I can understand why students who are living in the US feel that they don't 
have time to become literate in their own languages before tackling English. 
Off the top of my head, I'd say that literacy in English could perhaps 
tranfer to literacy in their own languages depending, of course, on what 
alphabet their language uses--we know that literacy in L1 makes learning L2 
easier, so I would think that writing and reading in L2 could perhaps make 
writing in L1 a little easier.  But what I wonder is whether students will 
value L1 literacy at that point, not because it isn't important, but 
because, if their lives and families are immersed in an English-speaking 
world, will they feel that it's "progress" to loop back and learn as an 
adult in L1.  And, of course, English syntax and grammar don't follow the 
same rules as syntax and grammar in other languages, which could lead to a 
student writing "fractured" L1 AND "fractured" English!  I suppose a help 
for that would be to try to get them reading in L1.

Luri Owen
Bayfield/ESL Coordinator
The Adult Learning Center, Inc.
Phone 970-884-7765


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "A Tom" <abtom at mindspring.com>
To: "The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List" 
<englishlanguage at nifl.gov>
Sent: Tuesday, February 07, 2006 1:36 PM
Subject: Re: [EnglishLanguage] FROM JAY CASTANO AT ROSARIO CENTER,IN 
WASHINGTON, DC


I don't know about research but my adult students don't feel that they
have the time to do this.  What I'm curious about is whether becoming
literate in english then carries over to the student's first language.
Abbie Tom
On Monday, February 6, 2006, at 06:55  PM, JMCAST1031 at aol.com wrote:
abtom at mindspring.com
Abbie Tom
Durham Technical Community College
Durham, NC US


> Hi, everyone...... a "quick and dirty" question. Is there any

> research on teaching

> Adult LD or illiterate students in their own language for a

> semester or 100 hours, before

> immersion into English???? Basically, if the student learns how to

> read and write and/or

> decode in their language, is that a benefit to them in their process

> of learning English???

>

> Thanks, Jay


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