A comment on a recent post of mine reminded me of a time in high school when something I did effected someone in a way in which I was not aware. Until months later, I didn’t have a clue of what it had meant to one person in particular.
By the time I got to plan my classes for my senior year, I had already taken all of my required classes, with the exception of science and P.E. I planned on continuing my electives but I still had room left in my schedule for another class and so I signed up to be a teacher aide for the ESL class which was housed in the social studies building. The teachers were Mr. Dal Porto and Mr. Archer. It was a two period class with about 25 students, most of which were fluent in English. In those days, we didn’t really have a lot of non-English fluent students, however the ESL class provided the little bit of extra help in academic subjects. In this class, the kids got the extra help which allowed them to function in the school. Very often this was done through one-on-one tutoring and/or text books written in simplified language.
My friend, Jenny was the aide for the ESL class for first period and then I would come along and replace her at the start of second period. It was easy but also fun and rewarding. The year I was a teacher aide in that class, we had a ninth grade student name Xuan (pronounced “Swan”) who was fresh from Vietnam and spoke not one word of English. She was in the ESL class for two periods a day then went to all of her other classes where she had no help. All of her teachers were having a very difficult time trying to reach her because no one at the school spoke Vietnamese. This was 1973 and Xuan was the only Vietnamese student in the school and there was no one on staff who spoke Vietnamese. Basically, Xuan sat at her desk and quizzically looked at the teachers, completely lost and not knowing what to do. She could not communicate with anyone and no one knew how to communicate with her. So she sat and marked time.
I had been absent for the first week that Xuan came to the school but the day I returned, I was assigned to work with her. It was frustrating to not be able to communicate with her. After the first day, I knew I had to find a way to reach her. I thought about it and thought about it for the rest of the day and again at home. Finally, it occurred to me that while I didn’t speak her language, perhaps she spoke French! I was taking my fourth year of French and I thought this might be a way to reach Xuan. The next day, I was very anxious to get to second period to see if I was right about reaching Xuan. When I spoke to her in French, Xuan smiled and nodded. She did speak French and soon we were blabbing away in French. We smiled and giggled a lot that period and she helped me learn to pronounce her name correctly. When I realized it was like “swan” I told her there was an English word that sounded the same and I showed her a picture of a swan. She joked that she would have to walk around like a graceful swan. I was so happy when I was able to call Mr. Dal Porto and Mr. Archer to Xuan’s desk so she could say to them, “My name is Xuan.” Both the teachers were delighted and baffled until I told them the secret to getting through to Xuan…French! I had found the door through which Xuan could be reached.
After that, I communicated with Xuan in French and the other teachers in the school realized that if they had a French student in the class, they could communicate with her, too. It was still difficult to communicate with her but there was a way to do it. It was not uncommon for a teacher to send a student to the French class to get someone to talk to Xuan. With patience and a little creativity, Xuan was able to access the curriculum and within a few weeks, she was speaking enough Basic English to make herself understood. By the end of the school year Xuan had made quite a few friends and was no longer the outcast she had been without English skills.
I didn’t think much about this. I was glad I had been able to help her but I didn’t realize fully what I had done until months after I had graduated from high school and had entered college when, during a weekend trip home, my Uncle Joe came to visit. He told me about having met one of the teachers at my former high school while they were both bowling. My uncle had met Mr. Nelson, the choir teacher. Of course I knew who Mr. Nelson was but I had never taken choir so I really didn’t know him. Imagine my surprise when I learned that Mr. Nelson had told Uncle Joe that I had been a wonderfully helpful student. Uncle Joe said he had told him a lot of “stuff” about me but one story in particular held Uncle Joe’s interest. Mr. Nelson had told my uncle about Xuan and how I had helped her to learn English by figuring out that she spoke French! Apparently, the story had been the talk of the faculty lounge. All of Xuan’s teachers were grateful to me and it had led to them knowing how to approach a few more Vietnamese speaking students that entered the school the following year. It was only then that I began to realize what a difference I had made in Xuan’s life. Now, after years of working with ESL students, I realize it even more.
So like David said, one never really knows what an impact we make on others, sometimes without meaning to. The way we live extends to many people beyond our reach and our deeds live often long after us.