Rashmi K

My daughter is an ESL teacher. She teaches adult refugees who have never spoken English in their lives. She narrated me this one instance which brought tears of joy to my eyes.

This is what she told me...this is her story in her own words.

"About a year ago, I walked into my classroom to prepare for my lesson only to find one of my students already there, 30 minutes early. My student, Hawa, a Somali refugee, looked excited. She reached into the folds of her hijab and took out a folded piece of paper. On it were sentences written with a careful, painstaking precision; it was her handwriting.

She read me her note, speaking slowly and clearly: "Teacher, today I take the bus. Now I go to the supermarket for the food and my son stay home. He is happy. He help me with my homework. Now I read myself, I can do it." She handed me the note with a big smile. I thanked her and congratulated her on her progress, pointing out her wonderful use of some of our class vocabulary words from the past week in her note. On the inside, I was choked up and tried not to let it show. Hawa, like so many of my students at the Refugee Women's Alliance, arrived in the US without being able to read or write in any language, and had never spoken English."

I too was choked up when she told me this story. She still continues to teach English to those who come to this country with a dream to survive, raise children and to give them a better life. I feel my daughter is my hero!!!

Submitted by Anonymous

Reaching Out