COMMUNITY LEARNING CENTERS
Bringing Together ESL Students, Parents, and Teachers

By Précille Boisvert, Yolanda Ronquillo, and Kavita Rao

Students crowd around a computer, sharing a microphone as they record narration for the bilingual “book” they are creating. Excited by recording their own stories, they work as teams, taking turns with the microphone and with the software they use to create the book.

For students with languages as diverse as Marshallese, Kosraean, Yapese, Spanish, and Ilocano, writing and speaking in a new language can be daunting. However, the workshop they are participating in uses technology to provide a non-judgmental medium in which these English as a Second Language (ESL) learners can thrive.

Hawaii’s Community Learning Technology Centers (CLTCs) offer dozens of workshops each year in which ESL students, teachers, and parents use technology to create and develop their own work. CLTC workshops often begin by validating knowledge that ESL students and parents bring with them when they move. Recent workshops have focused on themes and concepts like advocacy, alele (a Marshallese word meaning “things people treasure”), and friendship. Participants use art, language, and group discussion to explore personal experiences and ideas related to the themes. The themes are then developed through computer-based activities that build technology skills while furthering literacy and English language development. The goal is to focus on common experiences and values, developing community in the process.

To produce the “books” described above, participants used digital pictures from library books, sequenced the pictures, and narrated their own stories using iMovie software. Rich literacy learning took place as students wrote and rehearsed dialogue before recording it.

In centers where only older computers and software were available, students used PowerPoint, with digital images downloaded from the Internet. To share their completed projects, students used choral reading techniques to play out the characters they had created, developing writing and oral communication skills as well. The technology skills they learned will transfer to future classroom assignments and other school activities.

The CLTCs are part of a technology initiative started six years ago to address the needs of the ESL community in the schools. They began as a collaboration between the Hawaii Department of Education ESL program and the Pacific Southwest Regional Technology in Education Consortium project at the Center for Language Minority Education and Research at California State University at Long Beach. The project continues today through support from PREL’s Pacific Regional Technology in Education Consortium (PR*TEC) grant.

Based in theories of community building, critical pedagogy, and transformative learning, the CLTCs place the use of technology as an exciting tool for learning in a climate of supportive relationships. In this non-judgmental environment, students can freely experiment with language structures and sounds as they develop their projects. Students take pride in the end result, perfecting the ways in which they express their thoughts. Bringing parents and teachers into this process through CLTC workshops results in shared experiences and community building for those who are an integral part of the lives of our ESL students.

For information about CLTCs, contact Kavita Rao at raok@prel.org.