Meeting the Needs of ELL and Non-ELL Students

Meeting the needs of students whose primary language is not English can be challenging.  To encourage the students’ mastery of English, as well as content, classroom teachers should address the language domains of reading, writing, speaking, and listening.  By giving students opportunities to use language in these ways, English language learners (ELLs) will become more competent in English while developing content knowledge.

During a sheltered English instruction course, I was exposed to a variety of strategies.  Some of the strategies jumped out as me as having a big bang for the buck for both ELL students and others.

Partner Reading

I was first exposed to partner reading through Larry Ferlazzo (http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/).  Simply, students read aloud in pairs.  They alternate reading paragraphs and can do a variety of things to process the information after each paragraph, all involving discussion:  one sentence summary, circle key terms, draw the main point, question the paragraph makes you think about, etc.

This process slows the students down and makes them think more deeply about what they are reading.  All the students have multiple opportunities to manipulate the information.  I continually go back to this strategy, as it benefits each student.  In addition, if the reading were assigned for home, a percentage of students, especially those who struggle with reading, would not engage.  This strategy makes a difficult task far more engaging and productive.

Vocabulary/Idea Carousel

This strategy proved great as both a review and a prewriting activity.  Students are put into groups of four to five with one sheet of paper.  They are given a focus and need to write one thing associated with it before passing it to the next person in the group who would then add another item.  The paper keeps going around the group for a minute.  When a minute is up, each group shares their list to the class.  They are given a few minutes to review their materials: reading, notes, handouts, etc.  They then follow the procedure for another minute but cannot repeat anything their group wrote in the first round.

The students are exposed to a variety of ideas while reviewing or  prior to writing.  Instead of having students brainstorm individually, this collective means of brainstorming, complete with the sharing aloud, exposes students to far more ideas.  Students often stumble out of the gate trying to come up with ideas about which to write.  Instead, this strategy allows the student to start strong with a ready made list of key ideas and vocabulary which they can use to focus their writing. It also broadens their understanding as they review information.

Write Around

Students sometimes balk at writing.  The write around gets them to write in a more social setting and allows them to review ideas as they write.  The students each start with a piece of paper and a prompt or sentence starter.  They each write a sentence on the paper they have and, when done, pass it to the person to their right.  They then read what is written on the paper and add another sentence to the new paper.  They keep reading, writing a new sentence, and passing the paper to the right until the teacher asks them to stop.

Content is continually reread and the task of writing does not seem as daunting (compare it to asking the students to write a summary on a topic by themselves).  By blending the writing talents of several writers, there is exposure to a variety of understanding.  Write around has been a both a great review and writing activity.

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These three strategies are highly engaging for all students.  They also engage the ELL student in reading, writing, listening, and speaking while offering enriching opportunities to gain mastery of content.
  If you have any positive experiences with these strategies or others, please leave a comment. I would love to hear about them.

Every Day for a Year (Almost): A Lesson in Perseverance

With the start of a new year, I rarely look to resolutions and areas of improvement.  I try to do that on more of a daily basis, starting every day with the notion of improvement, large and small, from the previous day.  When I stumbled upon the idea of a 365 project, however, January 1st seemed the natural starting point.

I also decided I would challenge my students to complete a 365 project with the promise that in a year’s time we could meet as a group to share what we accomplished.

I don’t recall where I first heard of the 365 idea, but, upon investigation, I did come across the 365Project website, so I directed the students there to get a flavor of what a 365 challenge could be like.  Although the website focuses on taking photographs, I encouraged students to think of other things they could do instead.  They could make note of what they did (since they had not photo evidence) and could then share.  We discussed challenges, amongst others, such as the following:

• a random act of kindness each day
• saying “hello” to someone new each day
• listening to a new song each day
• choosing a theme for photographs: trees, breakfast, whatever is behind you at a certain time of day

To encourage them, I tried to put students at ease, noting that it would be okay if it didn’t happen every day, that sometimes life may get in the way.  I also pointed out that 365 was a goal, and if they came up short in other ways, then that was okay, too.  Another wonderful thing about a 365 challenge, I relayed to the students, is that they could start one on any day, not just January 1st.  (I encouraged students again after the first with this tactic and again a few weeks later.)  When the year was up, we could share, as much or as little as we accomplished, our success or our failures.

Twenty-six students said that they were going to to a 365 project.

Did any actually followed through on this difficult task?   (I believe I recall one student mentioning she had been taking pictures of her breakfast.)  I will touch base with those students who said they wanted to attempt the challenge and call them together to share.

I’m interested to see what any of them have accomplished.

As for myself, I have come to value the 365 challenge, and upon recent reflection, want to challenge my new students to throw their hats into the ring.  A 365 project is really one about perseverance, as it is easy not to follow through.  It was difficult to complete my task every day, especially without feeling or being repetitive. There is great satisfaction in the accomplishment.  It has been a very positive experience for myself, and I am quite impressed with some of the photos I took for my challenge.  These characteristics make the task one students should partake in, as they can then provide another model for themselves of working through a difficult task, achieving a goal, having a positive experience, and, perhaps, even inspiring others.  

My 365 project from 2014 was to take photographs of whatever was above: UP.  Some photos come from a perspective that I could not (or generally would not) physically get into.  There is one photograph that was not taken of what was above - it was of the clouds in an airplane, so I felt it qualified.  Although I did not meet my goal of a photo a day or 365 photos, I am pleased, especially with some of the more intriguing perspectives.

Below you will find the photos that complete my challenge for 2014.  Now, I need to figure out what to do for 2015.  I challenge you to throw your hat into the ring as well.  Good luck!

If you have ever completed a 365 project challenge, I would love to hear about it.  Please share in the comments.