|
|
|
Matt's winning essay:
Communication between human-beings is an elegantly simple concept, but seems fiendishly challenging to accomplish at times. Granted there are hundreds of languages and thousands of dialects in use throughout the world to address this problem, but if one cannot communicate well in the language and dialect of their own environment it makes little difference if one attempts to master a new language outside of their own environment or not. Humans have difficulty communicating even in their primary language, and therefore it is my mission in life to improve communication. I will improve myself and my community by becoming a certified English, ELL, and Japanese teacher for secondary level students in America. To be an effective teacher, one must be a passionate teacher, and I know that I can instill passion in these subjects through my students. English will be my primary endorsement. I graduated from Washington State University with a bachelor of arts in English in the year 2000. While many university graduates often accept employment for positions non-related to their major, I have continued to be fascinated by English literature and writing, and I want my employment to clearly reflect my university education. As an individual, I have felt driven to read ever since I was a child and I was always in AP English classes. I enjoy articles, comics, essays, novels, poems, short-stories, and any other form of writing for that matter. Ideally I would have eight hours a day to do nothing but read, but I more commonly settle for stealing just fifteen minutes here and there throughout my day. My favorite writers include Akutagawa, Coleridge, Hemingway, Obama, Plath, Kafka, and Shakespeare. Furthermore I consider myself as an accomplished writer and although I have not had any of my novels published yet I have been working on them over a number of years and they will be published eventually. It is easy for me to realize that even though I adore English to extreme ends many junior high school or high school students view English class as boring or unnecessary. What they do not understand, or want to admit, is that even native speakers have difficulty with communication, and many cannot read or write at an intermediate level. Will my students realize these truths just by me telling them to so? No! My students will choose to read more and write more effectively because the curriculum will seem like a parallel universe to their own lives. I can accomplish having my students choose to learn because I will take the necessary time to get to know about my students interests as much as possible and letting them know that I myself am fascinated by their interests through the lessons I teach. This is a tactic I have employed as an ELL teacher in Japan and the results have been staggering. Young people who were rebellious stopped being so, and young people that were shy blossomed into talkative individuals because these types of students have chosen to learn English and have used it as a tool to better communicate their interests.
Because I have had so much experience and reflection as an ELL teacher in Japan over five years, of course I know I can change peoples lives in America as well by seeking an ELL endorsement for secondary education. American citizens come from diverse backgrounds and many Americans get by solely relying on their mother tongues as their primary languages instead of attempting to communicate in English. The mother tongues of Americans of diverse heritage are rich and beautiful and should not be sacrificed or outlawed as in Old England. However I am a strong believer in the old proverb, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do', and I know that by learning how to communicate effectively in English the American experiences of Americans of diverse mother tongues will become greatly intensified and enriched. My life was certainly enriched by taking time to study the Japanese language while I was living in Japan. I used to often tell my colleagues that did not take time to learn Japanese that they did not know what they were missing. However I also understand the task of mastering a new language many seem intimidating at first. As an ELL teacher in America I mean to take the time to study Arabic, Cantonese, French, Hindi, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Mandarin, Spanish, Swahili, Vietnamese, or any other language that will get me closer to my students and get them closer to wanting to master English as a means of communication. If the students know that I am also a student myself they will feel much more accessible to me as a fellow human-being. I plan on becoming endorsed to teach Japanese as well eventually. I took my first Japanese classes as an extracurricular activity through J-Club at the McCroskey International House where I lived as a freshman at WSU. I made many Japanese friends at WSU, became enrolled as a Japanese Area Studies minor, and my Japanese friends were all overjoyed when I told them I had been accepted to study abroad at Nihon University in Tokyo during the spring of 1999. Since that semester abroad in university I have never been the same. I returned to Japan two more times after that semester abroad and taught ELL for over 5 years.
During my time in Japan, I also met a beautiful and fascinating woman that shares a passion for life long learning with me and I intend to make her my wife. Having had so much exposure to Japanese society and customs I now consider my ethnic identity not only as Caucasian-American, but also as Caucasian-Japanese. Even now I cannot believe that in this one life I have become this deeply in love with the Japanese language and culture. As an interesting side-effect of my love for Japan, I have had the opportunity to see America from the outside over many years. Seeing America from the outside I have come closer to relating with all of the other countries of the world while still clinging strongly to my American roots. I am effectively an International Citizen. With all of the movements towards globalization in modern times it is becoming increasingly more important for American young people to be able to identify with the world outside of Americas borders. Admittedly Japanese is by far not the foremost studied international language in America when compared to Cantonese, Mandarin, or Spanish. Not having Japanese offered in my sophomore year of high school was one of the reasons I took up learning German, but by doing so I was able to become more attached to that wonderful culture as well. I welcome the idea of students wanting to study any international language they may become interested in. When it comes to Japanese though, many American young people love Japanese culture through animation, automobiles, comics, and electronics as I once did and by taking Japanese classes in junior high school or high school they might just want to take a look outside Americas borders. It is now my intention to utilize the wealth of experiences I have had abroad and use them to benefit America. I want to improve myself by becoming a certified secondary level English/ELL/Japanese teacher because I want my lifes work to have a positive influence on my community that will also positively influence the world not only today but also tomorrow. What unifies these three passions in my life is a desire to communicate effectively and inspire others to communicate effectively as well. Drawing from my international experiences and love of diverse cultures I know that I can bring a fresh change to the ways English, ELL, and Japanese classes are traditionally taught. By getting to know my students, individuality will be highly valued in my classes, and I won't just point to test scores as evidence of lessons taught and learned effectively. Through my lessons the improved communication skills, and openly inspired love for learning and diversity, in combination with test scores, will become showcased in the words and actions of each individual I have taught. Because of my actions as a teacher, communication will become more elegantly simple for human-beings soon.
|
