Mother Tongue

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

How well do you believe the PSAT, SAT, PreACT, ACT, or other standardized tests represent students’ skills in math or English? What assessment might give a better representation of skills?

Teaching Suggestion: Conduct an anonymous class survey by providing paper ballots to students, with no name required. On the ballot, list the four tests plus “other” and ask students to check the tests they have taken. Then, provide SAT and ACT score ranges and ask students to check the score range into which they fell on one or both tests. Collect the ballots, then tally and display the results. Reference these results during the discussion.

• “Bless the Tests: Three Reasons for Standardized Testing” by Aaron Churchill discusses the purposes of standardized testing.
• “Pro and Con: Standardized Tests” considers the practice of such testing.

Short Activity

In “Mother Tongue,” Tan discusses the difficulty Asian students often have with standardized language-based assessment items. She mentions, in particular, the infamous SAT word analogies. She elaborates that students from varied cultures may think about language differently, which clouds the idea of a “right” answer.

Individually, in a pair, or in a small group, solve the following language analogy. If working in a pair or group, listen to all viewpoints regarding the word relationships and reach a group consensus about the answer. Be prepared to share your thinking about word relationships with the class. How difficult was reaching a consensus (or answer), and why? After your teacher reveals the correct answer, discuss your accuracy—how were you able to determine the correct answer, or what stood between you and the right answer?

Oat is to raisin as

A) Apple is to cider

B) Bark is to leaf

C) Smooth is to wrinkled

D) Acorn is to squirrel

E) Flour is to ale

Teaching Suggestion: Ask volunteers to share responses and explain their thinking. (The answer is E. Based on a real sample SAT item, the answer is E because there is no relationship. This item represents a kind of “trick” questioning and should breed divergent thinking, reinforcing Tan’s point.)

• “The Racist Beginnings of Standardized Testing” by John Rosales and Tim Walker discusses systemic racism in education.
• “A Civil Rights Challenge to Standardized Testing in College Admissions” published in the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review discusses the movement against standardized testing.

Differentiation Suggestion: For visual students, it may be helpful to present the analogy in images in addition to words.

Personal Connection Prompt

This prompt can be used for in-class discussion, exploratory free-writing, or reflection homework before reading the essay.

Read the following text. Then, write a paraphrase.

“The river east side, he belong to that side local people. That man want to ask Du Zong father take him in like become own family. Du Zong father wasn’t look down on him, but didn’t take seriously, until that man big like become a mafia.” —from “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan

Now, discuss your experience with the original text. How much difficulty, if any, did you have in understanding the text? If the purpose of language is communication, how well does this text communicate its message? Considering the theme Perfect or Broken English, is it fair to call this text “broken” or “fractured”? Why or why not?

Teaching Suggestion: Suggest that students read the original text aloud two to three times before paraphrasing.

• “Broken English: Definitions and Examples” by Richard Nordquist discusses the implications of this label.

Differentiation Suggestion: For auditory learners, it may be beneficial to conduct the activity verbally by reading aloud one sentence at a time and then asking the student to paraphrase.