Month: January 2022

Collaboration doesn’t end after LTS

By Keli Yerian, LTS Director and faculty member, and Connor Yiamkis, LTS alumnus 2020 and Pit River tribal member

Graduating from the LTS program doesn’t mean we say goodbye! Many LTS alumni stay in touch with each other and with faculty for many years after they graduate. Sometimes we even continue to collaborate on presentations and other projects. As one example, Keli and Connor describe their ongoing project below.

(Keli) LTS alumnus Connor Yiamkis and I are working together this year on a chapter called A Multicompetence Approach to Awakening Dormant Languages with third co-author Jarrid Baldwin from the Myaamia Center, member of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma. The chapter will be part of an edited volume on Awakening Languages organized and edited by Linguistics faculty member Gabriela Pérez-Báez. We just presented an early draft of this work at the Linguistics Society of America (LSA) annual convention in January, 2022. Connor is now working as Community Consultant for the Achumawi Database & Pit River Language Curriculum Developer and Language Teacher for Indigenous Language Network.

In this chapter we explore how a multicompetence approach (see Hirata-Edds & Peter, 2016) can help support efforts to awaken languages that have been dormant in a community for some time. A multicompetence perspective claims that bilingualism is not parallel monolingualism; learners of an additional language are not starting from scratch. Learners already have rich cultural and communicative resources in their mutually shared language or languages (e.g. English) that can help maintain motivation and momentum if used intentionally and mindfully as scaffolding to awaken a heritage or ancestral language. With time, the awakening language can establish stronger and stronger footholds in chosen domains of use and expand as learners gain confidence and proficiency. In this way, a multicompetence perspective does not mean simply reverting to the dominant language; on the contrary it can promote more and more use of the awakening language in meaningful ways as part of a growing overall repertoire of bilingual language competencies. Connor will explain more about how this has been working in his case with Pit River language revitalization.

Connor teaching a virtual lesson in Pit River. The domain is in the kitchen, cooking breakfast. Click to watch the video!

(Connor) Cʰú micisunwíumá LTS – How are you doing LTS? I first want to mention that I am grateful for my time in the program, and it has been a pleasure to stay in touch with faculty after graduating from LTS. As Keli has mentioned we have been working together on a chapter exploring a multicompetence approach to language revitalization. For the context of my tribe’s (Pit River) language community this has taken the form of a method called reclaiming domains. This method utilizes a multicompetence approach through instruction in English and providing scaffolding to slowly build up language use in the target language. A domain is a space, such as a room in the house, that is dedicated to speaking the language. For example, if the bathroom is your first domain you can start out with the activity of washing your hands and self-narrating each of the steps. Each week, you add another activity which increases the amount of time you are speaking the language each day.

A similar scaffolding process is applied to conversations: “where did you go today?”, “who did you see?”, “what did you eat?”, etc. Eventually these short conversations can be added together and flow into a more natural conversation. If someone doesn’t know the word in Pit River word for “meat” for example, they can simply insert the English word in the meantime as the focus is on keeping the conversation flowing (Ex: Sáámi qa meat: “I ate meat”). English and other languages the learners may know can also be used to compare and contrast with when discussing pronunciation and grammar and can help students start to branch off of the scripted speech, drawing on all of their language knowledge to help them learn a new language.

Pit River is in the upper right side of this map: Achumawi

We hope our collaboration continues for many years to come. Stay in touch and keep learning LTS!

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Crafting a personal statement for a program in language education

For those who are applying to graduate programs in language education in the US, it’s that time of the year to craft your personal statement as part of your application. Here are a few tips for making a statement that will stand out to your readers:

The DOs:

  • DO…organize your statement as a ‘deductive’-style essay: with an introduction paragraph, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. The introduction should engage the readers but also make a fairly direct statement about why you are a good fit for the program. The body paragraphs can then provide specific supporting information for your qualifications, interests and goals, while the conclusion can restate how these qualifications will match well with the program you are applying to.
  • DO…highlight your past educational and professional experiences that have brought you to a career in language teaching. If you are an experienced language teacher, highlight your accomplishments, what you have learned from them, and how they have influenced your teaching identity and philosophy. If you have little experience teaching so far, describe what experience you do have and why it has inspired you to learn and do more in this profession.
  • DO…tailor your statement to the specific program. Write about what you hope to learn from the program and how your participation and strengths will contribute to the program. Most departments want to see that an applicant is ready to take advantage of the resources in the program (e.g. relationships with faculty, other departments or institutes, internships, specific coursework topics, etc.) and realize their own full potential with those resources.
  • DO…provide specific examples of your achievements, goals, and experiences that help to tell the story of your journey towards becoming a language professional, e.g. a teacher, curriculum designer, future administrator, researcher, etc.
  • DO…write your statement well before the deadline, so you have time to revise and refine it before you submit it.

The don’ts:

  • Don’t…exaggerate or misrepresent your own experience, such as with teaching. If you have little experience so far, be honest about this.
  • Don’t…just list facts and statistics about yourself. Write also about what you have learned about your own interests and goals, and how these relate to the future.
  • Don’t…wait until the end of your essay to state why you want to attend the program. Readers want to see your ‘thesis’ near the beginning of the statement.
  • Don’t…ask someone else to write your statement for you! Readers will expect writing styles to naturally vary, and understand that bilingual and multilingual writers may have a unique writing ‘accent’. Do, however, revise and edit carefully for common errors and for typos.
  • Don’t… write it at the last minute.

In the end, faculty who are reviewing graduate program applications want to see a clearly written statement of who you are now, how you got to this point, and where you want to go, all in the context of your (future) professional identity as a language teacher.

Good luck with your application!

Keli Yerian, LTS Director

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