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Abby Barnes
English 4
Mrs. DeBock
18 November 2016
Real World Experience Narrative Writing
Beginning with my Senior Digital Exploration project, I had a general idea of what my
topic was about. It began with foreign language and cultural barriers that uprise conflicts around
the world. After doing extensive research on the topic, I decided to take my work a step further
than originally planned. Within my second research paper, it was formed to be solely about how
children at a younger age should be required to study a foreign language class. From this
research, I went on the experience my service portion of this product. The people who allowed
me to go on this journey with them would be multiple classmates, teachers, and bilingual teens
all learning or of another language.
I began this project with the idea in the back of my mind to reach out to one of my
Spanish teachers. Mrs. Curbelo being one of the very first persons that I was able to have the
pleasure to converse with. I spent 4 hours with her during her class time on Monday, November
14, asking her questions and even helping her teach Spanish. From her, I learned the struggles
that she has dealt with throughout her lifetime. Not only did I learn about her personal
experiences with foreign language, but also about how schools should include a requirement of
at least one Foreign language. One thing that I really felt for Mrs. Curbelo is one question I asked
her. Is
teaching a foreign language hard for students who have never had any experience? I asked her.

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Teaching is difficult overall no matter what language, especially trying to reach out to every
student you have, however, each student makes a difference in my life. Like a big beautiful book
and every student I teach is one amazing story wholeheartedly told from Mrs. Curbelo. Another
teacher that I visited was Mrs. Henry. I was lucky enough to visit her on Tuesday, November 15
when she had planning period. We spent only a meager half hour discussing foreign language
and cultural barriers. Unfortunately, I was only able to talk about the necessary questions, but
Mrs. Henry was able to fit in an example of how foreign language affected her life in a negative
way. She told me a story of how she had moved from Venezuela over to New York at a young
age. Her obstacles included her poor English skills at the time, and how she could not properly
communicate with others her age. She explained to me about how she was stereotyped because
of her language. People though she was from a jungle and that she had pet snakes. Her story
impacted me on another level. This was all due to the fact that kids such as her classmates were
unexposed to other cultures and ethnicities at a young age, making the struggle of
comprehension more evident than before. Staying within the classroom setting I moved on to
other specimens, my classmates.
After talking to my Spanish teachers, I moved along to students who were studying
Spanish. On Wednesday, November 16 I reached out to 3 students being Hannah Bayliff,
Brandon Crane, and August Cribb. I surveyed them on the epidemic of foreign language classes
around the united states. Hannah and Brandon tended to agree that if they had been acquired to
attend foreign language classes at a younger age that they would be excessively well-suited in
the present and future. But due to the fact that they were not required to take those classes, they
feel as if they have been cheated because it is an obstacle just to understand the basics of Spanish

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today. On the other hand, I had an interesting response from August, almost every question I
posed she seemed to have a negative outlook on all of them. Her basic understanding of the
subject at hand was that foreign language was not necessary whether in personal form or
educational-form it was not required. One question I asked was do you think you will need to
know a foreign language for your future. She replied with a bland no, I more than likely will
not need to possess this skill for my future career. I was very confused by this answer.
However,
I did understand that you might not need it for your career. But what about the people on the
street every day, the people who you meet and converse with? This brought light to my eyes that
most people only take a foreign language class due to the fact some colleges might require it to
be accepted in. This is a daft concept to me because there are people of the world, of other
languages, who I would what to learn from and collect knowledge from. The last person I
shadowed knew languages like my teachers and was as young as my classmates.
Lastly, I interviewed Paola Cordero. She, as well as the others, is a student at St.
James High School. I had the privilege to speak with her on Wednesday, November 16 for an
extensive amount of time. However, she is unlike many of the other students. Paola is bilingual,
she is fluent in Spanish and English.From my interview with her, I learned that she had become
bilingual around the age of 3. She hardly remembers learning a second language due to her
young age. How this came to be was that her first language was English, but the majority of her
family was from Ecuador, in which they only spoke Spanish. So from that, her family decided to
teach her at a younger age rather that later in life because they thought it would be extremely

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difficult. Thanks to Paola I can now comprehend how learning various languages at a young age
can be beneficial for a person.
I took great pleasure in learning about the different stories and experiences that others
had to offer me. From this service project, I was granted the opportunity to gain insight on the
matter of foreign language and cultural barriers within personal life and the education system.
Many different opinions were opposed during my time shadowing and interviewing. Which
included negative aspects about learning a foreign language to the pure joy it is to teach one. I
was able to observe first-hand what it means to be a person of a different language learning
another. Also that I and others believe the school system should require the study of a foreign
language at a young age.