ESOL Platform
Over this past year, I have learned about a variety of different resources and ways to accommodate to maximize the learning experience for an English Language Learners in my classroom. Through my instructional courses, as well as my field experience I have gained so much knowledge when it comes to assisting and accommodating for ELL students in my classroom.
In my ESOL class, I put together a resource book for myself to look back on when I become a classroom teacher. These resources will be great when it comes to helping ELL students learn in my classroom.
My Resource Book:
Assessments
Cloze Activity- A close activity is a technique in which words are deleted from a passage, which is then presented to students, who insert words as they read to complete and construct meaning from the text. For ELL students, I would put a word box on the top of the worksheet. This activity can be used to assess student's knowledge of the reading process or it can also be used to assess an ELL student's vocabulary and knowledge of a subject. This activity will encourage ELL students to monitor for meaning while reading and encourages them to think critically about the text.
VRT- A VRT (Vocabulary Recognition Task) is a great strategy to assess classroom vocabulary for content area. This task is teacher-constructed and is a yes-no task used to estimate vocabulary recognition in a content area. The purpose of a VRT is to identify content-related words that students can both read and associate with a unit of study. This strategy is a great way to assess ESL/ESOL students with their vocabulary of a unit that has been taught.
Leveled Questions- Leveled questions would be a strategy to assess if a student is understanding what is being taught. Leveled questions are used when teachers adapt the way they ask questions to that students can respond to them according to their language acquisition stage. This strategy can only be used effectively when the teacher knows the adjust the question to the student's level of English acquisition and provides enough context in the question so that the student can respond. Once the teacher has done her part, he or she will be able to assess the student's progress and understanding.
Choice Boards- Choice boards are a great alternative assessment for ELL students because they are allowed to choose how they will learn a concept. Choice boards are a great way for ELL students to make decisions about what they will do in order to meet class requirements. Choice boards were developed to meet the multiple needs of today's learners. Choice boards allow ELL students to choose how they feel most comfortable showing they understand the lesson. ELL students won't feel that this is an assessment and will have fun with showing what they have learned.
ACT Website- This website is great for teachers learning to administering tests to ESL (English as a second language) students. This website gives examples of level 1, level 2, level 3, and level 4 type questions. Teachers will benefit from this website because they will learn what each level of questions should include. For example, level 1 questions need a picture along with them and for level 3 questions ESL students should be able to recognize the main idea, locate explicit details, and be able to infer meanings of words.
Spelling Test- When giving spelling tests to ESL/ELL students I would use spelling words in a sentence or a story so that limited English speaking students will have a context for the words and ultimately more meaning will lead to more retention.
Learning Logs- Learning logs are a great tool to use when assessing language learner's understanding of a text. Learning logs are valuable because they engage ESOL students in the process of negotiating knowledge and increasing their understanding of the text. The logs also provide an excellent source of information for ongoing or summary review of material. After a student has completed their learning log, it's important for the teacher to address the issues, questions, or difficulties that students have noted in their logs. Learning logs allow teachers to assess where ESOL students may be struggling in the text and which parts they are understanding.
Content-Area
Brain Pop- Brain Pop is an online resource that is great for ELL students because it provides games, activities, information, and videos on subjects such as science, social studies, english, math, engineering & tech, health, and arts & music. Brain Pop uses animated movies, quizzes, and supplemental information to help ELL students grasp almost any subject they are struggling with or just want to learn more about. I would love to use this site in my future classroom for any of my ELL students who seem to be struggling in certain content-areas. This site has great short, animated movies that get educational lessons across to English Language Learners. The site is extremely animated, has fun characters, and students will have fun while learning.
Concept Map- Concept Maps would be a great tool for teachers with ELL students in their classroom. When ELL students are in your class, instead of presenting a concept map to the class and seeing how much they know about the subject, the concept maps could be passed out individually to each student to see how much he or she knows about the subject that is going to be taught. They could be used as a form of assessment, but in my classroom, I would use them to better my knowledge as the teacher to see how familiar my students are with the content-area we are about to discuss.
Realia- Realia is a great strategy to use for ELL students because realia means using real items found in the world around us to help teach English. Using realia makes lessons memorable and ELL students will be able to create a link between the objects and the word or phrase they show. Realia allows students to use their senses. ELL students can touch, smell, and with a food item, taste it. Realia saves time, as recognition of an object is often immediate and is not limited to only food. Realia can be tickets, newspapers, clothes, and all these things provide visuals and will peak the students interest.
Charts and Graphs- Charts and graphs are a great resource to use in the classroom to teach any subject. By drawing out a chart or graph, it gives students a visual and can communicate concepts with minimal use of spoken and written language. The layout of these visual aids should be clear and uncluttered. This example is a chart for the subject of science. As you can see in my example, by drawing out the seed and labeling each part, ELL students will understand what each part looks like and have a visual for themselves.
Literacy Development- In our textbook titled, The Cross-cultural, Language, and Academic Development Handbook, it has several strategies to support English language learners. On page 86, there is a chart that provides examples of reading and writing activities that have been found to help ELL students. This chart will help support English language learners in their literacy development.
Reading Response Journal- This reading response journal is a great resource for ELL students to record their thinking while they are reading. The front side would be a great reading response journal for level 1 ELL students because they just tell of their favorite parts and get to draw pictures. On the back would be a reading response journal for level 3 or 4 ELL students. This is a great tool for upper level ELL students to track their thinking of what is going on in the beginning, the middle, and at the end of the story. Overall this reading response journal would allow ELL students
Discovery Kids- Discovery Kids is a great website for English language learners to go because can teach them about animals, science, space, machines, and more. This website is interactive and has puzzles, games, quizzes, and activities that will be educationally fun for children learning English. ELL students will have fun playing all the games, but learning as they go.
Parent/Community Involvement
Alpha Box- Every night for homework, I will ask my students to read for 30 minutes. I want my student's parents to become involved by helping their child out with his or her homework each night. While the child is reading each night, I would love for them to fill out their alpha box. An alpha box is strategy to help ELL students write down words they don't know the definition to or how to pronounce and later on, they should look up the word. An alpha box becomes a students own personal word wall and will help ELL students increase their vocabulary. This activity could be used each night during reading and parent could go through their child's alpha box and help them learn any new and unfamiliar words they had put in their alpha box.
Fall Festival- This Fall Festival flyer was sent home with students which allows families to take part in community involvement. The flyer is two-sided, one side being English and the other side being Spanish for ELL students and families. This event put together by Mort Elementary is a great way for community and parent involvement within the school. The event includes cake walks, games, health screenings, food and drinks, and chances to win prize baskets. This event also has community resources, bounce houses, and is great for ELL students and families to come enjoy some fun and become involved in the community.
Oxford Picture Dictionary- The New Oxford Picture Dictionary is a great resource for students trying to learn English as well as parents. This book is a great tool to have at home because this dictionary is not your ordinary dictionary. It helps students connect the words and pictures together and build up their vocabulary while they are not in school. Parents could teach their child with this book about any word that they are struggling with in English.
Parent Flyer- This flyer was handed out to parents at the elementary school I'm interning at. Not only was there at English flyer, but a Spanish flyer as well for ELL students and parents. Many ELL parents don't how they can get involved because they don't speak the native language or don't have the resources. With flyers like this, ELL parents now are aware of why they should get involved, how they can get involved, and how their child will benefit from their actions.
Addressing Issues- It can be hard to increase parental involvement and there can be many issues, but our book states the five main issues that schools have trouble with when it comes to involving parents. These five issues are language, family structure, educational background, knowledge about education and beliefs about learning, and power and status. This chart was developed by Ovando and Collier (1998) and it offers questions within each area that schools can use as a guide to begin to address and overcome misconceptions regarding parents and that will open dialogue for collaborations and programs.
NCPIE- According to our textbook on page 308, there is a website titled, The National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education (www.ncpie.org) and this site offers tips for involving families. One example of how this site can help ELL families is by providing links to articles such as "Working with Immigrant, Refugee Students and Families To Help Them Understand School Transportation Services" and also contains tips for helping families learn about school bus service and other issues related to transportation.
In my ESOL class, I put together a resource book for myself to look back on when I become a classroom teacher. These resources will be great when it comes to helping ELL students learn in my classroom.
My Resource Book:
Assessments
Cloze Activity- A close activity is a technique in which words are deleted from a passage, which is then presented to students, who insert words as they read to complete and construct meaning from the text. For ELL students, I would put a word box on the top of the worksheet. This activity can be used to assess student's knowledge of the reading process or it can also be used to assess an ELL student's vocabulary and knowledge of a subject. This activity will encourage ELL students to monitor for meaning while reading and encourages them to think critically about the text.
VRT- A VRT (Vocabulary Recognition Task) is a great strategy to assess classroom vocabulary for content area. This task is teacher-constructed and is a yes-no task used to estimate vocabulary recognition in a content area. The purpose of a VRT is to identify content-related words that students can both read and associate with a unit of study. This strategy is a great way to assess ESL/ESOL students with their vocabulary of a unit that has been taught.
Leveled Questions- Leveled questions would be a strategy to assess if a student is understanding what is being taught. Leveled questions are used when teachers adapt the way they ask questions to that students can respond to them according to their language acquisition stage. This strategy can only be used effectively when the teacher knows the adjust the question to the student's level of English acquisition and provides enough context in the question so that the student can respond. Once the teacher has done her part, he or she will be able to assess the student's progress and understanding.
Choice Boards- Choice boards are a great alternative assessment for ELL students because they are allowed to choose how they will learn a concept. Choice boards are a great way for ELL students to make decisions about what they will do in order to meet class requirements. Choice boards were developed to meet the multiple needs of today's learners. Choice boards allow ELL students to choose how they feel most comfortable showing they understand the lesson. ELL students won't feel that this is an assessment and will have fun with showing what they have learned.
ACT Website- This website is great for teachers learning to administering tests to ESL (English as a second language) students. This website gives examples of level 1, level 2, level 3, and level 4 type questions. Teachers will benefit from this website because they will learn what each level of questions should include. For example, level 1 questions need a picture along with them and for level 3 questions ESL students should be able to recognize the main idea, locate explicit details, and be able to infer meanings of words.
Spelling Test- When giving spelling tests to ESL/ELL students I would use spelling words in a sentence or a story so that limited English speaking students will have a context for the words and ultimately more meaning will lead to more retention.
Learning Logs- Learning logs are a great tool to use when assessing language learner's understanding of a text. Learning logs are valuable because they engage ESOL students in the process of negotiating knowledge and increasing their understanding of the text. The logs also provide an excellent source of information for ongoing or summary review of material. After a student has completed their learning log, it's important for the teacher to address the issues, questions, or difficulties that students have noted in their logs. Learning logs allow teachers to assess where ESOL students may be struggling in the text and which parts they are understanding.
Content-Area
Brain Pop- Brain Pop is an online resource that is great for ELL students because it provides games, activities, information, and videos on subjects such as science, social studies, english, math, engineering & tech, health, and arts & music. Brain Pop uses animated movies, quizzes, and supplemental information to help ELL students grasp almost any subject they are struggling with or just want to learn more about. I would love to use this site in my future classroom for any of my ELL students who seem to be struggling in certain content-areas. This site has great short, animated movies that get educational lessons across to English Language Learners. The site is extremely animated, has fun characters, and students will have fun while learning.
Concept Map- Concept Maps would be a great tool for teachers with ELL students in their classroom. When ELL students are in your class, instead of presenting a concept map to the class and seeing how much they know about the subject, the concept maps could be passed out individually to each student to see how much he or she knows about the subject that is going to be taught. They could be used as a form of assessment, but in my classroom, I would use them to better my knowledge as the teacher to see how familiar my students are with the content-area we are about to discuss.
Realia- Realia is a great strategy to use for ELL students because realia means using real items found in the world around us to help teach English. Using realia makes lessons memorable and ELL students will be able to create a link between the objects and the word or phrase they show. Realia allows students to use their senses. ELL students can touch, smell, and with a food item, taste it. Realia saves time, as recognition of an object is often immediate and is not limited to only food. Realia can be tickets, newspapers, clothes, and all these things provide visuals and will peak the students interest.
Charts and Graphs- Charts and graphs are a great resource to use in the classroom to teach any subject. By drawing out a chart or graph, it gives students a visual and can communicate concepts with minimal use of spoken and written language. The layout of these visual aids should be clear and uncluttered. This example is a chart for the subject of science. As you can see in my example, by drawing out the seed and labeling each part, ELL students will understand what each part looks like and have a visual for themselves.
Literacy Development- In our textbook titled, The Cross-cultural, Language, and Academic Development Handbook, it has several strategies to support English language learners. On page 86, there is a chart that provides examples of reading and writing activities that have been found to help ELL students. This chart will help support English language learners in their literacy development.
Reading Response Journal- This reading response journal is a great resource for ELL students to record their thinking while they are reading. The front side would be a great reading response journal for level 1 ELL students because they just tell of their favorite parts and get to draw pictures. On the back would be a reading response journal for level 3 or 4 ELL students. This is a great tool for upper level ELL students to track their thinking of what is going on in the beginning, the middle, and at the end of the story. Overall this reading response journal would allow ELL students
Discovery Kids- Discovery Kids is a great website for English language learners to go because can teach them about animals, science, space, machines, and more. This website is interactive and has puzzles, games, quizzes, and activities that will be educationally fun for children learning English. ELL students will have fun playing all the games, but learning as they go.
Parent/Community Involvement
Alpha Box- Every night for homework, I will ask my students to read for 30 minutes. I want my student's parents to become involved by helping their child out with his or her homework each night. While the child is reading each night, I would love for them to fill out their alpha box. An alpha box is strategy to help ELL students write down words they don't know the definition to or how to pronounce and later on, they should look up the word. An alpha box becomes a students own personal word wall and will help ELL students increase their vocabulary. This activity could be used each night during reading and parent could go through their child's alpha box and help them learn any new and unfamiliar words they had put in their alpha box.
Fall Festival- This Fall Festival flyer was sent home with students which allows families to take part in community involvement. The flyer is two-sided, one side being English and the other side being Spanish for ELL students and families. This event put together by Mort Elementary is a great way for community and parent involvement within the school. The event includes cake walks, games, health screenings, food and drinks, and chances to win prize baskets. This event also has community resources, bounce houses, and is great for ELL students and families to come enjoy some fun and become involved in the community.
Oxford Picture Dictionary- The New Oxford Picture Dictionary is a great resource for students trying to learn English as well as parents. This book is a great tool to have at home because this dictionary is not your ordinary dictionary. It helps students connect the words and pictures together and build up their vocabulary while they are not in school. Parents could teach their child with this book about any word that they are struggling with in English.
Parent Flyer- This flyer was handed out to parents at the elementary school I'm interning at. Not only was there at English flyer, but a Spanish flyer as well for ELL students and parents. Many ELL parents don't how they can get involved because they don't speak the native language or don't have the resources. With flyers like this, ELL parents now are aware of why they should get involved, how they can get involved, and how their child will benefit from their actions.
Addressing Issues- It can be hard to increase parental involvement and there can be many issues, but our book states the five main issues that schools have trouble with when it comes to involving parents. These five issues are language, family structure, educational background, knowledge about education and beliefs about learning, and power and status. This chart was developed by Ovando and Collier (1998) and it offers questions within each area that schools can use as a guide to begin to address and overcome misconceptions regarding parents and that will open dialogue for collaborations and programs.
NCPIE- According to our textbook on page 308, there is a website titled, The National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education (www.ncpie.org) and this site offers tips for involving families. One example of how this site can help ELL families is by providing links to articles such as "Working with Immigrant, Refugee Students and Families To Help Them Understand School Transportation Services" and also contains tips for helping families learn about school bus service and other issues related to transportation.