How respecting cultural heritage validates immigrant students Gonzalo Salazar
I was 6 years old when I first enrolled
in a U.S. school in the Rio Grande Valley.
The classroom setup at my new school
was different than the one I attended in
Mexico.
The truth is, everything I once knew was
different.
Instead of sitting in groups around a
table,
we sat in rows in individual desks.
All the adults and most of the kids at
my new school spoke English.
The few kids that spoke Spanish
either whispered or said nothing
most of the day.
We began each day pledging allegiance
to a flag I didn’t recognize.
Kids at my new school placed their hand
flat over their heart,
instead of a military-style salute across
their chest,
the way I had previously been taught.
The teacher led the class from the front
of the room,
and I could not comprehend a single word.
I spent most of my day looking feverishly
around the classroom,
trying to read body language, trying to
keep up with my classmates,
even the alphabet above the blackboard
in the front of the room was different.
It was missing letters.
Mama explained that Papa had taken a job
in the shrimping industry,
and that we would be leaving our home in
Mexico and moving en otro lado,
on the other side,
part of the vernacular in the region that
no one had to explain to you.
It referred to the border community
on the other side of the river,
in the United States.
She gave my siblings and me a crash course
in English,
and taught us the few words she knew.
In reality, there was little
she could have done
to prepare us for what we
were about to experience.
Although I previously excelled at school
I was now struggling in the classroom.
Our teacher placed us into groups
according to our reading ability.
I was either a red bird or a green bird.
I know with certainty that I was not a
blue bird.
Those blue birds could
read English fluently.
And I, I was reading every
letter phonetically,
I was sounding everything out using
the phonetic approach
that Maestra Raquel in Mexico
had taught me.
But my spoken word had no meaning.
We spoke Spanish at home, but we could not
do so at school,
at least not around our teachers.
Every year, teachers at
my elementary school
were more adamant about not allowing
us to speak Spanish.
On occasion, speaking Spanish
in the presence of our teachers
resulted in corporal punishmnet.
I remember a time when a teacher placed a
ruler on the back of my hand.
She lifted it and swatted
down to strike me.
Another teacher taught me a lesson using
the Webster’s Dictionary.
She had me hold one in each hand and raise
my arms up away from my body
for what seemed like an eternity.
I was being punished for speaking the
language
that I knew to be the language
of poetry and the arts.
It was the language of my abuelos,
the language of my padres.
I did not understand.
Our teachers wanted us to speak English
instead of Spanish,
but as the month of February drew near,
we were highly encouraged to participate
in the Charro Days festivities,
an annual celebration of the Mexican
heritage and the relationship that exists
between the people on the Mexican
and the American sides of the Rio Grande.
Things were strange at home also.
Our parents knew we were learning to speak
English at school.
Still, when my siblings and I reached a
conversational proficiency level,
we were scolded for doing so.
At the Salazar household,
speaking English in the presence of those
who did not understand it
was considered ill-mannered.
“En esta casa se habla español.
Que falta de respetos esse?
Como en esta habla de inglés en la
presencia de sus padres y sus abuelos?
In this household you will speak Spanish.
What lack of respect is that?
How can you speak English in the presence
of your parents and your grandparents?”
It was as though we
were living a double life.
I did not feel deeply rooted in either
culture for a long time.
Circumstances were forcing us to develop
what Anzaldúa referred to
as the mestiza-like consciousness.
Circumstances warranted going in and out
of both cultures, and between languages.
I was living in a state of nepantla,
a term in the indigenous Aztec
dialect of novato,
that captures an existence involving
an in-between state of conciousness.
Looking back, I can see that I was
struggling to find my cultural identity.
How could I feel this way?
How could my blood still boil when I
heard Mexico’s national anthem?
How could my blood boil when I heard
my mama sing along to Mariachi music
that played on Spanish television or radio
stations?
How could I feel this way when I was
pledging allegience to a new flag?
Who was I?
The state of confusion and shame grew
deeper as time went on.
Everything rooted in culture and
citizenship
was contingent on a situation or location.
I was nothing more than an academic
tourist in the borderlands of culture.
By the time I got to middle school,
teachers were no longer as concerned about
students speaking Spanish.
Still, there was something rather ironic
about the entire middle school experience.
I had reached this whole new level of
proficiency in English,
and now, the school curriculum required
that I take Spanish as a foreign language.
Through my undergraduate work,
I learned that when we set out to shape
the academic experience
for immigrant students,
we cannot simply concern ourselves with
the cognitive and the linguistic domains.
We must also address the effective domain.
That portion of our lessons or academic
experience that teach students
an appreciation and a
validation of the self.
In our efforts to help students
assimilate into the mainstream culture,
we are erasing the richness of their
heritage,
and weakening the fiber of the fabrics
that make our nation stronger.
It is in this domain where schools are
failing to capitalize
on one of the most valuable
resources we have:
the culture of our students.
Almost 21 million elementary
and secondary students
of immigrant families were enrolled
in the nation’s public schools
in October of 2016,
representing 26% of the overall
student population.
I trust that no one is using rulers or the
Webster’s Dictionary
in the way that I experienced.
I fear, however,
that there may still be schools out
there sustaining learning environments
that allow shame and doubt to
creep into the lives of our students.
Our ability to help immigrant
students succeed
necessitates leaders with the courage
to create spaces
in which students can feel comfortable
participating in activities
that validate their heritage
and their culture.
Today, these spaces exist in schools
throughout the Rio Grande Valley.
One such space was created
by one of our principals.
This space exists in the performance
portion of pep rallies
ahead of our football games.
Having nearly 2,000 students in the
gymnasium at one time
is every high school principal’s
nightmare.
Allowing kids to come down to the floor
to dance along to conjunto
or mariachi music
that is being played by their classmates
and then return to their seats
for the introduction of the offense
and the defense
takes courage, and is rather unique.
Thanks to one of our teachers,
an activity that was once
an after school club
is now a popular course offering
in our high school.
I am referring to folklorico,
or folkloric ballet,
a collective term for traditional Mexican
dances
that emphasize the folk culture
of different regions.
The pictures, the smiles on the
faces of kids tell it all.
Can you see the pride with
which they perform?
These clubs are now available at almost
every one of our elementary schools.
When teachers sponsor these clubs,
or teach the class,
they are creating spaces and addressing
the effective domain.
When teachers share the similarities
between their culture
and the culture of our students,
they are achieving cultural congruence,
and reaching a whole new
relationship with kids
If I could speak to my 5 year-old self,
I would choose to do so during one of
the many evenings that I spent
sitting on the tailgate of my
grandfather’s yellow and white
‘71 short bed Chevy.
I distinctly remember sitting on this
tailgate, swinging my legs back and forth,
trying to stay in sync
with my grandfather,
as he would sway his legs
while listening to the evening news
on a transistor radio.
My grandfather was a sorghum farmer,
and to him, this Chevy pick up
was a way of transporting sorghum
and seed to the ranch.
But to me, it was a classroom.
It was here where he and I spent many
memorable moments.
He had a unique way of telling stories.
He told me about his journey,
and how he and his family traveled
into the United States
to work the fields and pick the cotton.
He told me of his struggles and his
experiences.
And it was here where he told me how
blessed we were
to live under the shade of this
great oak known as the United States.
It was through these moments
and these stories
that I gained the values and morals that
began to shape my character.
I would pick this precise moment
to tell my 5 year-old self
that I too would have a journey
and struggles,
and that through these experiences
I would be afforded opportunity.
I would encourage my 5 year-old self
to stay the course,
and to absorb everything I was about to
experience,
because one day, I too would join the
ranks of the many passionate educators
in the Rio Grande Valley,
and that I would draw on my lived
experience to shape the world
and make it a better place for children
just like me.