Antonia's+Unit

=A Latino in Philadelphia=

What is the immigrant experience like for Latino immigrants in the Philadelphia area?
(Spanish, grades 11 and 12)

Overview:
I want my students to put a face to the Latino immigration experience in the Philadelphia area. I want to break stereotypes and expose students to the immigrants’ reality. I want them to develop their language skills as well as their understanding of others.



**What did this unit used to look like?**
This project was created in 2008. It originally intended to make students get to know the lives of Hispanic immigrants in the US. Students were more used to a more "academic" kind of project so it was difficult for them to understand that this time they had to talk to a Hispanic immigrant and talk about their lives in their country of origin and find out why they came to the US. It was a valuable experience but I knew that there were too many loose ends and that I definitely had to change the rubrics and make them, as well as my expectations, more explicit.

Reflection on the process
I have made significant changes to the original project. However, due to time constraints, I was not able to fully implement the project this year. That is why, I will comment on the ideas I was able to test this year. In 2008, I helped the students find someone to interview. This year, I thought it would be more meaninful for my students to find themselves a person willing to share their story with them.This proved to be more challenging but at the same time more memorable for my students. Originally, the project was more a biography of an immigrant in the US. However, this year as we had discussed very current and controversial topics all related to immigration, I planned the project so that the main focus would be on the experiences of Hispanic immigrants in Philadelphia and the factors that made of this experience a positive or a negative one. Concentrating in one geographical area would help my students better compare and contrast the lives of these immigrants. Most students felt more invested this year and "discovered" that the immigrant reality is more complex and closer to them than they thought. Several students chose people in our community and it was nice to see that these people were really glad to share their stories. In addition, I made it my goal to make students accountable not only for the quality of their work but also for their punctuality. I am happy to say that when the rules are clear enough and especially when enforced, students respond responsibly and hand in really good products. I can't wait to implement the project next year. I know it is still a work in progress and there are many things to improve but I feel that it is a good thing to give our students the chance to form their own opinions and to relate to a reality that most of them are not familiar with despite all the media coverage.

Thoughts for next year
As I said before, I hope I can implement the project next year and make all the necessary changes to improve it. I would love to create a wiki so my students can share their products and learn from each other. That is something we could not do this year. In addition to that, I would like to have a conversation via skype with the person with "the most interesting"story at the end of all the presentations. One student mentioned that it would be a great idea if they could have their articles published. I agree with him and that's why I will encourage my students to send their articles to a bilingual publication (the magazine "Motivos" is one of them). I am also planning to organize an event for my students to share their findings in a more public way: a community forum, a panel discussion organized with the help of the Latino Club at Shipley,etc.