Eighteenth International Conference on Diversity in Organizations, Communities & Nations

Abstract

Over a one-year period on Friday evenings, a household served as the venue for a bilingual researcher to meet with parents of three Mexican families to offer English language instruction and explore the effect of four strategies to summon the power of their voices in their native language and the English language. Over multiple sessions, the strategies intentionally tapped the richness of their cultural knowledge and life experiences. The chosen methods encompassed napkin notes at the kitchen table, graphic organizer focused on a central theme, mix of auditory messages sent via text message before the session followed by casual conversations and writings, and the researcher’s modeling of paragraph writing in the Spanish language focused on a central concept followed by the parents’ own practice writings. What started as household visits to offer instruction in the English language subtly evolved into rich conversations about family memories—both here and in their native land, cultural traditions, and sentiments about their lives in a new country. This study demonstrated the significance for educators to forge parent-teacher connections as a pathway for valuing the parents’ native language and emergent acquisition of the English language—as resources for empowering the voices of culturally diverse families.