By Lisa Magers/CISD Community Services
The essays of three Cleburne ISD Adult Education students are featured in the June issue of The Quarterly, a publication of the Texas Center for the Advancement of Literacy and Learning.
Silvestre Hernandez, Gabriel Ramirez and Sonia Granado wrote about their experiences and successes as adult learners in CISD’s English as a Second Language program.
“Stories written by adult education students are a regular feature of the TCALL Quarterly,” said Adult Education Director Barbara Yoder. “This was our first time to submit student work, and for their stories to be selected is a big deal for a small program like ours. We are so excited to see their essays in print. They get a small stipend, too. I credit our teachers for really making students’ goals important in their classroom instruction.”
Granado, a native of Jimenez, Coahuila, Mexico, titled her essay “Overcoming Obstacles to Go to School.”
“I am so proud that I am from Mexico, but I’m so lucky to live in the U.S.A., which gives me the opportunity to learn how to talk, write and read English,” Granado wrote in her essay. “Learning or speaking English gives us many opportunities. Remember, speaking one language is like bring a single person, but speaking two languages is like being two people.”
Hernandez, who was born in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico, enrolled in Cleburne’s ESL program at the age of 62 and has been taking classes for a year.
The title of his essay is “It’s Never Too Late.”
“I thought I was too old to take a class and learn English,” he wrote. “But then I decided ‘why not?’ The first paper I wrote in class, even I didn’t understand it. Now I feel good about my writing.
“My first goal is to learn to speak, read and write English well. Second, I need to volunteer in my grandchildren’s school. Third, I need to talk with their teachers and learn more about their homework assignments.
“Maybe I’ll be ready to help my grandchildren with their homework in a few months. After I start helping my grandchildren, I’m going to look for a good job.”
Two weeks after he arrived in America, Ramirez began taking ESL classes at the invitation of a friend. He is a native of Chihuahua, the largest state in Mexico.
“For me, studying English is completely necessary for many reasons,” he wrote. “One of them is we are here in this great country, so we need to speak English with everybody; with our neighbor, with our boss, with all people around us. So that means we need to learn English.”
Ramirez plans to continue with his studies through CISD Adult Education as a participant in the GED program to earn a high school equivalency certificate.
“If you one day think or feel about giving up learning ESL or GED for some reason, like somebody laughed at you because you are too old study,” wrote Ramirez, “Always think about you and your family, not the people who have the bad attitude.”
Bonnie Weathersby, the ESL teacher who submitted her students’ essays to The Quarterly, said teaching adult education is all about success stories.
“I am very proud of my students who have gotten their success stories published,” she said. “They work very hard. And there are so many other successes out there, like our student whose English skills are now to the point that when she took her daughter to the eye doctor she was able to have a conversation with the doctor in English, and she understood what he told her.”
Cleburne ISD offers free day and evening classes in English as a Second Language and adult basic education and preparation for the GED at its Adult Education Learning Center located on the J.N. Long campus at 425 N. Granbury.
Through a cooperative program, classes are also offered in locations throughout Johnson County and Granbury. For more information, call 817-202-1108.
