When I first started this semester, I had no idea what to expect from English 110. I had just recently graduated from high school three months before starting English 110 and was very nervous about starting my college experience. I was especially nervous about taking a writing course because I was worried the writing course was going to be strict, intensive, and fast-paced. Throughout high school, my English teachers had constantly told me that writing in college was taken very seriously and that if I did not produce quality writing that my professors expected, I would fail and likely get left behind, so one could imagine that I already felt pressured to become a good writer.

To my surprise, however, English 110 was not as bad as my high school teachers made me believe it would be. In fact, the start of the course was quite interesting because we began by discussing language politics. To be completely honest with myself, before taking English 110, I had not given much thought to language politics. I admit to being quite oblivious before about how language affects our perspective of the world and how the world views us. That changed, however, once I started English 110. Thanks to the many texts we began with during the start of the semester, such as Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue,” June Jordan’s “Nobody Means More to Me Than You And the Future Life of Willie Jordan,” and Langston Hughes “Theme for English B,” I felt like I became more aware of the role language plays in society, specifically how language can be used to make people feel oppressed and place people in categories that may not reflect who they truly are. The concept of language politics became more apparent when I heard my classmates talk about their experiences with language. I was surprised by how many people have been looked down upon due to their accents(since some classmates came to America from another country) or their “broken English,” for lack of a better term, and it made me more mindful of the struggle people went through to reach the point they are now. Recognizing people’s struggles while trying to learn a language and learning about their feelings as they were dealing with their obstacles helped me become more empathetic towards people who may not speak a language perfectly, which also helped remind me of two important lessons I learned from before, which was to never judge a book by its cover and to treat others with respect because you do not know what they have been through.

Luckily, however, I also got to see the flip side of things because of the stories my classmates shared. I heard stories where my classmates used their language abilities to help people when they were struggling to communicate, and it made me feel hopeful about our future society. I saw that just like people use language to oppress others, we can also use language to help empower those who may feel like they don’t have a voice. It was after reading the written language and literacy narrative of my peers and seeing the videos and presentations they made for the spoken language and literacy narrative that I could say I was able to achieve course outcome 1, which was to “examine how attitudes towards linguistic standards empower and oppress language users” because I was able to see from multiple points of view how language created obstacles for some of my classmates and how language had been used to help others and empower them.

Another course outcome that I feel I accomplished quite well was course outcome 2, which was to “explore and analyze in writing and reading a variety of genres and rhetorical situations. ” When I first started English 110, I was confused about how to go about analyzing rhetorical situations because I did not really practice this skill in my previous writing courses. Thankfully, Professor Lobell gave our class a rhetorical situation worksheet that helped me better understand what I should be looking for when analyzing rhetorical situations. I was able to use this worksheet to analyze Amy Tan’s personal essay “Mother Tongue” and Safwat Saleem’s video “Why I Keep Speaking Up Even When People Mock My Accent,” which helped rewire my brain and change the way I read texts and allowed me to practice and develop little by little my ability to explore and analyze rhetorical situations. Since we continued reading many different texts throughout the course, I was able to continuously apply the steps of the rhetorical situation worksheet to help me determine why an author may have structured a text the way they had and what message they were trying to send to their audience. I also feel like I explored and analyzed a variety of genres throughout the course because our class got to see many different ways in which people have tried to express their message. We got to explore poems, personal essays, videos, scholarly journals, and profiles throughout the course and the diversity in the type of genres we examined helped show me that there is more than one way for a person to deliver a message.

The course also involved a lot of collaboration with my classmates, and I feel like this has helped me improve my writing because it allowed me to get different points of view about a subject that I may not have considered. Having a different pair of eyes review my written work was quite helpful because it allowed me to see where I needed to emphasize a point I was making or where I needed to revise my writing to make it more understandable and less overwhelming for the reader. I also got the chance to practice my drafting skills quite a lot throughout the course because every time we had to write a major assignment (such as the peer profile, the research essay, and the language and literacy narrative assignment), we took a good amount of time to read about the topic we were going to write about, brainstorm ideas for the stance we will take in our writing, and then begin drafting our work to bring the ideas together. I often found that drafting was quite helpful in developing my writing because it gave me a chance to free-write, in a way, and then I used the time for revision and editing to polish up my work and make it more reader-friendly. Since I had created many different types of drafts and utilized new ways to revise my work throughout the semester, I feel like I was able to complete course outcome 3, which was to “develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing.”

The second writing assignment, the peer profile, for English 110 helped me accomplish course outcome four, which was to “recognize and practice key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situations” because I had to figure out what rhetorical strategies a classmate used to begin writing my profile. This assignment was very new and challenging for me because I had never written a profile before, so the whole writing process felt strange, and I had to get out of my comfort zone to complete the assignment. The assignment, however, did help me practice identifying rhetorical strategies in my classmate’s writing and it also helped me practice using rhetorical strategies myself so I could best introduce the person I was profiling to the readers. Although the assignment wasn’t my favorite, it definitely helped me gain some valuable skills that I feel helped diversify my writing and make it more interesting, so, overall, I’m grateful I got to experience this new type of writing assignment.

For the last course learning outcome, which was to “understand and use print and digital technologies to address a range of audiences, ” I feel like I partially completed this objective. I don’t think I did this objective to the best of my abilities because I often struggled with choosing a specific audience for my writing assignments and often settled with standard audience members such as my classmates or the professor. Due to this simple way of choosing my audience, I feel like I was unable to use technology or print to spread my message to a wide range of people who would have potentially been interested in the writing I created. So, although my written work partially addressed some audience members, I feel like if I had put more effort into deciding who the message I was writing was going to target, I could’ve better used my resources to reach a wider audience and therefore have my message heard by those who may have found my writing as a good/interesting read.

Despite not accomplishing all the course learning outcomes this semester, I feel like I did quite well in writing, considering that I don’t even enjoy writing as much as other subjects. I was able to improve my writing thanks to the help of my peers and the lessons I learned throughout the semester, and overall, I feel like this course helped me better appreciate the amount of work that goes into writing. I feel like I made real progress in improving my writing, and I am pretty grateful that my classmates and professor constantly helped me to improve my writing and that they did not judge my writing style. My experience in writing this semester was quite pleasant, and I hope I continue using the tools and lessons I learned in this class to help me create better and noteworthy writing in the future.

Cover Letter 

I began writing this essay because I wanted to expand my knowledge of AI due to its rapid development. AI is currently revolutionizing many different work fields due to its rapid development, and I was curious to find out what type of potential AI has for the future. 

As I was researching AI’s achievements, I stumbled upon an article that talked about using AI to enhance education for younger children. I found this article quite interesting because it went against the way I used to view AI. Whenever I thought about AI and education together, I usually thought about using AI to cheat, so for me, it was quite surprising to find out that AI could be used to improve the quality of education. This article made me interested in the benefits that AI could have on education, which is why I began researching information about it. I also feel like resisting the change that AI brings slows down our progress as a society since it is very likely that AI will become as common as phones in the near future, so I wanted to do some research so I could better understand AI and help inform others about the ways AI can be used to better our education; this way people can be better informed about the potential of AI and have less fear about embracing its usage for the betterment of humanity. 

I hope that the audience for my work is people who are interested in the development of technology (due to AI being an important part of technological development) and people who are worried about using AI for educational purposes (so that they could be informed about AI and hopefully have their fears eased down). I hope to learn about how AI can be used to make education better, and I also hope to learn about the different types of programs used around the world that involve AI because I am curious about how they work. 

After doing a good amount of research, I would say that I gained a lot more knowledge about AI than I expected. I got to learn about how both students and teachers were able to apply AI to improve the quality of education, and I got to learn about some specific AI programs used around the world and their functions (which, in my opinion, was pretty interesting). I also learned about some consequences that could arise from using AI, which helped me better understand the perspective of people who may be skeptical about using AI for education. This, in turn, pushed me to look for ways to make my argument more appealing, which allowed me to learn about the consequences people could face if they just tried to avoid AI altogether. I enjoyed collecting all this information because I am a technology enthusiast myself, and I am always excited to learn about technology that has the potential to make our future better while also being informed about the dangers it could bring. 

In this essay, I am most proud of the way I made people think about the consequences that using AI could bring to people and then discussed some problems that could occur if a student does not get exposed to AI because I feel like it was a good way to get into the reader’s head and make them think about which consequence is worse. I did this to force the reader to see that using AI and avoiding AI both have their downsides and that it is ultimately up to them to think about and decide with which consequence they would rather deal with. 

Throughout this research essay, I was able to accomplish course learning outcome 6, which was to “Locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazine, and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias”. Since I did most of my research online, I had to take time to read through some articles and later take them through the CRAAP (currency, relevance, authority, accuracy, purpose) test to make sure that I could use those sources to make my claim that AI can improve education stronger. This process of filtering sources was very useful to learn (since I could see myself writing more research papers in the future), and I think I did pretty well-finding sources that helped strengthen my argument. 

Research Essay

Have you ever spent long hours doing schoolwork, wishing you could move on to another task that you find more worthwhile or enjoyable? Or have you ever found it hard to study because you do not have someone at home who understands the topics you are learning/covering? Perhaps, during your time in the COVID lockdown, you thought about ways to make learning more interesting since it was obvious that not many people enjoyed remote learning. If you have experienced any of these moments, I would like to inform you that there have been recent technological developments that allow a person to finish their long and tedious homework quicker, or that could help make learning more engaging, or that could help a person create better study sessions to tackle topics they may not understand well (and the help is not just watching YouTube videos). The technology I am talking about is artificial intelligence (or AI for short), and AI is now expanding more quickly than ever. 

Wait, wait, wait. Isn’t AI bad? I mean, we have all seen movies like Terminator, The Matrix (1999), I, Robot (2004), and we have even seen Avengers: Age of Ultron, where it seems like the AI is the villain of the story and that they do more harm than good, despite being made with good intentions. Well, while these movies offer an idea about what could happen with artificial intelligence, the films are science fiction, and they do not show you the benefits AI could provide if used efficiently. In truth, AI has a lot of potential, and if we continue to try and understand AI, we could harness the power of AI to help make our lives easier and society more educated. 

Let us start off by defining what an AI is. According to “Artificial Intelligence” published by Britannica, AI is “the ability of a digital computer or computer-controlled robot to perform tasks commonly associated with intelligent beings. The term is frequently applied to the project of developing systems endowed with the intellectual processes characteristic of humans, such as the ability to reason, discover meaning, generalize, or learn from experience.” (Copeland). Ultimately, an AI is a computer/robot that tries to imitate tasks intellectual beings do. This definition is important for people to understand because it is the reason why many people do a lot of research on AI; we want to know how well a computer/robot can complete human tasks (that involve reasoning, learning from past mistakes, etc.) Now, there are many ways to try and analyze how well AI can complete human tasks, but we are mainly going to focus on how well AI can complete the tasks of a teacher (ex: grading students’ work, providing feedback, etc.) and how well AI can be used for learning purposes (in essence how well can AI help students complete their tasks while also helping them learn). We are examining AI’s impact on education because I would like for you to see the opportunities that lie ahead for education thanks to AI, and I would like you to see how applying AI to education may be more beneficial in the long run than people realize. 

As AI continues to grow in our society, so does its potential to help humans get better education. Quite often, many people (especially students) see AI as an easy way to cheat and get homework done quickly. Understandably, teachers and scholars dislike AI for this reason, since it promotes the use of AI to cheat, which, in turn, does not help a student truly learn the material that homework is supposed to help them practice. Although people can utilize AI for cheating, many scholars and people concerned about improving education believe AI has much more potential to help with learning than just allowing students to cheat. You have to keep in mind that AI has many features that could be used for more than just cheating on homework or tests. 

People like Hector Bojorquez (IDRA’s Director of Operations and Educational Practice) and Michelle Martínez Vega (IDRA’s chief technology strategist) argue that AI can be used in multiple different ways to help a student learn the topic they are struggling with instead of relying on cheating. Let us start with the root of the problem as to why students try to use technology to cheat on their homework, tests, etc. When you really put some thought into it, you can understand that a reason for cheating may involve students just not being able to comprehend a topic that school taught them, so they see AI as an easy alternative to get through homework they do not understand. If you have been to school before, you also have to admit education isn’t always the most engaging, so it is clear that many students tend to pay less attention to their teachers due to being bored. Since students stop paying attention to their lectures, many of them are later confused about how to solve a problem, which leads them to take the easy route of using AI to help them answer the question over taking the time to learn the topic they are struggling with. These are some of the things that promote cheating, but people like Hector Bojorquez and Michelle Martínez Vega see that AI is more than just a tool for cheating; AI can be a tool to help combat cheating and improve the quality of education. 

In the expository text, “The Importance of Artificial Intelligence in Education for All Students”, published in the IDRA newsletter, both Hector Bojorquez and Michelle Martínez Vega argue that AI can be used to help improve education for both students and teachers (which improves society in the long run), as long as AI can be accessed by people equally. The authors believe that “AI has the potential to revolutionize the education sector by enhancing learning experiences, supporting teachers, and offering more personalized learning opportunities for students,”(1) which is why they mention using AI for things like personalized learning (AI used to help teach YOU in the way you learn best), making education more memorable and engaging (through gamification/virtual reality), and helping lighten the workload of teachers, which would allow teachers to begin focusing on the students themselves and establish meaningful connections with students along with creating better lesson plans. With these types of benefits, one could expect many more students to find learning more interesting as they are no longer forced to just sit in a class all day and listen to the teacher; no, now the students can engage with the material that they are learning and feel more supported by the education system, which should allow more students to enjoy learning and prefer to learn over cheating using AI. 

The IDRA is not the only one, however, that feels like AI can be used to improve the quality of education. We also have scholars who believe in the potential of AI. In the expository text (journal), Review of the Application of Artificial Intelligence in Education (2020), authored by Yufei Liu, Saleh Salmiza, Jiahui Huang, and Abdullah Syed Mohamad Syed and published by the International Journal of Innovation, Creativity, and Change (IJICC) we can take a dive into the history of AI and its development but more importantly we can also see some insights on how AI can be applied to education and some examples of the AI being used in education. The authors believe that “With the development of artificial intelligence technology, modern education will be combined with more technologies, such as speech semantic recognition, image recognition, Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality, machine learning, brain neuroscience, quantum computing, blockchain and so on” (Liu et al. 550) so, to figure out how well AI is doing in regards to education, they consider the application of AI in three different aspects, the technical level, the model level, and the practical level. The authors conclude that AI is undeniably finding its way into the education sector and that it is better for people to be informed about AI so that they can adapt to it and support it, which can help improve education systems around the world. 

Some of the AI products that the authors discussed were SuperMemo (an interval reminder app where AI calculates when you are more likely to forget something and reminds you to retouch the subject; created by Piotr Woźniak), Wolfie (an Israeli music app that has an automatic grading system that allows teachers to see the progress of their students and help them correct mistakes), Jill Watson (a virtual tutor using AI found at Georgia Institute of Technology), Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) Buddy teaching robot (an AI designed to help with personalized learning), Botty (AI teaching assistant), and the Great Barrier Reef Tour (product created by Alchemy VR in collaboration with the BBC documentary team) just to name a few. All these forms of AI have been used to help improve the quality of education in places like the U.S., Israel, Australia, and many other places. It is no wonder that the authors of the journal concluded that “In the context of the 21st century, the use of artificial intelligence technology in education is undeniable. Artificial intelligence technology is very much needed in the future to ensure effective teaching and learning process among teachers and students and will be indispensable for the betterment of the education system” (Liu et al. 555-56); their research mostly shows how AI has had a positive impact on education, which help to prove both their own claim and the IDRA newsletters claim that AI can be used to improve the quality of education. In fact, the IJICC journal tends to exemplify the applications that the IDRA newsletter mentioned because the journal published by IJICC gave real-world examples of AI being used to help keep students engaged in learning (ex: a virtual tour of barrier reef), helping decrease teacher workload (with Botty the AI teaching assistant and Wolfie the automatic grading system app), and help students learn at their own pace (MOOC Buddy teaching program used for personalized learning). Both these sources help us get a glimpse of the potential benefits AI could bring if applied correctly, which allows us to view AI as a tool to promote positive change, not as something to fear or try to avoid. 

These sources feel quite reliable since they mentioned similar things and helped build on each other’s ideas of how the education sector could implement AIs to improve education. The sources were also quite persuasive when discussing potential ways to apply AI into education, and they were quite helpful in helping the reader understand some complicated concepts, which allows us to understand their argument better and decide for ourselves if they are convincing or not. It should be noted that these sources do have a couple more examples demonstrating how humans could use AI to enhance education, however, considering how complicated their explanations can get, it felt necessary to slowly introduce the reader to only a couple of key AI programs so that the reader can get the point that AI can be beneficial without overwhelming them with too much information. 

Although we have been focusing a lot on how AI can help students in their learning journey, students are not the only ones who can benefit from interacting with AI. To many people’s surprise, teachers could also benefit from using and interacting with AI. Learning that AI can also help teachers is somewhat shocking since teachers are probably the last people who would want to use AI, considering that many believe AI is unethical and promotes cheating. The truth remains, however, that AI can be used as a tool to help teachers become better prepared for their upcoming challenge, a new class with many different students. 

When we explore the article “AI Will Transform Teaching and Learning. Let’s Get it Right.” (2023), authored by Claire Chen and published by Stanford University, we can see that Stanford University has already begun taking steps to determine possible ways to use AI to advance human learning by calling an AI+ Education Summit on 2/15/23. This summit was quite significant because it gathered “Researchers across Stanford – from education, technology, psychology, business, law, and political science –” and they were joined by “industry leaders like Sal Khan, founder and CEO of Khan Academy,” (Chen) to discuss how to properly apply AI into education so that it is used ethically and in a safe manner. As a result of this summit, Stanford University and the participants identified many ways AI could improve education for students and teachers. 

Although the AI+ Education Summit presented many good ideas and information, we will mainly focus on the benefits teachers get from AI since we already discussed how students could use AI for an improved education. In the article “AI Will Transform Teaching and Learning. Let’s Get it Right”, we see the author mention that teachers can use AI to help simulate students, receive real-time feedback and suggestions to improve the lesson plans, get post-teaching feedback, and receive refreshing information that is relevant to the subject the teacher is covering. Now, why would a teacher want to use AI to simulate students? Well, it is good to remember that not all teachers have the experience they need to help them have a successful school year. Some teachers may be new or it is possible that some might have to adapt to a change they weren’t quite ready for, so they require some practice to prepare themselves for situations that may occur in the upcoming academic year. This situation is precisely why AI can be beneficial for teachers. According to the article published by Stanford University, “AI language models can serve as practice students for new teachers. Percy Liang, director of the Stanford HAI Center for Research on Foundation Models, said that they are increasingly effective and are now capable of demonstrating confusion and asking adaptive follow-up questions.”(Chen). Using AI as a simulation can help better prepare new/inexperienced teachers to handle situations that may arise in a classroom, and it helps the teachers build confidence in their abilities, which will help them provide quality education. Another way teachers can use AI for their benefit could be by getting feedback and suggestions from AI programs. Dora Demsky was the person in the article who highlighted AI’s ability to provide teachers with feedback to improve education. The article says: Dora Demszky, assistant professor of education data science, highlighted the ability for AI to provide real-time feedback and suggestions to teachers (e.g., questions to ask the class), creating a bank of live advice based on expert pedagogy… Demszky added that AI can produce post-lesson reports that summarize the classroom dynamics. Potential metrics include student speaking time or identification of the questions that triggered the most engagement. Research finds that when students talk more, learning is improved. (Chen). This quote shows that AI has evolved into something quite resourceful to teachers. Now that AI can also provide feedback for teachers, teachers could begin improving their lesson plans based on the suggestions of the AI. No longer will teachers be forced to stick to a boring curriculum and teach it in a boring manner. Now, teachers can see what they may need to improve on and start working on it to help improve the quality of education they provide for their students and make learning more engaging. 

In addition to receiving feedback and simulating students, teachers could also use AI to help them keep up with the latest advancements in their fields. This feature of AI can be incredibly helpful for teachers when they want to make their lessons more engaging because they can now include recent and relevant information in their lesson plans to help keep students interested in the material they are learning. This addition to the curriculum allows students to feel that the class has actual value in the outside world and would make them more willing to learn, which helps teachers provide a better-quality education. The article also states that “Sal Khan, founder of online learning environment Khan Academy, suggested that AI could help teachers stay up-to-date with the latest advancements in their field. For example, a biology teacher would have AI update them on the latest breakthroughs in cancer research, or leverage AI to update their curriculum”(Chen), which shows that AI can provide teachers with stimulating facts that they could use to make their lessons more engaging or relevant to the times. Adding to the previous statement, learning about advancements in a field could also be quite beneficial for the teacher because it might help them rediscover why they were so passionate about a subject that they decided to teach it. It is no secret that teachers often lose their passion for teaching somewhere throughout their careers due to many factors. One common factor is that teachers may no longer see the point in teaching their subject because they may feel like people do not care about it. Well having AI search for information about why your subject is important and how it contributes to today’s society could be the very boost a teacher needs to rekindle their passion for teaching, which often also helps improve the quality of education they provide. 

Although we have explored AI and examined its potential to improve education, we cannot turn a blind eye to the fact that AI can have some unintended consequences that may be detrimental to us and our society. One such problem that could arise is becoming over-reliant on AI technology. The problem with becoming too reliant on AI technology is that we risk losing our critical thinking abilities, and we may also lose our social skills. Now, this can cause serious issues for the future because if a person does not develop their critical thinking skills, they will not be able to function independently and will always feel like they need an AI’s help to make decisions. Losing our social skills could also negatively impact us since it will make learning much harder (since we acquire knowledge by communicating with others). Aside from that, losing our social skills could also cause us to lose a lot of relationships with people we care about, which will, in effect, drop our motivation to continue learning. So, while AI has many benefits, it is understandable why there may be some uncertainty in integrating AI into education. 

However, I would like to offer you something to contemplate if you believe people should avoid AI altogether because of these downsides. What could the consequences be if you ignore the growth of AI and just avoid it altogether? Well, the IDRA newsletter we mentioned earlier by Hector Bojorquez and Michelle Martínez Vega touched upon this subject a bit. The authors of “The Importance of Artificial Intelligence in Education for All Students” believed denying people access to AI technology could cause serious drawbacks, such as increasing the digital divide, increasing economic inequality, and experiencing a loss of creativity and innovation. The article says, “Students who lack AI education may find it more challenging to secure well-paying jobs as many traditional roles may be automated or significantly transformed by AI. This can lead to increased economic inequality and limit social mobility for those who are not adequately prepared for the AI-driven job market”(Bojorquez and Vega 7), which shows that keeping people away from AI is not a reasonable solution to calm down the fear of becoming overdependent on AI. The article also mentions that if we do not have a diverse workforce due to people not knowing how to work with AIs, we lose valuable insights, creativity, and ideas that could help further improve AI technology. 

To add to this, the article, “The Pros and Cons of Using AI in Education ” (2023), published by the Harrow International School- Hong Kong, claims that one of the things we should be worried about is ensuring fairness and creating a bias-free AI to improve education. The authors believe students must be exposed to AI instead of shielded from it because “By fostering critical thinking and digital literacy skills, students can understand the ethical implications of AI and contribute to shaping a more fair and inclusive technological landscape.” (Harrow International School- Hong Kong). This article supports the IDRA newsletters’ claim that excluding people from learning about AI can be detrimental in the long run because it shows that diversity can play a crucial role in developing better, equal, and inclusive technology, which means that keeping kids away from AI prevents them from creating an equal and better future, ultimately leaving them to fend for themselves since they will not have the skills necessary to adapt to a society that has changed because of AI. 

All in all, AI has shown great potential to help revolutionize education and improve it. AI has shown that it can be programmed to help students learn a topic they may not understand, and it has demonstrated that it could even make the lives of teachers more manageable by giving them an understanding of where a child is regarding education and helping them improve their lesson plans. These are just some of the benefits we talked about that AI could bring to our education, but since AI is constantly growing, one can imagine that the benefits the technology could bring also grow. Since many speculate that AI technology will eventually be as easy to access and use as our modern-day cell phones, it is crucial for people nowadays to learn about AI and its benefits because it helps people prepare for that future without being unnecessarily influenced by fear. Many places around the world are already starting to embrace AI as a tool that can help humanity advance, so instead of resisting change, we should take a minute to look at AI through different lenses and see how we can use it to better our education so that we can create a better and more educated society. 

Works Cited Page 

Bojorquez, Hector,and Michelle M Vega. “The Importance of Artificial Intelligence in Education for All Students”, IDRA Newsletter, May 2023, p.1-7. Web. 

Chen, Claire. “Ai Will Transform Teaching and Learning. Let’s Get It Right.” Stanford HAI, 2023, hai.stanford.edu/news/ai-will-transform-teaching-and-learning-lets-get-it-right. 

Copeland, B.J. “Artificial Intelligence.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, inc. 8 Nov. 2023, www.britannica.com/technology/artificial-intelligence.

Liu, Yufei, et al. “Review of the Application of Artificial Intelligence in Education.” International Journal of Innovation, Creativity and Change, vol.12, no.8, 2020, pp 548-562. Web. www.ijicc.net/images/vol12/iss8/12850_Yufei_2020_E_R1.pdf.

 “The Pros and Cons of Using AI in Education.” Harrow International School Hong Kong, 27 June 2023, www.harrowschool.hk/the-pros-and-cons-of-using-ai-in-education/.

Cover Letter

When I started writing this profile about Stanley, I was very unsure about how it would turn out. I had never written a profile before, and the writing process was a new and challenging experience for me. I am, however, proud that I was able to complete this profile and have it structured in a way that I feel would help people understand who Stanley is as a person. Specifically, I am proud of how I connected parts of Stanley’s background, ideas, beliefs, and perspective to his narrative. At first, when I did the profile, it seemed like all I was doing was trying to get the reader to get to know Stanley a little better, but in reality, there was more to it than just introducing and describing who Stanley is. As you continue to read through my profile, you get to see that I used the information I gathered from my interview to slowly piece together Stanley’s narrative and help the reader understand how his experiences have helped him become the person he is today. In my profile, I gave the reader a chance to understand some of Stanley’s perspectives on certain topics (such as his perspective on our current society) while also highlighting how Stanley’s experiences helped him gain such perspectives. I then proceeded to point out how his narrative reflected the aspects of Stanley that I mentioned when I was first introducing him to the reader, which I felt was the hard part for me to do. That is why I am proud of how I structured my profile, because I feel like it did more than just describe who Stanley was. I feel like the way I structured the profile helped the reader feel more connected to Stanley and his experiences, which was ultimately my goal for the audience.

                Speaking about the audience, I decided when I started writing this profile that the audience would be my classmates in English 110. I decided that they would be my intended audience because I wanted Stanley to be better understood by my classmates. When I met Stanley through our interview, he admitted to me that he was somewhat of a closed person who hadn’t put himself out there as much as he thought he should have. Since I saw that Stanley was trying to change that, I decided that I could be of some help and try to help our classmates better know who he is through this profile, so that he could reach his goal of becoming more open and experiencing life to the fullest. I wanted my classmates to know that Stanley is a pretty interesting person who has relatable experiences and is worth meeting if they ever have time to do so.

                To construct this profile about Stanley, I used some repetition to help the reader see the aspects of Stanley I felt were relatable (such as repeating his enjoyment of technology and his value of hard work). I also used repetition to emphasize the lessons I felt were important for the reader to understand. For example, the idea that hard work is important came up a good number of times throughout the profile. This lesson came up repeatedly throughout the profile because I wanted to be sure that the reader understood this message clearly since, in my eyes, it really is a lesson that can help people go a long way (which also allows me to connect with the lessons Stanley brought up in his narrative). I wanted the audience to see how hard work helped a person like Stanley become a good person and how that if people apply hard work towards things that they care about and matter, they will eventually become appreciative of the hard times they have gone through and grow to become better people that will help our society move forward to a better future. I also used vague language and hypophora (asking a question and then immediately answering it) in the beginning of my profile to get the reader interested in who I was talking about. These two rhetorical strategies (repetition and hypophora) helped me both get the reader hooked onto who I was talking about and become aware of lessons I felt were important for the audience to know about.

                Through this assignment, I was able to accomplish course learning outcome # three (develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing) because since this assignment completely pushed me out of my comfort zone, it forced me to approach this assignment using multiple different perspectives. I had to interview someone and occasionally reach out to them outside of class time to help me structure my profile, which helped me develop some strategies to better collaborate with someone. I also had to take a step back and read my profile from multiple different perspectives to see if my ideas were clear enough for readers with different backgrounds and experiences to understand. I also had to do some revisions to my profile, so I had to use different strategies to write up multiple sentences and pick out which one would best deliver the message I wanted to deliver. Even the drafting process was different for me because writing a profile is something I never experienced before, so I had to use different styles of writing and planning to create my draft for the peer profile. This peer profile also helped me better understand language politics because it taught me how to use my voice in a different way to try and make people understand and empathize with those who may not always have the loudest voice. This peer profile taught me that I could help people feel noticed and help them spread the lessons they have learned through their experiences, which shows how writing and language could help empower people and make them feel more connected to our society instead of feeling isolated or ignored.

Peer Profile Writing

                Recently, I sat down with a classmate and tried to get to know him better. The young man I met was quite a nice guy, and he used a clear and respectful tone with me as we talked about certain topics for our ELA class. From what I could gather, the young man was down-to-earth, and he was a thoughtful person. He was interesting to listen to and often spoke about things that allowed me to relate to him. Now, you may be wondering, who am I talking about? Well, let me tell you. The person I am referring to above is a classmate named Stanley Zhu.

                Stanley Zhu is a CCNY student who is taking Freshman Composition English, and he recently wrote a narrative about some experiences he had with language. I was one of the students that was able to read his work and after getting to learn more about him, I began to see how some parts of his narrative reflected the type of person he is today.

                Many of you may not know Stanley, so I will help give some insight into who he is from the information I got before I start discussing his narrative.

                Stanley is a person who respects and values family. When we discussed family, Stanley told me “I value my family a lot because I have created many memories with them, and they helped me develop into the person I am today”. As a family person myself, this felt very relatable, and it just goes to show how Stanley is an appreciative and good-natured person.

                Stanley is also a realistic person because, from a young age, he understood that a single person cannot change the world, so he does not try to put all the pressure of trying to fix the world on himself. Stanley is also someone who is appreciative of what he has and some of the experiences he has gone through because when we discussed his view on our current society, he told me, “our society is not perfect, there are a lot of issues today that we still have to tackle and take care of, but to say that our society (specifically American society) failed us is also not true because we have it better than many other countries. I am fortunate to be here in America because I have a decent lifestyle and things that other places in the world might not have”. The way that Stanley answered this question shows maturity and appreciation because he knows, just like many of us do, that things could be worse and admitting that we are just very lucky that we got the better end of the stick, even if things do seem bad in our society, shows that Stanley is not close minded or does not value what he already has in life. 

                I also learned that Stanley enjoys reading, especially fiction books, because of how imaginative the stories are. He enjoys taking a dive into a good book and getting lost in it because 1) he enjoys it but also because 2)reading a good book helps him endure the harsh realities of our world. Even more so, Stanley is also quite interested in the growth of technology because he feels that “the growth of technology could help humans create a more effective and just society for all of us to live in”, which I find very interesting because it shows that he has some optimism, something our world does not seem to have enough of nowadays.

                Stanley is also a conscious person who understands who he is, what he likes, and what he needs to work on to better himself. I was able to see this because Stanley was pretty quick in responding about the things he likes (such as math and electronics like computers) and was also well aware that he hasn’t put himself out there as much as he should’ve, so Stanley understands that he needs to work on that to allow himself to get a better life experience.

                Stanley also values hard work a lot, and this was evident in both his narrative and when we talked about who he looks up to. When I asked Stanley, “Who do you look up to? (Can be a real person or a fictional character)”. Stanley’s response was an interesting one. He said, “ I don’t really look up to anyone in particular, but I do have a lot of respect and admire people who work hard, are determined, and are persistent”. I found this interesting because when we talked about the most frustrating part in his journey of learning English, he mentioned that he was mostly self-taught due to his parents not knowing English well, which made me understand why he looked up to hard workers because he himself is a hard worker who is persistent and determined to achieve his goals.

                It is no wonder that Stanley pursues a career in Electrical Engineering. Knowing that he is a hard worker who is interested in electronics and math, it would seem quite fitting that Stanley chose a career path in the engineering field. Especially since Stanley can think realistically and understands his limitations, it seems very logical that he would try to become an electrical engineer (which is a challenging task).

                Now that we know Stanley a little better, we can start talking about Stanley’s narrative. In Stanley’s Narrative, we had three different stories to read about, each with their own lessons. First, we have the story about Stanley copying down texts during his free time because of his parents. The second story was about Stanley talking with his parents about what activity he should do, and his third story was about him learning Chinese and keeping in touch with traditions as he continued his English learning journey. 

                When Stanley talked about copying down texts during his free time, it was clear from the dialogue that Stanley was frustrated because this task was not something he enjoyed doing. It was tedious work, and he much preferred to relax during his weekends over doing extra work, as any reasonable human would feel. The beauty of this part of the text, however, was the imagery that Stanley brought to make the story clear for the reader to visualize. Imagery was one of the things that Stanley was great at doing in his narrative and I don’t doubt that reading all those fiction books and having to take part in copying them down (which can be hard work) allowed Stanley to develop his imagery skills to help the reader feel connected to his story. Later on in the story, Stanley goes on to say that although he disliked this task for a while, he was appreciative of this experience because it helped him to gain skills that put him in a position that would allow him to help others, which shows why he also appreciates and values hard work. 

                When Stanley then moved on to his story about deciding what activity to do outside of school, we got to see how Stanley started to develop independence by being allowed to make his own choices and speak up for what he wants. This part of the text used personal experience and dialogue to make it clear that Stanley advocated for himself when it was required, which helps show why Stanley today seems to be quite conscious of who he is, his likes (such as technology and math), and what he needs to work on. This part of the text also shows Stanley’s appreciation for his own experiences because in his narrative he states that he remembers his friends telling him how they were forced to take art or music classes while he remembers having more lenient parents who let him have a voice in what he was going to do. 

                Stanley then goes on to tell his story about his role in his family (as the oldest brother) and his experience learning Chinese and its culture while also learning English and copying down English texts. Stanley is the oldest of his siblings, and in his narrative, he states that he tries to be a good role model for his siblings, showing how much Stanley actually values family and how he wants to set a good example for his younger family members just as his older family members (mom and dad) did for him. Stanley also had the challenge of trying to learn both Chinese and English at the same time while also keeping in touch with his Chinese culture, which, when you think about it, is a lot of hard work. When Stanley mentions his personal experiences with learning Chinese, he does so in a direct way that allows the reader to get the message he was trying to tell; learning two languages at once while trying to preserve your culture and while also copying down books in your free time was hard. Stanley didn’t try to sugarcoat this fact or anything, and he delivered this part with a serious tone, demonstrating that Stanley viewed these tasks as important for him to accomplish. Due to his hard work, Stanley was able to make good progress in his Chinese and his English, which allowed him to communicate better with his family and become more connected with his culture, and he was able to continue copying down texts in his free time. Now, Stanley is able to use his bilingual abilities to help his family with translation or to help people who seem like they may need it. All of this shows how much hard work Stanley had to go through to become the person he is today, which helps anyone see why Stanley tends to respect others who are also hard workers. 

                Stanley ended off with a reflection about how his different experiences helped him become the person he is today. Stanley was quite straightforward with his reflection and I feel it helped the reader better understand his interpretation of his experiences, which, in turn, allowed the reader to compare their own interpretations of his stories with his (Stanley’s) and start getting exposed to different perspectives about the same thing (which is what happens in the real world, many people have different perspectives, and interpretations about the same thing).

                Stanley’s use of ethos in the stories about him copying down texts and learning Chinese while also learning English was also interesting because it showed the reader that Stanley experienced himself the hardship of trying to improve a language, which makes his experiences a prime example (and a credible source) of how hard work and persistence can allow a person to overcome their obstacle and improve their language. Although many may not be able to relate specifically to having to copy down texts during their free time, Stanley was able to use this experience to show how the things we often dread at the moment can help us later on in life if we continue to work hard (since copying down texts did help Stanley, in the long run, improve his English and to take notes efficiently and quickly), which is a lesson that many people have already learned and can relate too. Also, since Stanley worked hard to learn Chinese, he was able to help a person out with his bilingual skills and give a woman the right directions to go to Flushing, which gave him a sense of resourcefulness and made him feel helpful, allowing him to see once again how hard work can help him in the long run (since Stanley is a nice guy who is often willing to help others, his hard work in learning Chinese helped him help others). This form of ethos only strengthened Stanley’s closing statement in his narrative because it allowed the reader to see that Stanley is not just some random guy who repeats that hard work bears fruit; no far from it, the narrative shows us that Stanley can be trusted when he says that hard work is valuable because in a way Stanley is a primary source of the effects of hard work, making him credible and more appreciative of the experiences he has gone through. 

For a person who does not often enjoy to write, I found it surprising that I enjoyed the process of writing my research paper. Since I was allowed to pick the topic that I was going to write about, I was able to pick a topic that I was genuinely interested and passionate about. I ended up writing about applying AI into education and finding information to strengthen my claim was quite enjoyable. I got to learn a lot more about AI than I had anticipated and I was able to explore the various different stances that there was in regards to applying AI into education. I also enjoyed writing this paper because I am a shy person who doesn’t really like to speak out about the things I enjoy and I felt like this research paper gave me an opportunity to show others my interests and communicate with them the things I am passionate about. Obviously there was still some parts where I experienced writers block, but compared to the other times I had done writing, I felt like I enjoyed the challenge of trying to overcome writers block and convey the message I wanted the reader to get.

I usually read my paper to my family members to help me identify where I should do my revisions. If my family tells me there is a part where they are left confused or need a deeper explanation of something, I tend to revise that portion of my writing. Often my audience tends to be normal people who may not be as educated on a certain topic compared to others so I tend to use my family as somewhat of a guide to help me determine where “common people” might get lost in my work. I also do some personal reading of my work to see if I like the way I worded a sentence. If I feel like a sentence could be worded better to get my message through, I tend to revise that sentence. I also read through my paper to see if I may have included some extra information that does not exactly strengthen my claim. If I find extra information, I tend to revise the sentence so that it could either strengthen my claim or I delete it so that I don’t overwhelm the reader with too much information that they may not need. I often revise a sentence by isolating it to another document and then I just write many different sentences that have the same message but are written differently. From there, I read over the sentences I was able to come up with and try to pick which sentence best fits with my writing. After I do that, I go back to the original document in which the entire writing was in and I replace the sentence that I felt needed revising with the new sentence that I chose. I also at times read my work to my friends and they give me some suggestions on where I could improve my writing.

I personally found the peer profile as kind of strange because I had never done an assignment like that before. The assignment definitely pushed me out of my comfort zone because it forced me to have to interview someone (which was already a little nerve-racking because I’m shy) and have to write about them while connecting who they are as a person to their style of writing. This was all quite a new experience for me and, for me at least, it was not really a pleasant one to go through. I am thankful that through the interview I got to learn more about one of my classmates and feel more connected to them but having to make a rhetorical analysis and connecting their personality and ideas to their style of writing was not a fun process to go through. I felt like for the majority of this assignment I had experienced writer’s block, which only made me feel frustrated because I did not know how to proceed with my writing to capture who my peer was and how their writing reflected that. To top it off, I don’t typically enjoy writing, so it already felt like I was forcing myself to do something I don’t enjoy doing. I value writing and recognize its importance, but since it is almost never something I look forward too, writing tends to be something I struggle with and would prefer to avoid. This assignment was one of those that reminded me of why I tend to dislike the writing process and would much prefer doing things like math or science work over writing.

I think that it is important for people to continue learning to write because aside from it being a tedious task, writing can help you better communicate your ideas with others and it helps you see how much of a topic you truly understand. If you are able to write about a topic and make it easy for a regular person to understand, it is clear that you know the topic pretty well because you were able to communicate your message in an efficient and effective way. If you find that your ideas aren’t received the way you would like for it to be, then that is a good reason to continue to practice your writing because only through practice can a person become better at structuring their ideas. Writing is also important because it is the way that we can preserve knowledge and continue to pass on our knowledge to future generations. Take Ancient Egypt for example. Due to the Ancient Egyptians writing in hieroglyphics along their tombs, houses, or more, the modern person could get a glimpse about how life was in the past. Their writing not only helps us understand history but it also helps preserve the knowledge the Ancient Egyptians acquired during their time, which has laid foundations to some of the things we have today (such as medicine). That is why it is important to learn writing, it helps preserve our knowledge and improve our own way of expressing our ideas.

As of right now, I find Eng 110 more interesting than any of my previous ELA courses because it has touched on topics that seemed pretty relatable for me. The class usually has very interesting conversations and I feel like the class has helped me better understand the point of view of the people around me. So far, the texts we have read were quite interesting and often helped better show how language plays an important role in how people view you in today’s society. The writing we had to do for the class, in my opinion, was fair. There wasn’t too much writing up to the point where it may have overwhelmed you and there wasn’t too little writing in the class. I personally enjoyed this because I’ve had bad experiences before with ELA teachers assigning a lot of writing and it felt good knowing that this class wasn’t one of those that overwhelmed you with work. I really don’t have much complaints about the class for now. I feel like we get a good amount of group time to work together and analyze a text or do some peer review, so I don’t really have any complaints there. I look forward to see what we have to do next for this class and I hope I can enjoy the process of growing my skills as a writer.

Cover letter:

When I began writing my story about the conversation between my mom and my brother’s school, I honestly did not know whom to direct this story to. I questioned myself for a long time about who would be able to relate or understand the story I was going to write about and in what manner I should deliver this story. I ultimately decided that the audience for my story would be teenagers and young adults.

Why did I decide this? Well, because the message I was trying to send through this story was that we have the power to choose how we use our tools of English in society. I feel like this message should be heard by the young generation that is soon going to enter the adult world because I want the upcoming generation to know that they have a choice on how they communicate with others, and depending on their choice, they can either make people feel accepted into our society or feel rejected by it.

Some of us were forced to learn English because it was the only way to survive in a nation that spoke mainly English. With that in mind, it would be quite reasonable to conclude that some people may have negative emotions or thoughts towards the English language because of how they may have been treated by people who spoke better English than themselves. These negative feelings and thoughts are completely understandable to have, but the negative experiences that a person may have gone through while learning to speak English may also be something we could use to make our society more inclusive and understanding.

Since many of us know firsthand how it feels to be isolated from others due to our English capacity or to feel helpless because we don’t know the right words to say so that people could help us, we could use our experiences to help make sure that history doesn’t repeat itself.

Now that we teenagers and young adults are going to be the adults entering society, we could choose to be the help that we wanted to have when we were struggling to learn English. With our experience, we could become more empathetic towards people we may meet who struggle to speak English and help them out in a better way than was offered to us. We could also help them feel like they belong in this place by being patient with them and even demonstrating to them that we also have our own ways of speaking English and that their English does not need to be perfect to be taken seriously. All of this could be done, because we or people we know have gone through the struggle of trying to speak in English, ultimately, however, it is up to you if you want to use the tools of English you learned to make our society better and more inclusive. That is why I feel like this story was directed toward teenagers/young adults and why I, at times, included my thoughts throughout the story (since I am a teenager myself).

I feel like my story may be relatable to a good amount of people because I used my personal experience to help the reader understand what immigrant households typically go through. I even tried to include some dialogue in my story to help the reader understand what I meant when I said my mom’s English wasn’t perfect, which I feel many people could relate to when hearing their parents speak English. I feel like these personal experiences served as useful pieces of evidence for my story because they show how your knowledge of English could potentially limit your opportunities and even have “doors” slammed in your face (as the case was with my mom) or how it could allow you to help others (as the case was with me). In fact, I would say that I am most proud of how I used my personal experiences to get my message across because I feel like I effectively used my experiences to make them more relatable for the reader, which in turn allows them to understand my message better.

My story helped me achieve the first-course learning outcome (“Examine how attitudes towards linguistic standards empower and oppress language users”) because it allowed me to go back to my past and see for myself how the attitudes towards my mom’s “broken” English made her feel helpless and it reminded me of how I could use my knowledge of English to empower others and help those who may struggle with English. Especially now, since I still have the responsibility to translate whenever I am needed (not as often as before since my parents improved their English), I was able to see how people tend to respect those who know English more than those who struggle to speak it. That is why my story tries to make readers aware of the power they have with their English because I want society to change and be more accepting instead of being oppressive.

Kevin Lema

Language is a tool that helps many communicate and express ideas with each other. One of the most dominant languages used in today’s society is English, and because of that, many of us have grown up learning how to read and write using the English language. If you were anything like me growing up, you’ve also probably heard this phrase many times as you learned English, “Good English, well spoken and written, will open more doors than a college degree… “. It is a common saying that gives many of us young people hope that if we learn English, we can be accepted by society and given more opportunities to do things.

See, what you probably do not know, however, is that there is more to this quote than has been repeated to us. The same quote by William Raspberry goes on to say, “…Bad English will slam doors you didn’t even know existed.” Now, why does the complete quote matter for the story I am about to tell? You see, the second part of the quote matters because it helps people understand that language can either help you gain more opportunities, or it could hold you down and allow people to form strong negative opinions about you. In the story I am about to tell, my mom happened to experience the latter.

When I was in my junior year of high school, my schedule became busier and busier due to the amount of work that AP courses gave and because I was part of a soccer team during the beginning of my junior year. Due to this, my parents began asking less and less for my help with things I used to normally take care of since they did not want to overwhelm me or feel like they were interfering with my studies. One of the things I noticed was that my family stopped asking me to translate what was being said over the phone and help them form clear English sentences to respond with. At the time, I was thinking, “This is awesome,” because it meant that a good chunk of responsibility was off my shoulders, but I later realized how much of an impact this decision had on my family.

So, I had just returned home from high school and on this day, I arrived home earlier than usual because it was a half day for high Schoolers. I greeted my mom, and we talked for a bit before I went to my room and began working on my homework. I remember being around an hour or so into my Calculus homework before my mind started to wander off, and I began procrastinating. That is when I heard my mom’s voice from the kitchen talking with another person. Like a curious child, I decided to try to listen to the conversation and piece together what was happening. My mom was the type to put her phone calls on speaker because she often tried to multitask and do many things at once as she talked over the phone, so eavesdropping on the conversation was not much of a problem. After some careful listening, I discovered that my mom was talking to an employee from my brother’s school.

At first, I was kind of surprised because my mom often asked me to help with these types of calls back then, but then I figured my mom made this call without asking for my help because she did not want to bother me. Still curious, I continued listening in on the phone call, hoping to figure out why my mom was calling my brother’s school. I listened for some time, and through it, I heard my mom say things like, “Why Eddy grade low?”, ” How can me help my son?”, “Have sample test for practice?”, and ” Is there tutor after school to help Eddy? “. Although somewhat choppy and a little hard to understand because of her Spanish accent, I expected the person on the other side of the phone to answer my mom’s questions because although it was not perfect English, I felt that the message was clear enough for the person to be able to answer my mom’s questions.

Instead, my mom got a loud, “HUH? Can you speak a little more clearly on the phone?” as a response to her questions. I heard my mom constantly try to change up how she phrased her sentences in an effort to help the person on the other side of the phone understand what she was asking for, but all of her efforts were for naught because the employee from my brother’s school was still unable to understand what my mom was asking for. This type of conversation continued between the two until I eventually heard the school employee begin yelling at my mom out of frustration. At one point, I heard the employee angrily say to my mom, “Mam, I’ve repeated it many times. I don’t know how to help you. Speak clearly to me so I can help you. If not, STOP BOTHERING ME because I have other things to do”, which ended up shocking my mom and causing her to end the call with a defeated “Thank you for your time”.

As I heard all of this unfold through my room, I began to feel a lot of anger build up inside of me. I decided to get out of my room to check up on my mom after the call, and I found her with her hands on her face and a clear look of disappointment directed at herself for not being able to get information to help my brother out. As I saw this, my anger intensified like fire mixed with gasoline. “How could someone treat my mother this way?”, I thought to myself. Being filled with anger, I proceeded to tell my mom that I overheard her conversation with the school employee on the phone and told her that we should call them back and make sure they get punished for their behavior.

My mom, being the type of person to try and avoid conflict, suggested that we instead wait for my stepdad to arrive home, and then we talk with him about the situation to see what our next move should be. I agreed and decided to try to cheer my mom up from the experience by talking with her about topics I knew she enjoyed. Once my mom seemed better, I decided to go back to my computer and begin doing research, trying to see if I could, in some way, get the person in trouble for yelling at my mom. I did not get far with my research before my stepdad arrived home from work.

Once my stepdad arrived home from work, I waited for my mom to tell him about the phone call incident she had experienced earlier and see how he reacted to the story. As I expected, my stepdad was furious with the school employee as well. He wanted my mom to call the school back and complain about unprofessional behavior from the school employee.

My mom, still trying to avoid making the problem bigger than it already was, decided to agree with me and my stepdad that we would complain to the school about the employee who yelled at her only after she got the information she was looking for to help my brother pass his classes. My stepdad and I agreed to my mom’s conditions, but before we called my brother’s school, my mom made sure to practice with me what she would say. She practiced because she wanted to make sure her message was understood and received well, so I did as best as I could to help her fix parts of her speech that may confuse people or be unclear. After about half an hour went by of me filling in the role of an English teacher, my mom decided she was ready to make the call.

As my mom prepared for the call, I decided to stick around our kitchen and start doing chores, making sure I was close enough to the living room to hear the conversation and guide my mom if she needed my help. This time, another school employee was helping my mom out with her questions. As I stood by the kitchen, I often heard my mom say things like “Me want to help Eddy be better at reading”, which I thought would confuse the school employee, so I would constantly whisper somewhat loudly throughout the call saying that it should be “I want to… ” not ” Me want to… “. Despite all the errors that my mom made during the call, she was able to get her message across much more efficiently than she had the first time, and what do you know, the school did have the information my mom was looking for.

My mom was satisfied that she got the information she wanted because it meant she could finally form a plan to help my brother get better at school. My stepdad and I, however, were not satisfied because we were still mad about how the earlier school employee treated my mom, so we decided to jump on the call and complain to the school about the unprofessional behavior that was displayed by the first school employee that “helped” my mom. The school took note of the person who yelled at my mom and assured me and my family that appropriate measures would be taken to deal with the school employee. They also apologized to my mom, and my mom responded by saying, ” Todo esta bien” (which roughly translates to “It is all ok”) to them. Ultimately, the call ended up a success, and my mom got to hang up the call in a better mood than she had before.

About a week after the phone call incident, my mom told me that the school employee who yelled at her over the phone was still working at my brother’s school. Supposedly, the employee constantly gives my mom the stink eye whenever she goes to pick up my brother, but fortunately, the employee does not do anything more serious than that. I was glad to hear the employee had not bothered my mom since that incident, but I was also somewhat annoyed that the person did not get in trouble for acting unprofessional toward my mom. Despite those feelings, however, I was glad to use my English to help my mom when she needed help.

After this experience, I told my mom to call me when she needed help with important calls because I did not want my mom to have such an experience again. I did not want to see my mom get doors slammed in her face because of her imperfect English, so I decided that for the benefit of my family, I had to be responsible enough to help my parents out when they needed help with English phone calls, even if I do not always like to do so. This decision led me to learn more “formal English”, which was somewhat annoying to go through, but I think it was worth it because now I can use my English language to help defend those I love and help guarantee they get the information they need. This experience also made me feel more empathetic towards people who may have different accents/dialects or may struggle with speaking English because it showed me that people who struggle to speak English “normally” often face barriers and experience moments where others are rude to them just because of the way they speak English, which I feel is wrong to do.

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