Globalizing Environmentalism: Immigrants in Maryland Share their Environmental Knowledge and Practices While Learning English

By:

This study investigated using a Funds of Knowledge Approach (Moll, 1992) in an urban after-school program for high-school students. The goal of the program was to promote student awareness of their connection to the environment, to improve student self-perceptions, to teach English language skills, and to promote immigrant involvement with the, predominantly Caucasian, environmental community in the United States. Ethnography of Speaking (Hymes, 1974) discourse analysis was used to examine the possible effects of student participation in the after-school program that targeted English language learners attending a Baltimore City charter school. This program focused on water-related activities designed to engage students, improve the environment, provide content for teaching English, and to help create an ethnically diverse environmental community. Students developed English skills through meaningful activities such as: writing letters to public leaders; giving a talk to a public audience about some of the environmental practices/beliefs in their native countries; learning to kayak; and writing a Blog to inform kayakers of river conditions. This presentation would be of interest to: educators who teach in a multicultural classroom, science/environmental educators, urban high- and middle-school teachers, community organizations seeking to include immigrants, environmental and social activists, public officials with an interest in empowering urban youth and minority populations, and scholars.

Stream: Learning, Education, Training

Paper: , , Globalizing Environmentalism

Lori Edmonds is a Ph.D. student of Language, Literacy, and Culture at the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC). She has a bachelors degree in Modern Language and Linguistics, with a Latin-American language and culture focus, and a masters degree in English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and Instructional Systems Design. She is currently teaching ESOL at UMBC and is working on a project that will train Maryland public school teachers to effectively teach English language learners (ELLs) in the content areas. Lori’s masters studies allowed her to build upon her earlier experiences working with underprivileged youth by teaching her how to begin to work toward solutions that promote equity in education. Toward this aim, Lori has completed projects that taught English through environmentalism to Hispanic adults and to ELLs at the secondary level. In addition to teaching English, the focus of these programs has been to empower immigrants in Maryland’s environmental community.