Mid-Manhattan Adult Learning Center June 2011 Volume 1...

ESL 5/6 Newsletter

It is now June, 2011 and almost time for our spring semester to end. I believe we’ve had a very exciting semester; our classes were filled with motivated, talented, and intelligent stu-dents. I, personally, find all of you quite inspir-ing and uplifting because in spite of your busy, lives, you’ve found the time and energy to come to class to improve your English and literacy skills and add to the morale and quality of our ESL classes. I congratulate you!

We began the semester with many lessons about Martin Luther King, Jr. Not only did we read about Dr. King, but we listened to and read his famous speech of August, 1963, and wrote dia-mante poems based on his life.

This led us into Black History Month when the morning class read , Through My Eyes, by Ruby Bridges and the afternoon class read Who is Harriet Tubman? We used these books to understand the African American experience in U.S. history as well as improve our reading comprehension and vocabulary skills. Our EFF goal for this period was: The students of the ESL 5 & 6 classes will read for understanding the African American experience in order to understand the qualities of success-ful African Americans in the United States and to learn how to be more successful individuals. The students will show their learning by creating original picture books about an African American of their choice.

The morning students wrote many reading re-sponse journals about Ruby Bridges, and even mailed Ms. Bridges letters, introducing them-selves and explaining their reactions to her book

Our P.M. students also wrote reading response journals about Harriet Tubman and created role plays based on the book. They also saw a full-length movie, starring Cicely Tyson, about Harriet Tubman and her work on the Under-ground Railroad.

Our students created utilizing Microsoft Word. Practically every students created a book. These books were later displayed at the Black and Women’s His-tory Celebration.

In March, we studied Women’s History. Our EFF project was to develop a performance based on both Black and Women’s history. Our students studied and recited quotes from leaders of these movements. We also studied the contributions and life of Susan B. An-thony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. We worked very hard on pronunciation and speaking skills for our very successful per-formance.

For the month of April, we concentrated on National Poetry Month. We had learned a few poems the month before about Susan B. Anthony and as I wrote previously, we had already written diamante poems. We began the month and our poetry curriculum with Langston Hughes’ poem, April Rain Song. We read and explored Robert Frost’s Stopping By the Woods on a Snowy Evening, discussing what

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Tilla Alexander

Note from the teacher

Mid-Manhattan Adult Learning Center June 2011

Volume 1, Issue 2

Inside this issue:

Someone Who Influenced Me

2

Trip to Brooklyn Botanic Garden

2

Earthquake in Japan 3

Happy to Be Alive 4

Most Beautiful Place in the World-reflection

5

The Power of Choice at Columbia

5

Women’s and Black His-tory Celebration

6

Trip to Mount Vernon Hotel Museum

7

Thank you, Dr. Coles, A Letter to Dr. Coles

8

At The End of The School Year

9

During My Dream 9

Djene, Poetry, Mother Love

10

Memorable Photos 11

Ryntha Henderson-Amare, Principal Sushma Malhotra, Asst. Principal

Nancy Fernandez, Asst. Principal-Welcome Center

Isabel Taveraz

The person who has influenced me most in my life is my mother. She always gave me a good orientation about life and supported me. She always took care of me and helped me grow up to be confident and happy. She is the type of person who always shows love to everybody; she had a very strong influence on my life.

Alicia Pierce

The person who has influenced me most in my live is my father , BADA. I admire my father for three reasons. First when I was in Africa he had done everything that he can for me .Second he

brought me in NY and keep doing the same things like taking care of me, paying all my bill setc and did all that he can to get me a good job. Third he s a type of person who likes to help people who need it.

Modou Samb

My friend Xiomara is a person who has influ-enced me a great deal. She is a mother with three kids who all have learning problems.

She doesn’t work because has so many appoint-ments with her kids, she doesn’t have time for

there were a lot of people. In fact, it was amaz-ing.

I went to Brooklyn Botanic Garden on Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn. It was such a good trip. My first impression was how big and well-organized the park is. You can see many types of flowers. I actually did many things such as taking pictures, and visiting the whole parts of the park. It was a great time to increase my knowledge. Even though it was a rainy day,

Someone Who Influenced Me

Trip to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden by Mor Diba

Japanese Garden

Alicia Pierce

The person who influenced me is my grand-mother

because she supported me when my mother died.

She always gives me good advice, and encour-ages me to do the right thing. She always said to me that I have to go to school and learn some-thing in life, and become more educated. That why she is the most important person in my life.

Solmaria Avila

Continued from above

anything, but she likes to help other people and never has bad moods.

She is a trustworthy person because never talks about other people or curses life.

She taught me “Money isn’t necessary to help other people”. For these and other qualities she has been my best friend for more than twenty years.

Martha Soto

ESL 5/6 Newsletter Volume 1, Issue 2

Martha Soto

Solmaria Avila

Killick Jean at the garden

Earthquake in Japan by Koymi Ike

My Dream for the Future by Mamadou Saidou Diallo

Kayoumi Ike

Mamadou Saidou Diallo

On March 11 2011, there was huge earthquake and Tsunami in Japan. About twenty thousand people died and many people are still missing. And people who lost their houses, forced to live in the shelter because their houses were de-stroyed.

On that day, early morning when I turned on the TV, I was stunned by nightmare of disaster. Many houses flowed into the sea it was what I ever see before in my whole life. Immediately I sent messages to my family but some of them returned to my computer because Japan was in a panic. All trains were stopped and cell phone didn’t work even in Tokyo. During the few

weeks after crisis when I watched about damage, my tears rolled down without my feeling any-thing. I didn’t know what happened in my mind. Some of my friends were depressed even thought they live in NY.

I really respect the survivors because they never give up for recovery and they smile at camera. But I’m sure that they are suffering and breaking their hearts by deep sadness. Many people reach out to help Japan. I appreciate all that they have been doing. I believe that one for all and all for one.

“In many poor countries people don’t have basic services: like health, retirement food, drinking, water, and schools.”


I’m Diallo Mamadou Saidou. I come from Guinea, west Africa. I live in Brussels. Now, I came to New York to learn more English for the future.

For the future, I wish to get a job with United Nations Development Program(UNDP), some where around the world.

This organization’s annual reports influenced me in my vision for the future. All the reports from UNDP talk about human rights in the world-how different governments in the world give their peo-ple many services: like health care, good education, transportation service and jobs. These reports also give some advice for each government about how to improve them. The helping people pro-gram in developing countries, like World Health Program, World Food program, and Agricultural developing fund program contribute to give very strong capabilities to reinforce the governments developing policies.

In many poor countries people don’t have basic services: like health care, retirement, , food, drinking water and schools. Many children don’t go at school to prepare them for the future. Malaria kills people more than 10 thousand people everyday in the world. Many other children are starving, more than 20 thousand everyday in the world.

I enjoy helping poor people to improve their life every where and every time, if I can. That is my goal for the future. That will be my small part of contribution for human liberty in the world. This is the main religious purpose of my life.

The following is a personal reaction to a news article from Cnn.com..

Tarah Castleberry and her hus-band are exactly right. It was a scary, incredible and moving story. I can’t begin to imagine what they went through. It’s noble that they’re renting peo-ple who needed medical atten-tion. They have to get checked soon because internal injuries can be worse than they first let on. I am going to pray for you

and for all the people who lost their lives, their families and friends. I’ll be praying for the people who lost all of their homes and belongings who are also thankful that it wasn’t their lives.

Yamiley Amadis

them, but I didn’t say anything because I was shy. I retreated from them. The wet flaw gnawed at me because I had to strain during my job. My co-workers arduously alleviated the problem by drying the floor.

I usually work hard with my coworkers. One day it was very busy at my restaurant. We were in a rush to get the food from the kitchen to the cus-tomer. When I tried to carry ten plates on my hand, I fell down on the floor because it was wet. Many customers looked at me, so I glimpsed at

Koyumi Ike

Modou Samb

Aris Bayona

Alicia Pierce

Joplin Resident: I’ve Never Been So Happy To Be Alive-Cnn.com

At My Job, A Vocabulary Story

Yamiley Amadis

neighborhood. After that, the government went to Joplin, and prom-ised them compensation in order to alleviate their pain.

Marcelle Golly

Killick Jean

Thierno Barry

Fanta Cisse

Storm, A Vocabulary Story On May 23rd, a big storm happened in Joplin, Mis-souri. The city was dev-astated. People were very gnawed about the situa-tion. After the retreat of the storm, everyone was warily looking for their r e l a t i v e s i n t h e i r


Excerpt from the book, The Most Beautiful Place in the World by Ann Cameron and my personal responses.

“Something was very sad for me. I said, “Grandmother wants me to go to school….next year. “

This paragraph talks about Juan’s dream. He wants to go to school, but the teacher said that he was older than the other children, so she wants Juan to begin next year. I dis-

agree with the teacher because if someone wants to study, you are supposed to help him and not give him a hard time.

In my opinion, I think Juan was smart because he learned to read alone, do arithmetic and sometimes help his grand-mother explaining the newspa-per.

Juan was brave too because he shines shoes to help his grand-mother in her business. His grandmother was terrible with

him one day. She said she couldn’t sleep with Juan. That day, he sleeps on a bunch of empty rice bags on the floor.

It’s easy to read this book. This book gives a lot of advice. You can breathe more ideas after reading and it’s also com-fortable for all people. This is my opinion about this book. If you want to know more, I ad-vise you to read and know The Most Beautiful Place in the World.

importance of keeping learning going on for children in the summer. It will give them practical ideas on ways to keep their children engaged in meaningful and age appropri-ate activities. Today, the United States worries about the children in school who will be out of school for the summer.

The conference was well or-ganized at 10:15 in the Hard-edge Auditorium filled with students and teachers. Who want to help the community members raise children to be-come more responsible adults. This workshop will help par-ents, the majority who are im-migrants, to understand the

The Department of Education would like to play a role in supporting the parents in pro-viding educational experiences for their children.

The Most Beautiful Place in the World by Moukailou Moumouni

The Power of Choice at Columbia by Francois Sambou

Francois Sambou

Moukailou Moumouni

that they will be able to get their photographs together because these are things they cannot replace. They have to find them and save them. The officials believe they will pro-tect the cities from flooding. Some residents are taking pre-liminary precautions because the Mississippi River is rising.

Summary: Towns Brace for Flooding as Mississippi River Spillway Opens by Watson Morancy

This year, The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and au-thorities plan to open as many as one fourth of spillways-125 floodgates in the coming days in an effort to spare Louisiana cities of Baton Rouge and New Orleans. They haven’t done this for forty years.

Some people are really happy

“The officials believe they will protect the cities from flooding”


Watson Morancy

Women’s and Black History Celebration by Thierno Barry

Frederick Douglass

Thierno Barry

Every February is Black History Month in the United States. These re-sources will help student’s research American women and Black History. In this month at the school, the students read about women and black history, and most of them made books. At my school we did same quotes and show. I made a book about Malcolm X and I ex-plain who he was. The Afri-can-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968) re-fers to the movements in the United States aimed at out-lawing racial discrimination against African Americans and restoring voting rights in Southern states. Many of those who were active in the Civil Rights Movement, with organizations such as NAACP, SNCC, CORE and SCLC, prefer the term "Southern Freedom Move-ment" because the struggle was about far more than just civil rights under law; it was also about fundamental is-sues of freedom, respect, dignity, and economic and social equality. What would the Civil Rights Movement be without the brave men and women who fought for equal rights? These leaders dedicated their lives to end-ing slavery, segregation, and unfair treatment. We want to thank these great people and help to learn more about them like.

Ruby Bridges

Ruby Bridges also helped end segregation in schools. She was the first black stu-dent at her elementary school, and Ruby had to be

very brave to stand up to all the people who didn't want her there.

Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass was once a slave. He became a poet and an abolitionist, and he worked hard to help end slavery and teach others about how evil slavery was.

Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey started the Back to Africa Movement to help Blacks be treated more equally. He thought mov-ing to Africa would allow Black Americans to stop being treated unfairly in the United States.

Jesse Jackson

Jesse Jackson worked with Martin Luther King, Jr. to gets equal jobs for Blacks. He later ran for President of the United States.

John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy was presi-dent during the 1960's Civil Rights Movement. He helped pass laws to make sure all Blacks could vote and get a good education. These laws ended segrega-tion in schools, jobs, restau-rants, theaters, and much, much more.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his famous "I Have a Dream" speech and led the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Read more about the many other things he did to help all people work peacefully to win equal rights. See and hear his most famous speeches for yourself!

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was Presi-dent of the United States when the Southern states broke away from the country. He worked hard to keep the country to-gether and ended up ending slavery after the Civil War.

Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks was arrested for sitting in the wrong part of the bus! Learn how she worked with civil rights organizations to start the Montgomery Bus Boycott and help end segrega-tion on buses in the South.

Sojourner Truth

Sojourner Truth was also a slave, but she won her freedom by running away. After she was free, she preached to oth-ers about ending slavery and fought for free Blacks and women to be treated as equals with Whites and men.

Harriet Tubman

Harriet Tubman was another slave who worked to free slaves. She ran away because she was afraid of being shipped further south where slaves were treated very badly. Learn more about her escape and how she went on to help many others escape to freedom.

Malcolm X

Malcolm X worked to end seg-regation in the 1960's. He preached to others that they should do whatever they needed to do to fight for their rights

Every one of these Civil Rights Movement leaders has an excit-ing story. I hope everyone will remember what they did to make the world a better place

“In this month at the school, the students read about women and black history, and most of them made books.”


Ruby Bridges

Mount Vernon Hotel Museum Trip by Rafael Carmona

My Dream for the Future by Mamadi Kamara

Rafael Carmona

Mamadi Kamara

Last April 29th, we went to the Mount Vernon Hotel which is now a museum. We learned how the lives of people were in the 1820s, how they lived and what they did.

The Mount Vernon Hotel was constructed in 1799 as a car-riage house for a 23 acre estate, and converted into the Mount Vernon Hotel in 1826. This stone building sits on land origi-nally owned by Colonel William Stephen Smith and his wife, the daughter of Abigail and John Adams who was the 2nd Presi-dent of the United States.

We learned how the New York-ers escaped the hustle and dirty city which at that time extended

only as far north as 14th Street.

We saw what kind of food they ate: turtle soup, clams, and different wines. The la-dies had a deluxe room where they took tea and talked about their lives. The men had a tavern where they played cards and talked. It was dirty and smelly.

We saw how the furniture was at that time (they didn’t let us touch anything). The bed was made of strings. In winter they had to warm it before going to sleep. They had a container to use as a bath-room. (They didn’t have a bathroom inside the hotel).

The tavern had a container where they threw the chewing tobacco, and had a table where they read and discussed the news and played cards. This room had space like a cantina that had something like a gate. It was used as a bar.

The ladies’ space was clean and well-cared for. It had carpets and on the wall there was a pic-ture of Mr. James Stuart. We weren’t allowed to take pictures.

At the end of the trip, we saw the garden and took many pic-tures. Finally, we visited the gift shop where I fought flower seeds, a pencil and postcards.

The trip was great!

want to do something that nobody has done yet, and to change the world. I want to be someone historic in the entire world.

When I will finish my edu-cation, I want to become a technologist, since when I was a teenager, I used to go to my uncle’s office and sit down to watch how he ma-nipulates his typing ma-chine. I want to create my own Microsoft program. I


Last month, Mississippi river was swollen. usually it happens when it rains a lot, but at the time it has been

terrible, The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers opened one flow gate or spillways. This hasn’t been done for the last 40 years.

The water from the spillways af-fect 3,900 people and 2,600 struc-tures. The authorities plan open as many as one fourth of the spill-ways, because they want avoid something like what happened in New Orleans years ago.

Mississippi Swollen by Arismendi Bayona

Arismendi Bayona

this reminds us of and the use of repetition by the poet. We tried to envision the scene. Using the site Read Think Write, we learned the attributes of a cinquain poem and then the students created their own poems. The next type of poem we learned was the acrostic poem. Again, we used Read, Think, Write. However, this time we created our poems directly on the web site; then we were able to save and print

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help me a lot for my com-munication in English.

Thank you,

Sincerely yours,

Fatou Bintou Seck

Dear Dr. Coles and Mr. Hamilton,

I appreciate the speech class you give us every Wednesday. I learn sound differentiation, pronunciation, and voice sounds. These lessons

A Note from the Teacher

A Letter to Dr. Jann Coles & Nate Hamilton

NYU Literacy Review

fifteen people who take this class every Wednesday. At two o’clock, we leave our kind teacher, Ms. Tilla, to go to the pronunciation class. I learn how to pronounce the vowels and different sounds.

Now I understand better when people are talking to me and I’m not so afraid to talk. I’m

grateful to Dr. Coles for the way she teaches us with pa-tience, especially the R and W sounds. She wants each per-son to do his or her best.

Marie Gelin

Thank you, Dr. Jann Coles Today, I am so proud to write about someone very special at the Mid-Manhattan Adult Learning Center. Her name is Dr. Jann Coles. She is an at-tractive, nice, and intelligent person. She had a good idea to teach people how to reduce their foreign accents.

I’m so happy to be one of the


them. In the month of May, for Mother’s Day, the stu-dents could choose any type of poem to write using the topic of mother. Some chose cinquains, while others chose acrostic and free form po-ems.

This semester, our afternoon class was so fortunate as to partake in our Superintendent Jann Coles’ pronunciation workshop. They truly en-joyed these workshops which

were filled with fun ac-tivities to help them reduce their accents. The students always remarked how much they have enjoyed these sessions.

At the end of April, our class went on a trip to the Mount Vernon Hotel Museum with Mr.


Marie Gelin

Jann Coles & Nate Hamilton

Fatou Bintou Seck

At The End of the School Year by Rong Hua Li (Sharrie)

A Note from the Teacher continued

During My Dream by Killick Jean

Rong Hua Li

Diana Raissis, Tilla Alex-ander, Maria Guzman

In my life, the most wonderful time was in school because I always like to study and learn something. The atmosphere in the school is so attractive to me; it is so pure and peaceful, not complicated, and not ag-gressive, so after finishing my job, I chose to go back to school.

Every day, I wake up early and exercise. Then I go to school. I like the way life goes on. I study hard because I don’t

want to waste my time. Hu-morously, I made some com-plaints too, but I did learn. One day, when I was driving on the Brooklyn Bridge, I was astonished by myself and I was thinking of something in Eng-lish. And later, I noticed that whatever I think and whatever I talk about is all in English. I know I am really improving my English by continuing to go to school So, thank you, Ms. Tilla. I am really appreciative of what you have done for me.

The school is almost finished for me, and I am thinking of what I should study next.

This I have been wondering since birth.

This is confusion for me

But there is plenty of time left

It is never too late

Eventually, I will discover my destiny.

When I close my eyes

My soul drifts into the night sky

My spirit rises up to the infinite

Floating through space

Endlessly searching for answers

Trying so hard to find its place

What is my purpose on this earth?

along with Diana Raissis, our Instructional Facilitator, Ryn-tha Henderson-Amare, our principal, and Maria Guzman, one of our Basic Education teachers. This was to honor the writers published in this year’s NYU’s Gallatin School Literacy Review . This year our school had three winners,

George Keriosiotis’ ESL 1 class. This was the site of a day hotel in the 1820s to 1830s. We had a wonderful tour and learned about the lives of New Yorkers during that period.

On May 3rd, I was fortunate to be able to attend the NYU Literacy Review Celebration

two from my classes (Yacouba Yeo and Modou Samb) and Asia Reape from Ms. Corrine O’Shaunessy’s class. I’d like to thank Ms. Raissis for all her support and help in this pro-ject. She gave our students a special lesson on creative writ-ing during the fall semester.



Killick Jean

Djenne in Mali is one of the cities I like most in the world. It is a beautiful city. Every year people fix the mosque, the most beautiful mosque in the world. It was all built with sand and wood, naturally with no chemi-cals; all with actual ob-jects. Djene is a big city with many mysteries like the natural wall or the lady they buried alive in order to be able to build the city, and the well peo-

ple were using to communicate with Tumbuktu. All the houses are built with cow dung and water. Nobody is allowed to build with other materials. All the houses are yellow with antiques, windows, many trees, a beautiful place which you have to take the ferry to go to. Their market opens just once a week, so that day there are only a few restau-rants everyone can eat in. Peo-ple need to travel through narrow streets. Usually the small children ride on donkeys.

There are no large buildings, just houses. They use the wood to cook and sit on the floor to eat. People always have time for each other; friends visit almost every day. Djenne is one of the kinds of places where people would like to live.

taught me how to say I love you. Wherever what will hap-pen to me or what I'm going to be," Remember who you are. She told me to always remember my background, and not to be afraid to get my hands dirty. They'll wash clean. Work before play, never lie, cheat or steal. She taught me

In my life I trust only two peo-ple, first is my mother second is me. My mother taught me a lot of things that I will never for-get. Our mothers are the only people that know more about us than we know about our-selves. My mom taught me that she loves me, no matter what. She taught me to serve others when I am feeling selfish. She

anytime when children are unable to solve a problem they face their mothers. She probably won't know the solution either but she will fake it. My mom gave me a life that is something that I will never be able to repay back. My mom is the best and also my best friend for-ever. I love you mom.

Djenne by Fanta Cisse

Mother Love by Karamoko Camara

Karamoko Camara

Fanta Cisse

A Cinquain Poem by Yamiley Amadis

Dog

Friendly, protective

Jumping, running, licking

Loves to chase balls

Canine

FISH, An Acrostic Poem by Rubeldy Paulino

Far off the coast

Imagine the freedom

Swim in the blue ocean,

Hidden in the water

Poetry By Our Students LIFE, An Acrostic Poem by Geomene St. Fils

Life is good

Interesting

Funny

Exciting and simple

Newsletter T i t le Volume 1, Issue 2

Geomene St. Fils

Memorable Photos

NYU Literacy Review Celebration-Our Winner, Yacouba Yeo

Newsletter T i t le Volume 1, Issue 2

Kettlie at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden Group Picture at the Garden Class Party

Florencia at Mt. Vernon Hotel Museum Ming, Marie, Fatou at museum Our A.M. Class

Newsletter Staff

Editors: Thierno Barry & Rong Hua Li

Writers:

Aris Bayona Koyumi Ike Mamadou Saidou Diallo

Modou Samb Martha Soto Mor Diba

Yamiley Amadis Marcelle Golly Killick John

Alicia Pierce Fanta Cisse Moukailou Moumouni

Watson Morancy Francois Sambou Karamoko Camara

Rafael Carmona Mamadci Kamara Rubeldy Paulino

Marie Gelin Fatou Bintou Seck Geomene St. Fils

Facilitator: Tilla Alexander

showing good or bad stress and eliciting effec-tive ways to deal with stress.

We are looking forward to our Student Recogni-tion Day on June 13th where we will honor all of our students.

I am ecstatic that so many of our students have reached level 7 of ESL and will be going on to Basic Education, and some of our students will be going to college in September.

I hope that everyone will have a productive and restful summer. Please keep reading daily in English and use English outside of class as much as possible.

Tilla Alexander

Our class also visited the Brooklyn Botanic Gar-den on May 4th. Though it was a rainy day, we were able to see many kinds of plants and flow-ers and take terrific photographs. We used these photos to create haiku poems. Our stu-dents poems were put into a book which in-cluded the photos.

We learned about the natural disasters in Japan and later in the United States. After reading about and discussing the floods and tornadoes in the United States, our students wrote summa-ries of news articles.

Our current unit is about Coping with Stress. We defined stress, and listed common stressors in our lives. We also discussed the physical, men-tal, emotional and behavioral symptoms of stress. The students then learned about coping strategies. Their task will be to create a scenario

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A Note from the Teacher continued

Students from the morning class

Mid-Manhattan Adult Learning Center

212 West 120th Street

New York, NY 10027

(212) 666-1920

Mid-Manhattan Adult Learning Center June 2011 Volume 1...

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