Teaching children to tolerate other cultures, to become, more global, the good example set by a school instructor, from the Front Page Sections, translated…
As people moved from their countries of origin to another, to live, or to study, to work, or to marry, they’d, needed to, adapt to their new environment, which is sometimes, not that easy. Other than the enormous pressures of learning a brand new language, the attitudes of the local residents, is also plays a vital role of whether or not they will, successfully survive in the world.
I’d taught a lot of biracial children, and I’d asked them if they’d learned their mother’s languages at home, only a minority few raised their hands, most of the children however, never speak in their mother’s tongues. For some, it was because the mothers didn’t want to affect their children’s pronunciation, so that’s why they don’t teach them. Some, because the elders were against it, believed that it wasn’t necessary, for the children, to learn their mothers’ tongues.
I want to tell the students, to respect every culture, that there is beauty, to every single spoken language, and usage too. And, that if you weren’t born in the country, it takes time, to learn to speak the language. In order to make the children understand how hard it was, to learn a new language, I’d found an online video, other than using English, teaching the students to greet people using French, Japanese, Korean, German, Vietnamese, Indonesian, and, after the class period, the children understood, that all the pronunciations are complicated, that no language is easy.
I wanted the students to tell me what they’d learned, the students with mothers who’d migrated to Taiwan told me, “from before, I’d heard my mother and my grandmother talk, I can’t understand them, I didn’t want to learn their tongue, and now, I’d realized, how hard it was, to learn to speak Vietnamese, if I don’t have any sense of it. So, my mother’s well-spoken Chinese in such a short time, she’s, amazing!” “Yes, so, you must, respect her, if I am to live in a brand new country, I may not have adapted well like your mom had!”, I’d affirmed the student’s observations.
Language is a tool for communication for people, there’s no caste system for it, each and every language deserved the same kind of respects. This doesn’t just apply to the languages, but also, people as well; we should, have more tolerance more understanding, toward the newly migrated individuals as well.
And so, this teacher uses that positive note, to teach her students to respect everybody’s culture, because we are all different, and we share the same living, and working environment, and, if we can’t respect one another for our differences, then, this world will totally, be uninhabitable.