Teaching Standard English in Urban Schools

Teaching Standard English in Urban Schools

In our society, there are many cultures with language and dialect variations, but Standard English is the language of the dominant culture. Therefore, it is necessary for all students to learn to write and speak Standard English effectively. However, for many students of Urban school districts, especially African Americans, writing and speaking effective Standard English can occasionally pose a problem. Many African American students speak a variation of Standard English (Black Vernacular Speech) whose linguistic patterns sometimes conflict with those of Standard English. It is true that African American speech is an essential aspect of their African American culture, so the educational system would be doing African American students a disservice by insisting that they learn Standard English as a primary discourse. It is also a fact however, that in order to be viewed as a successful, functional member of society, Standard English, if learned as a secondary discourse, should be written and spoken as fluently as the primary discourse.

As a State College student who received her high school diploma from an urban school district, I have found that often, students of urban schools have a difficult time becoming fluent writers and speakers of Standard English. According to the book Teaching Strategies for the Culturally Disadvantaged, Intelligence tests are usually linked with how well a student knows Standard English and the culture of the dominant race. Therefore, some students whose cultures vary from that of the ìsocial normî are unlikely to be ìwell readî or have exceptionally high IQ scores. And because it is often assumed that thinking is a product either of a lot of knowledge o...

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...l survival in our society. I work as a counselor each summer at a sports camp in Philadelphia, and each summer I encounter very intelligent students who are placed in lower tracks or labeled as ìlearning deficientî because of their language. This disturbs me because as a speaker of both Black Vernacular speech and Standard English, I know that students can learn to use Standard English just as I have. Unfortunately, many students are not privileged enough to have the same educational opportunities that I was given by my parents, therefore, it is my responsibility to teach these students Standard English the way that I have been taught. But I must learn more about teaching students and dealing with the issues that plague the educational system, and I am looking forward to receiving more of this knowledge during my pre-student teaching and student teaching experiences.