic community, spending extended time in the heritage country, and using technology (DeCapua & Wintergerst, 2002;Hashimoto & Lee, 2011;Nesteruk, 2010;Park & Sarkar, 2007;Rydin & Sjonberg, 2008;Şenyürekli & Detzner, 2009).…”

Section: The Parents' Rolementioning

confidence: 97%

“…These opportunities include reading children's books and folk tales in the HL, utilizing support within the ethnic community, spending extended time in the heritage country, and using technology (DeCapua & Wintergerst, 2002;Hashimoto & Lee, 2011;Nesteruk, 2010;Park & Sarkar, 2007;Rydin & Sjonberg, 2008;Şenyürekli & Detzner, 2009). Specifically, parents and grandparents in one study repeatedly pointed out the significance of adults' active involvement in selecting appropriate resources, and guiding children in the optimal and creative use of media technologies (Szecsi & Szilagyi, 2012).…”

Section: The Parents' Rolementioning

confidence: 98%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Teaching Strategies: “What If I Don't Speak It?” Classroom Strategies to Nurture Students' Heritage Languages

Szilágyi

Giambo

Szécsi

2013

Childhood Education

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

mentioning

confidence: 76%

Section: The Parents' Rolementioning

confidence: 97%

Section: The Parents' Rolementioning

confidence: 98%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Teaching Strategies: “What If I Don't Speak It?” Classroom Strategies to Nurture Students' Heritage Languages

Szilágyi

Giambo

Szécsi

2013

Childhood Education

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…These classifications of immigrants come to life when students learn about them in assigned readings: a case study of an African refugee family resettling in the U.S. (Vongkhamphra, Davis, & Adem, 2012), a chapter on mixed-status transnational families from Central America (Menjivar & Abrego, 2009), or an article about legal highly educated professionals from Eastern Europe (Nesteruk, 2010). Students can compare different immigrants' resources, life circumstances, strengths, challenges, and resulting adaptation.…”

Section: Classification Of Immigrantsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Teaching Family Science Students about Immigrant Families in the U.S.: A Course to Reflect the Diversity of the Immigrant Population

Nesteruk

2013

FSR

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

ABSTRACT.Working with immigrant families in a globalized world requires a deep understanding of the multidimensional experience of immigration as it unfolds over the course of the immigrant's life. Family science students need to be aware of the diversity of immigrants and be knowledgeable about immigrant family dynamics across generations and among diverse ethnic groups. In this paper, I share my ideas for developing and teaching an Immigrant Families course to family science students. I provide my teaching approach, course objectives, content and scope of the course, as well as examples of required readings and course assignments. My recommendations may be useful to instructors interested in introducing such a course into their family science programs or to those who wish to incorporate information on immigrant families into existing courses in order to strengthen students' employability and increase their cultural sensitivity as future practitioners and scholars.Keywords: immigrant families, diversity, immigration, family science Family science students are well aware that the United States is a diverse, multicultural society, comprised of immigrants and their descendants. During their studies students take required courses on cultural diversity and read textbooks with chapters on diverse families that contain descriptions of select ethnic groups. Nevertheless, how much do our students know about contemporary immigrant families in the United States and migration as a global phenomenon? Do we do enough to prepare them to work with this population and become culturally sensitive practitioners and future scholars? Based on my experience with students who are growing up in the state of New Jersey, where immigrants comprise 20% of the population compared to 13% nationally (U.S. Census, 2012), I argue that we need to do a better job preparing them to work with immigrant families. To begin this conversation, I will share my experience of developing and teaching an elective course, entitled Immigrant Families, in a Family and Child Studies program. I will describe the content and the scope of this course, outline my approach and philosophy of teaching this class, share course readings and assignments, and provide students' quotes to illustrate their learning. Developing a Course on U.S. Immigrant FamiliesI would like to start by sharing several representative comments from my students that reflect what they thought about immigrant families prior to taking this class and how their perceptions changed at the end of semester. The quotes throughout this paper come from informal written evaluations collected over three semesters from a total of ninety undergraduate students majoring in Family and Child Studies who were enrolled in Immigrant Families.To be completely honest, my assumption of this class was a Latino professor talking about crossing borders and how to teach ESL students. However, this class really showed me the true diversity of the immigrant population in the U.S. and the complex family dynamics -issues wit...

show abstract

“…However, research also suggests that a lack of support from schools, communities, and the society often jeopardizes parents' efforts for maintaining the HL (Nesteruk, 2010). Often, schools fail to provide assistance for students' developing bilingualism for numerous reasons, including: (1) lack of or inconsistencies in funding for effective bilingual programs (Gándara & Rumberger, 2009), (2) the sole and dominant focus on the development of English proficiency, which can be a result of high-stakes testing pressures (Menken, 2013;Menken & Solorza, 2014), and (3) teachers and district professionals' misconception of the value of being bilingual and biliterate (Cho et al, 2012).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Promoting and Maintaining Bilingualism and Biliteracy: Cognitive and Biliteracy Benefits & Strategies for Monolingual Teachers

Giambo¹,

Szécsi²

2015

TOCOMMJ

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Many school personnel pursue the goal of developing English language learners' English-language and literacy skills efficiently and this is most often implemented to the exclusion of supporting, developing, and maintaining students' heritage language skills. However, there is significant evidence that promoting bilingualism and biliteracy can significantly contribute to the effect that many school personnel want, that of efficiently developed English language and literacy skills, with the added benefit of students who can function and thrive in multilingual environments. In this article, we present research-based evidence in support of developing and maintaining bilingualism and biliteracy, and we submit that the empirical research support for the benefits of bilingualism and biliteracy should change language and literacy instruction. Strategies for teachers, especially teachers who do not speak the heritage language of their students, are provided and can be implemented to promote bilingual reading, writing, and language skill development.

show abstract

Heritage language maintenance and loss among the children of Eastern European immigrants in the USA

Cited by 110 publications

References 22 publications

Teaching Strategies: “What If I Don't Speak It?” Classroom Strategies to Nurture Students' Heritage Languages

Teaching Strategies: “What If I Don't Speak It?” Classroom Strategies to Nurture Students' Heritage Languages

Teaching Family Science Students about Immigrant Families in the U.S.: A Course to Reflect the Diversity of the Immigrant Population

Promoting and Maintaining Bilingualism and Biliteracy: Cognitive and Biliteracy Benefits & Strategies for Monolingual Teachers

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About