Eva Vincent

339 Final Project Reflection

5/4/2020
 This final project felt like the perfect way to end the semester and wrap up all that I

have learned from this class. After learning about so many cultures and ways to help students

feel included in the classroom, I felt prepared and eager to take on this assignment. My first

thought of which group to focus on were Spanish speaking ELL students because I am from

Yakima Washington, where about half of my community has ties to Mexico and/or speaks

Spanish, making this a very prevalent group for myself if I end up teaching here in the future,

which is very likely, so I thought this would be a great way to further educate myself. The

Egbert and Ernst readings we used for quizzes throughout the semester were a huge source of

information and to background knowledge on different cultures, especially for Spanish speaking

countries. These quizzes and readings in particular had a huge impact on my learning and am

grateful that I have learned all that I have from both. I am so thankful I had the opportunity to

learn so much from this course and to be able to wrap up some of that learned knowledge into

this flyer. The flyer format kept all of the information brief, yet it was concentrated and got

right to the point, making it effective and able to keep the reader’s attention so they will read

the entire flyer.

When it came to the looks and the layout of the flyer, I chose to use colors inspired by

the Mexican flag because the majority of the Spanish speaking ELL students here in Washington

state have Mexican heritage and I thought that the colors from the flag made my flyer much

more exciting to look at. I thought that the colors really brought the flyer to life and made it

something that people would want to stop and read and almost has the power the immerse the

reader in Hispanic culture while reading it. I also decided to show each source at the bottom of

the section that information it was used in instead of all together in a traditional reference

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section because of this information being presented in a flyer format, it needed to be appealing

to look at and I did not feel that a separate reference section would accomplish that task. I felt

that this looked more appealing to the viewer and it better organized where exactly I retrieved

information, showing the reader exactly where they can look to find information as they read it

in such a short amount of time.

By reading my flyer, teachers have the opportunity to gain a better understanding of

Spanish speaking ELL students and how to best accommodate their needs in the classroom. It is

important to understand your students’ culture as it can tell you a lot more about all aspects of

the student which is what I was aiming for my flyer to accomplish. My flyer informs teachers

about what a Spanish speaking ELL students home life might look like and what role they play

within their family, giving teachers a much better understanding of the student as a whole. This

information also will help the teacher better understand how to interact with the student’s

family because the teacher knows what they might value and how much the family unit is

prioritized and how much family members rely on one another. Teachers can gain a range of

information from this flyer like tips on how to help an ELL student to feel more welcome and

represented in the classroom and about background information regarding a few cultural

norms, both of which are valuable in the classroom with activities and in getting to know a

student. I think this flyer contains valuable information that educators should be familiar with

and should continue to pursue more information on after reading this which was my end goal

of this flyer. I just wanted to show the importance of being culturally aware and understanding

as an educator and how big of a difference it can make.

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 While this flyer is intended to mainly be for other teachers, this has also been a great

lesson for myself and will remain a great reference tool for years to come. This assignment

gave me the opportunity to really think about and sort through information that I have learned

in this class over the course of this semester. This allowed me to really think about how to

present information and how to best give classroom tips based on the information I have

learned in class and in research for this project. This is something I would be excited and proud

to present to others whether they are parents, educators or other pre-service teachers like

myself. I hope that I have a chance to use this flyer in the future and to be able to have more

conversations, whether virtual or in person, about ELL education and how to best assist these

students within the classroom and beyond.