Chol originally comes from the Sudan. He spent 20 months in a refugee camp in Kenya. Life was difficult in the camp. There was no opportunity to work or go to school. Chol said he spent most of his time waiting to hear when he could leave the camp and come to Canada. He has worked here in entry-level jobs such as stocking shelves and janitorial work.
Chol was late for his appointment and had difficulty finding the room. He was quiet and did what was asked of him, but asked no questions. It wasn’t until the end of the interview that he finally demonstrated his oral skills. He wrote his paragraph on the weather in Africa. He became quite animated as he talked about the heat, the wind and the shifting sand. Chol worked on his father’s farm with camels, goats and cows. Only at this point did he make eye contact and seem more comfortable.
He has been in Canada for five years and had three or four months of ESL in British Columbia. In his own country he went to school in Arabic until Grade 7. He also speaks his own tribal language. This is an oral culture and there is no written version of this language. As part of the coming of age ceremony in his tribe, his four bottom front teeth were extracted. This makes it more difficult for Chol to pronounce certain letter and sound combinations in English.
The sight word portion of the test was well done and he was able to read words in the Grade six range. However, when asked for the meaning of some of these sight words, he was at a loss. This lack of vocabulary meant that he really struggled with the comprehension portion of the assessment. Interpretive questions were also very hard to answer. He had some idea of what was being asked but couldn’t get to the kernel, essential for understanding. His instructional level was Grade 2/3. Learner Profile B: Chol Thung
The interesting anomaly is that he is a very good decoder but has little sense of the sounds in English. This is especially true of vowel sounds and consonant endings. On the Schonell spelling placement test, his score on the first column was two out of 10 for three-letter words such as net, lid and cap. Chol was then able to go on and spell 10 out of 10 on the third column, which contained more common sight words like tree, when and egg.
Observations
Reading
Writing
McCullough, C. (n.d.). Learner profiles: Pat, Chol Thung, Jill and Kevin. Calgary, Alberta: Bow Valley College. Training material. Used with permission.