Recognized Futures By Lisa Suhair Majaj

The purpose of this activity is for students to make a text-to-self connection to the poem “Recognized Futures” by Lisa Suhair Majaj, and to express themselves through creative means. Students are to produce a book featuring their favorite aspects of their native culture and of the culture of the new country in which they live. They can use a list of online resources to search for pictures or they can choose to draw whatever they wish to depict, such as their favorite holidays, TV shows, food, games, songs, and places. Using their home language, English, or both languages, students are to write brief sentences describing the pictures which show what their favorite parts of both cultures are, and why. When they are finished, students are

Encouraging text-to-self connections through an extension activity is a creative way in which teachers can check their students’ comprehension as it allows students to express themselves through words and art. If students were able to understand the text, which in this case is “Recognized Futures”, then they may be able to find points at which they related to the author and can accordingly express themselves. Multilingual research is the principle of translanguaging incorporated into this extension activity. As stated in Translanguaging: A CUNY-NYSIEB Guide for Educators: “Another option is to have your EBLs create part of their research project in the home language, and another part in English. For example, they could write a report in the home language and create a visual display with summaries and labels in English. Or, they could write an informational book in the home language and label photographs, diagrams, or illustrations in English. This is particularly helpful for EBLs with lower English proficiency levels because they can more fully express what they’ve learned by writing in the home language, while creating another written product in English that matches their English proficiency