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Know Your Terms: Code Switching | Cult of Pedagogy

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Know Your Terms: Code Switching | Cult of Pedagogy

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(noun) the practice of changing one's language, dialect or speaking style to better fit one's environment.

When you talk to your closest friends, you probably sound a little different than you do when you talk to your boss. You have learned that in order to communicate effectively, you need to code switch to fit different audiences. Here are some other examples:

* People who speak two languages often code switch right in the middle of a sentence, popping in a few words from their first language for a variety of reasons: Limited vocabulary in the second language may be one, but more often, the switch happens as a way of signaling membership in a group.

* Many people who speak in nonstandard or dialectical English with family and friends - such as African-American Vernacular English (AAVE, the preferred term for what some refer to as "Ebonics") or Southern American English - may have learned to code-switch to a more standard form of English in formal or academic settings.

* Barack Obama has been criticized for speaking with a more pronounced dialect when he talks to all-black audiences, but a closer look at his and other politicians' speaking styles shows a pattern of code switching with variety of audiences.

Teachers should know that when they want to teach students how to use standard English, correcting non-standard English has been found to be ineffective. In other words, treating the features of nonstandard dialects as if they are "errors" does not necessarily result in that student regularly speaking or writing in standard English.

Why? Because most of these dialects have their own consistent grammatical rules, and students who speak in these dialects are following those rules. To be told their language use is incorrect makes no logical sense: They are correctly using the features of another language.

This does not mean teachers should ignore non-standard English in their classrooms. It means there are more effective ways to teach academically appropriate language. In their book, Code-Switching Lessons: Grammar Strategies for Linguistically Diverse Writers, Rebecca Wheeler and Rachel Swords summarize the research behind this. Instead of correcting these other kinds of dialects as wrong, we need to be teaching students about when they are appropriate and when other "languages" would work better.

A two-part strategy has been found to be more effective than "correcting" the nonstandard language: First, contrast analysis lessons have students compare the features of their community English to parallel features in formal English. This process is a more linguistic approach, similar to what would happen in a foreign language classroom. Once students develop the ability to recognize the differences between their home dialect and formal English, they can then practice code switching - using the appropriate language in the appropriate context at the appropriate time. Instead of looking at one language form as "correct" and another as "incorrect," these lessons address the differences in terms of what is going to be most effective in which context.

In Other Words: Lessons on Grammar, Code-Switching, and Academic Writing (2009) by David W. Brown

Although I have not yet read it, this book looks like a good one on the subject, because it contains specific code switching lessons, and its approach is in line with the research on the most effective way to address language diversity. Offering 35 "detailed, practical, and sensitive lessons using examples drawn from commonly taught literature and from popular culture," the book will help you show students how and when to code switch, with a focus on academic language. Reproducible student handouts are included.

Launched in April 2013, this blog is written by a team of people "fascinated by the overlapping themes of race, ethnicity and culture, how these things play out in our lives, and how all of this is shifting." The blog is updated daily, and discusses topics that include but are not limited to code switching. In this 2013 article, Eric Deggans describes his own experience coming to terms with code switching.

In this interview, educator Lisa Delpit advocates for empowering children from low-income communities by arming them with the tools to thrive in academic environments. She talks about the way many teachers view students whose "first language" is nonstandard: "The problem is that it's not viewed as intelligent but as evidence of deprivation," she says. "It should be looked at as the intelligence of a child learning from his or her environment in the same way a child from a college-educated family would." ♦

Know Your Terms is my effort to build a user-friendly knowledge base of terms every educator should know. New items will be added on an ongoing basis. If you heard some term at a PD and didn't want to admit that you didn't know what it meant, send it to me via the contact form and I'll research it for you.

Wheeler, R. & Swords, R. (2010). Code-switching lessons: Grammar strategies for linguistically diverse writers. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

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(noun) the practice of changing one's language, dialect or speaking style to better fit one's environment. When you talk to your closest friends, you probably sound a little different than you do when you talk to your boss. You have learned that in order to communicate effectively, you need to code switch to fit different audiences.

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Dos & Don’ts for Teaching English Language Learners | Edutopia

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Dos & Don’ts for Teaching English Language Learners | Edutopia

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Edutopia is a free source of information, inspiration, and practical strategies for learning and teaching in preK-12 education. We are published by the George Lucas Educational Foundation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization.

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A Collection Of My Best Resources On Teaching English Language Learners | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

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A Collection Of My Best Resources On Teaching English Language Learners | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

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I have an insane amount of resources on this blog related to teaching English Language Learners.

I thought readers might find it useful if I put together a collection - in one post - of the materials I have either written or brought together (I'll be posting a similar collections on student motivation and another one on parent engagement, two of the other topics I've written about a lot)

Here goes:

I'll have to start with All My NY Times Posts For English Language Learners - Linked With Descriptions. I've written nearly one-hundred posts for The New York Times Learning Network over the past few years, and practically all of them have focused on teaching English Language Learners.

I've written nearly thirty posts for the British Council, the largest organization promoting English-language teaching and learning around the world, and you can see a list of them - with links - here.

I've authored or co-authored three books on teaching English Language Learners, and a fourth one will be published next April. There are a zillion free resources from them, including student hand-outs and lesson plans. Clicking on each of the book's titles will lead you to all of those freebies:

The ELL Teacher's Toolbox: Hundreds of Practical Ideas to Support Your Students is the one being published in April. There are only a few resources there now, but that will change as we get closer to that date.
Navigating The Common Core With English Language Learners The ESL/ELL Teacher's Survival Guide: Ready-to-Use Strategies, Tools, and Activities for Teaching English Language Learners of All Levels English Language Learners: Teaching Strategies That Work
Here are some articles I've authored or co-authored about teaching ELLs (several are book excerpts). They've appeared in various publications, including The Washington Post, Edutopia, Education Week and ASCD Education Leadership:

I've published many columns in my Education Week Teacher "teacher advice" column on Teaching English Language Learners.

Eight-minute radio shows accompany most of the Ed Week columns. You can find the ELL-related ones at All My BAM! Radio Shows About English Language Learners.

Here are a few of the many ELL-related "Best" lists I've published (I think these are the most key ones):
The "All-Time" Best Resources On English Language Learners & The Common Core The "All-Time" Best Resources, Articles & Blog Posts For Teachers Of English Language Learners "All-Time" Best Web Tools For English Language Learners The "All-Time" Best 2.0 Tools For Beginning English Language Learners The Best Videos For Content Teachers With ELLs In Their Classes - Please Suggest More The Best Advice To Content Teachers About Supporting English Language Learners The Best Three Sites On The Web For ESL/EFL/ELL/ELT Teachers "Ways A Mainstream Teacher Can Support An ELL Newcomer In Class"

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A Collection Of My Best Resources On Teaching English Language Learners

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I have an insane amount of resources on this blog related to teaching English Language Learners.

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Enriching Academic Vocabulary: Strategies for Teaching Tier Two Words to E.L.L. Students - The New York Times

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Enriching Academic Vocabulary: Strategies for Teaching Tier Two Words to E.L.L. Students - The New York Times

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This is why, when I'm working with English language learners, I mainly focus on this tier. There is simply more bang for your teaching buck: Learning these words will make more texts accessible to your students.

To start, you can find many lists of such words online, from this one by the Smarter Balanced test consortium to this one from Flocabulary to this one collected by the author Jim Burke.
Steps For Teaching Academic Vocabulary
Many teachers know Robert Marzano's Six Steps to Better Vocabulary Instruction, and I use them regularly in my own classroom. Here are how I modify the steps:

First, I pronounce the word, and usually write it on the board or overhead as well. Mr. Marzano doesn't explicitly point out the act of pronunciation in the six-step process. However, it is a crucial step for E.L.L.s.

Then, I describe the word using various examples, sometimes with an image, sometimes using it in different sentences, or, often, both.

Next, students actively process the word through writing their own definitions (in English or in a home language) and drawing their own images. They can use an online dictionary for ideas, but need to be reminded not to copy a definition word-for-word. Of course, this takes teacher modeling and student practice. I also encourage students to use the word in an original sentence. Here is a sample activity sheet (PDF) so students can follow this sequence.

I try to complete these first three steps on the same day that new vocabulary is introduced.

I then take on the last three activities - reinforcing exercises, student discussions and games - over the next several days and beyond.

It's clear that multiple exposures to new words in different contexts (or, the Principal of Re-contextualization and the Principle of Multiple Encounters) is critical, though there is not universal agreement about the exact number of repetitions needed before the word is fully learned. Some researchers suggest eight to 10 times in different contexts will do the trick.

It's important to look at these six steps as a compass and not as a road map. In other words, keep them in mind, but don't apply them dogmatically in every instance.

_________

Practical ideas for teaching tier two words found in The Times and other texts

Word Sift is also a tool specifically designed to help teachers, especially those with E.L.L. students, "manage the demands of vocabulary and academic language in their text materials" by identifying key words to teach in any text.

Teachers might try putting the text of a Times article into the tool to quickly surface words to teach. You can use the functions to sort the words alphabetically, by how common or rare they are, and by their appearance on various word lists, including an Academic Word List.

One other way to use this tool that might make a fun challenge for students: Create a graphic, like the one in the image above, of the first several paragraphs of an article you're about to read, and invite students to guess what that article will be about.

What would your students guess about the graphic we've created from this 2017 article? How did they make those guesses?

Teacher-Created Word Charts
A Word Chart is a simple graphic organizer used to pre-teach the key vocabulary words that students will encounter in a text or genre.

The teacher identifies 10 or so key words and either provides a copy of a Word Chart graphic organizer with the words already printed or with blank spaces for students to write them.

Here, for example, is the Word Chart I used with my E.L.L. geography class when we read the first four sections of The Times' article, " Climate Change Is Complex: We've Got Answers To Your Questions. "

Using some of the steps I outlined in the Marzano method above along with this activity sheet, you can pronounce two or three words at a time and then give students several minutes to access any prior knowledge and look up the meanings online. Students can then write the definition in their home language and in English (in their own words, of course, not copied from the dictionary).

Next, students share with a partner and make any needed revisions. Finally, the entire class reviews those words with the teacher calling on students to share what they wrote and drew. That process is then repeated until all the words are reviewed.

This all culminates, of course, in the class reading the text - everyone together, in pairs, or individually. You may choose to ask students to circle the targeted words as they go.

For homework, you might divide up the words and ask each student to make a small poster for one of them that you can tape onto an Interactive Word Wall.
Student-Created Word Charts
Students can also create their own versions of Word Charts when reading a text and then identify and define words that are new to them.

For instance, I wanted my students to read a recent Op-Ed in The Times called "What Is America To Me?" It is written by a woman who volunteers to help English language learners at a local public school. My class and I were reading this text as part of a series of activities done to deal with the stress of news about the Trump Administration's latest crackdown on immigration. It was not part of a "close reading" exercise in which the emphasis would have been on reading and rereading the text; my intent was simply to share the information with them.

To make it more accessible to them, I modified it in various ways. Here is my version of the article, and, at the end of the document, a list of the changes I made and why I made them.

First, students numbered the paragraphs and defined new words using this "Identifying Words While Reading" chart, which asks them to write definitions in English and in their home language, then draw an image.

Next, students read the article on their own, completing portions of the chart as they went. They took a break every seven minutes or so to teach their classmates what they learned and share summaries of each paragraph.

Afterward, of course, we discussed the message of the article, and what it made them think and feel. Here is how the piece ends - a paragraph I didn't modify at all:

School's out for summer now, but I can't stop thinking about all those brand-new Americans recalling the countries of their birth, using the poetry of their new language to convey the beauty of home. English is a problematic language, but these students are working hard to learn it - and working harder still to belong.

Word Webs
Words Webs are also known as Semantic Mapping and Word Mapping, but all of these describe graphic organizers that in some way visualize connections between words and help students understand them. Teachers can use them in endless ways, as this Learning Network lesson plan, or a Google image search, will show. They typically have one word or concept in the middle ("Climate Change" or "American Dream") words and phrases branching off.

I keep our Word Webs simple, and generally use them in preparation for a writing assignment. For instance, I might use a version to help students identify words that fit under the five senses.

Or, I'll identify an important word that would be key to a text they are reading and which they will be writing about. For example, I focused on the word "protest" before reading The Times article, High School Students on Why They Protest Anthems And Pledges, and had students identify synonyms in a Word Web.

One way to help students visualize this is to show them the first two images in this Times slide show about the work of artist Mel Bochner and the "Secret Power of Synonyms," then ask them to create their own versions.

Easy online tools that students can use for this activity include Lexipedia, Visuwords, Snappy Words (my personal favorite because of its clean interface) and Graph Words.
Student-Created Videos A video made by one of my students as we were learning about writing Problem-Solution essays.
Having students create 15-second videos defining words can be another vocabulary-reinforcing activity and a lot of fun.

The Learning Network has an annual contest where students can submit their clips. You might choose some of the work of recent winners to show your students. For example, here is dexterous:

I've been doing this activity with my E.L.L. students for years, primarily using Instagram because of its easy "stop action" feature. They accompany their narration with a series of colorful sheets first showing the word then their own definition, followed by a sentence using the word, then a cartoon illustrating the sentence and ending with the word again.
Teacher or Student-Created Cloze Exercises
Clozes, also known as "fill-in-the-blanks" or "gap-fills," are relatively short texts with key words removed so students must use context clues.

Clozes can be excellent tools to help students enhance their vocabulary and develop metacognitive skills, especially if they are challenged to explain the "clues" in the text that assisted them in choosing the correct answer. I often model this by explaining that clues can come either before or after the blank, then circling a clue word and drawing an arrow to the word I write on the blank line.

There are many different kinds of clozes, including ones that have "word banks" that students can use in completing the gaps. You can find many specifically created for E.L.L.s that have previously appeared at The Learning Network, like this one for Valentine's Day.

Here are some instructions for how you, or your students, can create your own.
Vocabulary-Learning Strategies Outside the Classroom
What can students do when they come across new words and there's no teacher around to help? My students brainstormed a list, which now both hangs in the front of our class and is in their notebooks.
Ask classmates for help. Remember what has helped me in the past. After I'm done, double-check my work. Use Google Translate or a dictionary. Highlight or underline important words in a text. When I don't understand a word, I can use context clues, do a word analysis (prefix, root, suffix), and think if it's a cognate (similar to words in other languages). After I've finished an activity, take a minute to think about what things I did that helped me. Ask my teachers questions to clarify or confirm my thinking and not just to get the answer. (Does it look like I'm on the right track? I think this word means __________________-is that right?) In-Depth Investigations Into Individual Words
The Learning Network's Word of the Day feature focuses on Tier Two words, and each entry includes a definition, an example of recent usage, and a quiz to test understanding. Above, for example, you can see a screenshot of the quiz for the word tantrum. Though these words are difficult for E.L.L.s, if students are adopting individual words, perhaps for a Word Wall, this is one way to "get to know" the word in depth.

The Learning Network post 12 Ways To Learn Vocabulary With The New York Times offers many more ideas. But here is one recommendation specifically for exploring individual Tier Two words:

Few American high school students missed the news that the SAT will no longer test "obscure" words. Instead, it will test "high utility" words that appear in many contexts, in many disciplines, and with shifting meanings - the so-called Tier Two words.

The Times is just the place to find those words in the wild.

Take the word "intense," for example, and have a look at the variety of ways it shows up in Times headlines.

The word can mean "strong or extreme," as it does in the context of the intense heat of hot yoga or the intensity of youth sports, but it can also be used to mean "concentrated," as it is in the Real Estate section to describe the "intense influx of housing in Honolulu" or in a Times recipe for a particularly rich chocolate mousse cake. Meanwhile, this article by Daniel Goleman concerns intensity as "exhibiting strong feeling."

Key any word you're learning into the Times search field to explore the nuances of its meaning in different contexts.

And though words like "obsequious" may have been deemed too obscure for the new test, they remain worth learning in order to navigate the complexity of college-level texts and to communicate ideas clearly, as this essay illustrates.

What individual words would your students choose to learn more about? What will they discover?

_________

How do you teach Tier Two vocabulary to your students, whether they are English language learners or not? Tell us in the comments.

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Enriching Academic Vocabulary: Strategies for Teaching Tier Two Words to E.L.L. Students

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This is why, when I'm working with English language learners, I mainly focus on this tier. There is simply more bang for your teaching buck: Learning these words will make more texts accessible to your students.