AN intensive native language program for adults: The instructors' perspective

McGill Journal of Education, Fall 2002 by Merle Richards, David Maracle

RESEARCH METHOD

Sinclair Bell (1997) comments that "language teachers possess a wealth of knowledge about language learning, which is still largely unwritten and unacknowledged" (p. 5). To delve into that implicit knowledge, reflective interviews were conducted with Brian Owennatekha Maracle and David Kanatawakhon Maracle towards the end of the spring terms of the second cohort, after the summer session, and at the end of the third cohort. The interviews were then transcribed and subjected to content analysis to discover the instructors' insights into their students' learnings and their own evolving teaching approaches. The interview data were verified through interviews with the students in the program and by classroom observations conducted by Merle Richards. This article therefore focuses on the experiences of the instructors over two years. Quotations in italicized font are from the third-year interviews with Owennatakha and Kanatawakhon; when not noted otherwise they are from Kanatawakhon. It is notable that the two instructors have collaborated so closely that, although they were interviewed separately and at different times, they did not contradict each other at all.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

1. What was the reason for developing a full-time language program?

When a language has so few speakers left that it is no longer used for many ordinary functions of daily life, and when the remaining speakers do not have the energy or background for formal classroom teaching, the only way to maintain a community language is to recruit people to learn the language to a high level of fluency so that they can use it and pass it on to others (Richards & Schutz, 1997). Years of regular once-a-week language classes for adults have not been successful in developing fluent speakers of Mohawk. Most students drop out after the first few weeks, and those who remain seldom develop enough oral language skills to practice further with fluent speakers in the community. The classes usually focus on the basics of language (i.e., greetings, how to ask questions, vocabulary, etc.), but do not provide enough opportunity for active language use. An adult immersion program was therefore envisioned to provide an environment where students could actually learn the language through conversation while benefiting from the presence of fluent speakers.

Such a program demands extraordinary commitment from the learners, especially as it often means time away from employment and perhaps family, but even more on the part of the instructors, who must constantly seek funding, develop resources, plan instruction, and also look to their own continued language development. The motivation for such devotion, expressed by every participant, is the sense that the language and culture must be kept alive, and that with fluent speakers becoming fewer and fewer, the time is now. Owennatekha asserts:

In terms of creating a speaker, if you happen to have a community where it's a minority language, where it's a dying language, nothing else will work anymore if you want to get somebody to learn it. . . .We have to create our own speakers who will obviously know the grammar and the method and then use them to teach.