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Christina Wong Educational Biography 2 10/06/13 The American Language Growing up, English has always been my first language. I remember when my dad would always take me to my uncles house and my cousins and I would built a fort with pillows surrounding us, while we watched 101 Dalmatian, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Mermaid and many more. This was actually how I learned English! I picked up English pretty fast and was communicating with my parents with English and very little Cantonese mixed together (I called it Ching-lish). It never occurred in my mind to learn more Cantonese. I always told my mom that I didnt need to learn Cantonese because we are in the United States and how English is the main language for communication. At that time, I felt so proud to be able to speak English, to be able to make friends so easily because I knew how to speak the American language. The hallway was filled with laughter as I walked through the doors. It was another day for me at Monterey Vista Elementary School. I was so excited for recess because we were going to play basketball today. When recess finally came, two guys from my class were chosen as captains. I was so nervous because out of 12 people playing, there were only 3 girls playing, myself included. Surprisingly, I was the first girl to be chosen into a team. When the game started, Jonathan, my captain was dribbling the ball but couldnt shoot the basketball because he was being guarded by two other players. He faked it to his right but instead, passed the ball to me and I quickly ran and threw the ball to the net. WOO HOO! OOOHHH YEAHHH!!! My team mates cheered for me when I made the shot. Nice work! Well done Christina! That was awesome Christina! was all I heard from my team mates as they congratulated me and high

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fived me. As we continued the game, eventually my team won the gamy by 2 points. Yeah, I like my team! Jordon, another player in my team said. I felt so proud and felt like I was an important player to my team. I was about 8-9 years old when I first encountered a new and unknown environment. My family was going to Hong Kong. Wow was what I thought to myself I stepped through the doors. Ive never been to such a place before. I was at the airport with my parents and my brother and it was super packed and loud here. We were going on a family vacation to Hong Kong, where we were going to visit my aunt and cousins over there. I have never been to Hong Kong and this was my first time in an airport as well. It was such a huge place with lots of bright lights and a bunch of people walking in and out all around us. I felt so anxious and curious about everything. How can this place fit a huge airplane in it? What was that thing that people had to walk through that made beeping noises? These questions and many more was running through my head as I was looking all around me. I was nervous, yet excited about going on a plane and meeting my aunt and cousins over at Hong Kong. When we finally got to Hong Kong, we were greeted with hugs and kisses by my auntie and cousins. My parents were talking to my auntie and cousins in an excited tone. ?, one of my cousins said to me. I just looked up to him with a confused expression. I had no idea what he was saying. It was really hard to communicate with my aunt and cousins at first, because they didnt know any English at all and they couldnt understand my Ching-lish as well. My parents had to translate for us. My cousins took us out to hang out with their friends and took us to explore new places but it was hard to enjoy anything because I couldnt understand them. My cousins would joke around with their friends and I would just stand there outside of the circle, feeling completely lost and wanting to go back to home to LA. I was not used to this new environment and their language.

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But as time went on, I started to learn more basic Cantonese and I even taught my cousins some English as well! Things got a little easier after that. After learning the language better, it was easier for me to adapt to the environment and to communicate with my cousins. In The Perils and Promises of Praise by Dweck, Dweck talks about how a fixed mind set works. Dweck states that if a student has a fixed mind set, he/she will believe that their intellectual ability is a fixed trait. What this means is that because some students believe that they are already smart to begin with, there is no need for them to learn anything new because they are already smart. And how Dwecks fixed mind set relates to my outsider experience is because I had my own mind set. And my mind set was that I believed I didnt have to learn Cantonese because I lived in the US and the main language needed to communicate was English, the American language. And because of this mind set, when I was encountered with a new environment that had a different language, I was confused and lost. Also in Dwecks The Perils and Promises of Praise, he also states about how a growth mind set works. If a student has a growth mind set, they are willing to learn more. And Dweck believes that if a student is willing to learn more and the more they use their brains, the more the brain develops and grows. How Dwecks growth mind set idea relates to my insider experience is that when I finally accepted the fact that I need to learn more than one language, English. Even though I live in the US, and the language most common here is English, I am still an Asian American and have to keep my Chinese culture alive still. And in order to do that, I have to be able to speak my language and learn Cantonese. And the more I think this way, the more my brain will grow and develop. If I have a growth mind set, I am more open minded about learning more languages besides English that can help benefit me in the future.

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In Mother Goose in Monterrey by Sofia Gomez, she tells us that she learned English by watching and reading Disney movies and books. Its funny because thats exactly how I learned English! But unlike me, Spanish was Sofias first language. She also had that growth mind set to learn more language and she did that by watching and reading Disney movies and books. I on the other hand, actually started off learning English first and didnt have that same mind set as Gomez and Dweck, and refused to learn another language. I thought because I lived in the US and the common language used here was English, I thought I didnt have to learn another language because I wouldnt need to use another language here in the US, but boy was I wrong! Another literacy narrative I have read, Always Living in Spanish; Recovering the Familiar, through Language by Marjorie Agosin, Agosin actually moved from her hometown Chile, to the United States. She spoke Spanish but because she was living in the United States, she also learned English as well. But Agosin didnt feel that English could truly express her love for her hometown Chile. She felt that Spanish expressed her true feeling about Chile better. Even when she is living in another country, she never left her culture or have forgotten her hometown Chile. She was still rooted to her culture. She was the opposite of me. Whereas I lived in the United States and went back to Hong Kong where my family was originally from, I did not know anything about my culture. I was not rooted to my culture as Agosin was. I didnt understand my home language and I was fine with expressing myself in English. But even with her love for Spanish, that did not stop Agosin from learning English, where the language is needed to get adapt to the new environment. What I want to get out of this particular English class in PCC is maybe to improve my writing. I feel that annotating also helps me because when I annotate, I feel like I understand the text a lot better. Something that I want you to know about me is that, it might take me awhile to

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actually be able to write a good essay. Im really no good at writing essays, so it might take me awhile to improve my essays and get the hang of how you are expecting us to write our essays. Because usually when I write essays, I dont really have a format. But in your class, you want us to relate whatever our topic is to one of our readings and I dont usually do that, so that will take me awhile to get the hang of. This is mainly what I want you to know and mainly my main concern when you have us write essays. Im excited about having more group activities.

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