Is Twelve Weeks Enough?

In the last post I concluded that the natural time for our curriculum is 12 weeks, with an extra review week, for a total of 13 weeks. In this post I’ll try to figure out if that’s enough to learn what’s needed.

There are three broad subjects areas in a successful American Citizenship class: United States history and civics, interview techniques and strategy, and conversational American English. Let’s look at how those categories might fare in a 12 week syllabus.

The history and civics material is for the most part basic stuff. The interview questions are public knowledge with short, easy answers. The hardest part for learners with limited English and almost no contextual knowledge of American history and government is to memorize unfamiliar words and facts. We’ve read, heard and seen literally tens of thousands of references to Lincoln and Jefferson, so it’s hard for us to imagine how anyone could get them confused, but many do.

Nevertheless, I believe that given the appropriate study material just about anyone can adequately master the content in 12 weeks. They’re not getting their doctorate, just learning the enough to pass the civics part of the interview. It’s only if we wish to push further into developing civic awareness and responsibility that time becomes a significant restraint.

As for interview technique and strategy, 12 weeks to prepare for fifteen minutes is enough time for most. The skills are simple and the behavioral changes are modest.

Which leads to the question of how long it takes to master the ESOL component of a successful interview. The answer is, “It depends and I don’t know.”

Citizenship applicants come from many cultures, speak different native languages, and have varying educational levels and experiences. They also have job, kid, health and family issues (just like native-born Americans) that limit the time they can devote to study. In that respect they are the same as most other groups of adult learners.

 
But citizenship applicants are unique in the ESOL universe in that they are defined by a very specific, short-term goal, rather than the broader ambition of improving their English. Because their purpose is by definition democratic and open to all, they have the widest range of abilities and education. Some of the learners need a basic crash course in order to pass the interview and others need constant motivation to stay interested in the class. As a result, it’s less hard to define the essential ESOL content than it is to design a working model for organizing the class that keeps the advanced involved while giving everyone the best opportunity to pass.

The good part is that there’s a lot of natural camaraderie in class. Most of our students speak Spanish, some know one another socially or from work, many share native countries, all have the common immigrant experience. I intend to tap into this fellowship by pairing the advanced students as mentors with the beginners. The details will be in another post.

Does this answer the question if 12 weeks is enough to adequately master the English requirement for citizenship? No, it doesn't. But I am hopeful that those who need more help can get it from within the class, which I believe makes a tightly organized 12 week schedule feasible.

What’s the Best Course Length?

A fundamental issue in designing an appropriate curriculum for a citizenship preparation class is that of course length. You have to decide on the number of weeks that a class should run, or whether there should be any set length at all.

In my experience, there’s really only one factor that drives the decision: the typical length of time between when a student enters the program and she passes the interview. Although it might be nice to plan the curriculum based on the time needed to optimize the students’ ability to learn, we rarely have that luxury.

By tracking the students who have entered our program in the past two years, I've calculated the mean (average) and the median (most common) of the length of time between their entry and their passing the interview. I then eliminated the extreme cases and recalculated, excluding those who were in the program more than 2.5 times or less than .33 the mean. (Both of these multiples are capricious and arbitrary. If anyone wants to do this more rigorously just shout me out and I’ll send you the data). The sample was 42 students total, 25 who have passed the interview. It’s a small sample but probably large enough for our purposes.

The adjusted median is 81 days, or 11.6 weeks. The mean is 99 days, or 14.2 weeks. I think it makes sense to focus the scheduling on that range.

Anecdotally, many students first come to us after filing their application or after receiving their fingerprint appointment. That usually leaves 12 -16 weeks before their interview to prepare. But there are also those who come in after they get their interview appointment. That leaves about 6 – 8 weeks to get ready. So the scheduled curriculum must be flexible and compressible in a standard and easily administered way to accommodate latecomers.

Although we decide on a case basis whether to allow students to join a class after a couple of classes, our policy is to never turn away anyone, especially one who has a scheduled interview. There may not be enough time for them to get all of our brilliant nuances but they should have the same opportunity to succeed as the others.

As stated earlier, the median/mean range that a student is with us is 11 – 14 weeks. Let’s try setting the class curriculum for 12 weeks, and add a review class at the end for a total of 13 weeks and see how well that works.

For a late starter, a 12 week schedule can be compressed into fewer weeks as needed, with double assignments until the time is made up, up to a probable minimum of 6 weeks, which requires double work for 6 weeks. Not easy to do, but it can be done if the student is advanced and motivated. So it’s possible to accommodate a student who enters the class with as few as 6 weeks to go before the interview.

How does this fit into a yearly schedule? Were it not for holidays and vacations, a 13 week schedule could be given 4 times a year, but I think it’s more realistic to plan on a 17 week rotation, 3 times a year. Of course, if the demand is there, you can always run multiple overlapping classes.

 
A 13 week class that meets 3 hours a week yields 39 contact hours. Subtract the review class and there are 36 hours of face time with the students. Now the question is, what do we do with our 36 hours? We’ll begin to answer that next post.

Significant New Dialog on Immigration

Starting today at the New York Times Online is a significant new dialog about immigration. The initial topic is bilingual education for the young, which is near enough to our mission to warrant close attention. You can follow it here.

It's good starting point to see how leaders in the field see the same issue from various perspectives. Although the obstacles facing adult learners are different than those of children in the classroom, it can't hurt to broaden our knowledge with the experience of others.

Regarding the education of young SOL, we all know there's a major change going on in many of our local classrooms, but it helps to see statistics and charts to appreciate it. From the Times:

Immigration’s impact is often first seen in the classroom. The increasing diversity of the nation’s education system is the most detailed measure of where immigrants have settled in recent years. View demographic changes in more than 17,000 school districts across the nation — including your own.

If you want to see how immigration has effected the student population of Plainfield and the rest of New Jersey over the last twenty years, click here.