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Close & Reciprocal Reading w/ Metacognitive Marks Template

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Close & Reciprocal Reading w/ Metacognitive Marks Template

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Culturally Responsive Teaching-Blog by Zarretta Hammond

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Culturally Responsive Teaching-Blog by Zarretta Hammond

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This school year, I have the privilege of working shoulder to shoulder with teachers who are rolling up their sleeves and asking hard questions about how they can better serve their under-performing students who are disproportionately English learners, poor students, and students of color. They are working to incorporate culturally responsive practices into their classrooms.

I believe culturally responsive teaching (CRT) is a powerful method for accelerating student learning. But truth be told, most educators are not really sure what it is or what it looks like. For some, it seems mysterious. A number of leaders discount it because it seems too "touchy feely" or only focused on raising students' self-esteem, when they need to raise achievement levels. But CRT is so much more than that. It's the reason why I wroteCulturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. ( Brief podcast on CRT)

Two of the biggest challenges I see teachers struggle with when first embracing CRT, is understanding the role culture actually plays in instruction and how to operationalize culturally responsive practices. They worry that they have to learn 19 different cultures -- everyone's individual customs, holidays, foods, and language. This simply isn't true. Here are four other big ideas about culturally responsive teaching to keep in mind:

1. Culturally responsive teaching isn't the same as multicultural education or social justice education. Too often we use the terms culturally responsive teaching and multicultural education interchangeably, when they're different things. They are related, but only culturally responsive teaching focuses on building students' learning power. It's important to remember that CRT isn't about diversity training, but about helping students reach deeper levels of understanding.

2. Culturally responsive teaching builds students' brain power by Improving information processing skills using cultural learning tools.This isn't an aspect of CRT we talk about a lot. Instead, educators like to focus on the affective elements. Keep in mind one way that the achievement gap manifests itself is by creating dependent learners who find it hard to do critical thinking or independent learning. When we focus on using culture as a cognitive scaffold, then we're able to leverage students' neural pathways that make learning easier.

3. Culturally responsive teaching is grounded in social and cognitive neuroscience. Neuroscience is giving us new findings every day that support why culturally responsive practices work. For example, social neuroscience reminds us that relationships are the on-ramp to learning, meaning if a student doesn't feel heard or seen, then it leads to increased stress. Stress hormones like cortisol impair the brain's executive function. So in order to create a learning environment conducive to all students learning, we need to lower stress hormones by building those relationships.

4. Culturally responsive teaching requires teachers to recognize the cultural orientation we call "collectivism."Teachers are often confused about how culture plays a role in culturally responsive teaching. They think they have to mention race, ethnicity, or cultural artifacts like ethnic food, music, or literature all the time for every different group. Instead, a key starting point to making cultural responsiveness manageable is to organize instructional activities around collectivist cultural principles -- group harmony and interdependence. Vygotsky talks about this as "socio-cultural learning" and highlights that it is necessary to move students into their zone of proximal development.

Here's another important point to make: Culturally responsive teaching isn't a program or set of strategies. First and foremost, it is a mindset. That means that it's equally important to do the ongoing "inside-out" work to build your social-emotional capacity to work across social, linguistic, racial, and/or economic difference with students and their families. Too often I hear educators say that they are "color-blind" or don't understand the socio-political issues that lead to inequities in education -- like disproportionate discipline outcomes for boys of color or low achievement data for English learners, poor students, and students of color in general.

We have to make it our personal business to build our emotional stamina to address our own blind spots and biases. One of the nation's leading implicit bias scholars, Patricia Devine of the University of Wisconsin, compares implicit bias to habits that, with intention and practice, can be broken. Her research has found that three conditions need to be in place for individuals to successfully "de-bias":

1. Intention: You have to acknowledge that you harbor unconscious biases and are motivated to change.

2. Attention: You have to pay attention to your triggers and know when stereotypical responses or assumptions are activated.

3. Time: You have to make time to practice new strategies designed to "break" your automatic associations that link a negative judgment to behavior that is culturally different from yours.

"De-biasing" requires a level of metacognition. In this case, you're not thinking about your thinking, but thinking about your unconscious reacting. Remember, it isn't about getting rid of our biases, it's about rewiring our brains to not respond unconsciously to the negative dominant narratives about the learning capacity of poor students, students of color, and English learners. We have to tame our amygdala, our brain's fight or flight defense mechanism, and take advantage of neuroplasticity - our brain's ability to change itself and respond differently to emotionally charged situations, like talking about race, culture, and inequity.

At the end of professional development sessions with teachers, I usually share this quote from Atul Gawande, author of the Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right: "Better is possible. It does not take genius. It takes diligence. It takes moral clarity. It takes ingenuity. And above all, it takes a willingness to try." Operationalizing CRT may seem overwhelming, but start with something small but high leverage, and grow your comfort and skill level. We can do this!

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Culturally Responsive Teaching & The Brain

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This school year, I have the privilege of working shoulder to shoulder with teachers who are rolling up their sleeves and asking hard questions about how they can better serve their under-performing students who are disproportionately English learners, poor students, and students of color.

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Culturally Responsive Teaching -Zaretta Hammond Interviewed by Jennifer Gonzalez

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Culturally Responsive Teaching -Zaretta Hammond Interviewed by Jennifer Gonzalez

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Culturally Responsive Teaching: 4 Misconceptions | Cult of Pedagogy

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In some cases, teachers think they’re practicing culturally responsive teaching, when in fact, they’re kind of not. Zaretta Hammond helps clear things up.

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National Center for Educational Statistics

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National Center for Educational Statistics

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Our MLL students have Funds of Knowledge and need to know they are Language Brokers! Build them up by building on what they know!

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Follow Me, Lizette Roman, on Instagram and twitter!

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Rooted Linguistics: Serving Teachers of Multilingual Learners

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Home page for teachers of English Learners/Multilingual Learners

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This is a website designed to support teachers of English Learners/Multilingual Learners.

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ESOL Educator, , NYSED ENL Resource Specialist

@LIRBERN @ESBOCES

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Reading and Writing with English Language Learners

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Reading and Writing with English Language Learners

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Reading & Writing with English Learners: A Framework for K-5: A Framework for K-

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Reading & Writing with English Learners: A Framework for K-5: A Framework for K- [Gonzalez, Valentina, Miller, Melinda] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Reading & Writing with English Learners: A Framework for K-5: A Framework for K-

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The new question of the week is:
What are your suggestions for how to make social studies classes culturally responsive?
In Part One, Denise Facey, Sarah Cooper, Dennisha Murf, and Keisha Rembert "kicked" things off.

Denise, Sarah, Dennisha, and Keisha were also guests on my 10-minute BAM! Radio Show. You can also find a list of, and links to, previous shows here.

In Part Two, Don Vu, Kiera Beddes, and Stephanie Smith Budhai, Ph.D., contributed their reflections.

Today, Stephen Katzel and Ching-Ching Lin, Ed. D. wrap-up this series.

'Not a Singular Lesson'
Stephen Katzel is the author behind Win Your First Year of Teaching Middle School: Strategies and Tools for Success. He is an educator with a passion for middle school education and helping new teachers:
For decades, differing opinions have existed on how to teach social studies, with no national consistency, meaning that a child in Boston may receive an entirely different perspective from another in Boise, Idaho. Social studies has dominated the headlines educationally and politically due to parent's perceptions on the correct way to teach and implement the curriculum in the classroom.

To drown out the political banter and farcical politicians, social studies teachers must adopt a specific approach on culturally responsive teaching. Which isn't a lesson, a picture, or a reading, but a mindset. It doesn't matter if you are teaching world history, U.S. history, or any class related to social studies, your mindset that each lesson will be culturally responsive is crucial for engagement and achievement.

Adopting a mindset of cultural responsiveness will pay dividends for your students and content. Each day, social studies teachers can post "Today in History" on the board that lists historically significant events or achievements about a person or group of people. Teachers can access dozens of pre-made, culturally relevant lists online that resonate to different groups of students. The "Today in History" ideally would be related to the content you are covering in class, but if not, no problem! Highlighting accomplishments from different cultures and groups of people will make students feel supported, seen, and appreciated. In addition, teachers can use the "Today in History" as a hook to begin their lesson on the historical content covered in class that day.

Knowing the primary and secondary sources being used is critical for increasing cultural responsiveness in social studies classes. Many social studies curriculums completely exclude the perspectives of marginalized historical figures and groups. Spending class time analyzing differing perspectives and historical figures will increase cultural responsiveness and add depth to any social studies lesson due to additional voices being added to the historical content being covered in class. Next time you prepare a lesson that involves primary sources, I challenge you to add an extra source that highlights and amplifies the voice of a person or group not traditionally included in the curriculum that you teach.

Teaching social studies comes with a great deal of responsibility and trust. Making a concerted effort to include different sources and viewpoints in your daily routines and lessons will not only enrich your classroom, but also the lives of the students that you teach. Remember, being a culturally responsive teacher is not a singular lesson, it is a mindset!
Ching-Ching Lin, Ed.D. is a former social studies and ESL teacher and is currently a teacher educator in TESOL and Bilingual Education in New York City. She is a co-editor and contributing author of the following edited volumes, Internationalization in Action: Leveraging Diversity and Inclusion in Globalized Classrooms and Inclusion, Diversity, and Intercultural Dialogue in Young People's Philosophical Inquiry:

'Beyond SIOP'

ESL teachers tend to see our job in social studies or other content area classrooms as providing language support, building fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension skills in content areas. We help learners develop the skills necessary for academic success and expand their access to the general education curriculum.

Essentially, the above-mentioned classroom practices imply that students cannot meaningfully interact with the text until they have understood the distinctive text features of what they read or hear. Such views not only treat reading and writing as context-independent skills, but also reflect an oversimplified, linear view of language acquisition that often leads to missed opportunities to engage multilingual learners' complex literacy practices and agency.

In contrast, an asset-based lens would look at students positively, assessing what they bring with them as strengths and embracing these strengths. What if, instead of approaching students based upon our perceptions of their weaknesses, we purposefully position ourselves as a co-learner, questing, connecting, probing, deeply curious, focusing on students' strengths and empowering them as creators of knowledge?

Here are a few suggestions to infuse asset-based approaches into a fifth grade SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol) lesson for English-language learners about the Dust Bowl to move our goals beyond providing language support in the social studies classroom.

By connecting students to their local community, teachers can use their power of understanding, curiosity, and empathy to drive inquiry-based learning in the social studies classroom that aims to affirm students' cultural and linguistic identities.

Thanks to Stephen and Ching-Ching for contributing their thoughts!

Consider contributing a question to be answered in a future post. You can send one to me at lferlazzo@educationweek.org. When you send it in, let me know if I can use your real name if it's selected or if you'd prefer remaining anonymous and have a pseudonym in mind.
Just a reminder; you can subscribe and receive updates from this blog via email (The RSS feed for this blog, and for all EdWeek articles, has been changed by the new redesign-new ones are not yet available). And if you missed any of the highlights from the first 11 years of this blog, you can see a categorized list below.
You can also contact me on Twitter at @Larryferlazzo.

Education Week has published a collection of posts from this blog, along with new material, in an e-book form. It's titled Classroom Management Q&As: Expert Strategies for Teaching.

I am also creating a Twitter list including all contributors to this column.

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How to Adopt a Culturally Responsive Mindset (Opinion)

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Enrich your classroom-and students' lives-by including different sources and infusing meaningful interaction with the material into lessons.

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QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF W/ SIOP in MIND WHEN LESSON PLANNING

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QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF W/ SIOP in MIND WHEN LESSON PLANNING

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© 2020-2021, Brandon P. Fleming All right reserved.

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Bilingual Educator who has a informative BLOG and TPT!

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New Teacher with Great Ideas!

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University of Florida

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1.  Go to Edpuzzle.com
2. Log in/Create an account
3.  Adding  students
-Google classrom/TEAMS
-Via Code
4.  Upload/Search Videos
5.  Adding/ Editing Questions
6.  Assigning Videos to Students
7. Gradebook/Gather Data

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How many times did you almost fall asleep in class as a student? Be honest, everyone's been there at least once. Between PowerPoints and droning teachers, there are a lot of things that can go wrong in a classroom. Teachers who can keep things lively will see students who are more involved and engaged with the material, even if it's difficult. Many language teachers use Total Physical Response, or TPR for short, to keep their student's energy up.

What is Total Physical Response?

Total Physical Response is a method developed by James Asher in the 1960s. It was created with the goal of helping students learn a second language. TPR helps students learn by associating a physical action with new vocabulary.

Some benefits of TPR:

It helps students remember new phrases or words

It can be used in both large and small classes

It doesn't require much preparation (bye bye worksheets!)

It gets students excited about learning and involved in the lesson

It is effective for all age groups and abilities

TPR isn't only for the teachers though, students who are trying to learn a language on their own can benefit as well. Associating a movement with new vocabulary can help you remember it next time. TPR works by helping students understand the meaning of new words quickly. Teachers can develop TPR centered activities, or add TPR into any classroom activity they already do.

How to use Total Physical Response?

Ready to get moving? Here's a quick step by step guide for teachers using TPR for the first time.

Prepare: Decide on the vocabulary you will be teaching and think about the most effective movements to use. You can also take some time to gather any props or extra materials you will need.

Teacher Modelling: Show the students the movement and say the vocabulary word. Be sure to do this a few times so everyone understands what you're doing.

Student Modelling: Now it's time to get your students involved. Choose a few and have them mimic the action and say the vocabulary word. This will help the rest of the class understand what you need them to do in the next step.

Student Participation: To ensure everyone understands, have the entire class model the movement and say the word together. This will get everyone on the same page. It will also help relieve some of the self-consciousness your students may feel saying a new word or doing a funny action.

Write it Down: Write the word down on the board, or whatever you are using to show your students new vocabulary. Not doing this earlier helps students focus on the sounds in the word and your actions, rather than the spelling of it. Writing it down for them at this point in the process helps students connect the sound with a written word.

Repetition and Practice: Continue teaching the rest of your vocabulary in a similar manner. At the end, be sure to review all the new words and movements with the class.

Total Physical Response Activities

Group Singing

Everyone loves a good song right? This is an especially great tool for younger learners, as singing together is a fun and exciting activity for them. Adult learners may not get as much of a kick out of this.

A great example of group singing with total physical response is the grade school classic, "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes". This song is not only fun to sing but incorporates movements that students can remember even if they can't quite get all the words. This helps them remember the words more accurately after practice, and reinforces their meaning.

Simple Simon Says

This is a great game because your students likely already know it in some capacity. Simon says to do something, you do it. Teachers in large classrooms typically have all of the students stand up to start. Throughout the game, students sit down if they miss a question, answer incorrectly, or answer when they are not supposed to. This is useful for reviewing vocabulary from previous lessons or at the end of a complicated lesson.

For example, you've just taught a lesson on the face (eyes, ears, nose, mouth, etc.) and you want to make sure your students understand. You can stand at the front of the class and play "Simon says..." "touch your eyes", "touch your ears", "touch your mouth".

This game is perfect for all levels, as even students who do not initially understand the game can catch on quickly. It can also be used for more advanced vocabulary and can be done at any pace to test quick understanding.

Charades

Charades is a helpful game for any learner, not just for language learning. Charades involves a student getting up and performing for the rest of the class. They are told a vocabulary word or action that the rest of the class needs to say, and then it's their job to get that answer from the class. This helps test the student performers ability as well as the ability of the class.

You can also let your students get a little competitive by dividing them into teams. Teams alternate turns, so they can't guess off of the other performer's actions. This helps get your students more involved in the game, as everyone likes a little competition.

You can do this game with or without preparation, making it a great cool down activity or quick review game. If you want to prepare, write down your vocabulary (this works best with verbs) and put them on pieces of paper in a jar for your students to pull from. If you're winging it, tell only the student that is performing which action they need to do.

Pantomime Actions

Have some extra props lying around? Get your students interacting with them by using this pantomiming activity. Here's how it works- think of a series of actions you can do with your props, then get your students to mimic the actions. Use simple sentences for each action, so your students can practice extended speaking.

For our example, we'll use a grocery store scenario-
"Get a basket" "Pick up an apple" "Look at the apple" "Put the apple in the basket"
This can be extended indefinitely depending on your props and subject matter. This is a great way to get students practicing speaking and performing TPR at the same time. For large classes, you may want to set up a few different stations so no one gets bored watching or doing the same thing.

Storytelling sessions

Stories are a great way to put vocabulary in context and get your students to have a better understanding of what goes on in class. Adding TPR to your story makes it easy for students who may not have understood the vocabulary the first time around. Plus, it makes it more engaging.

Choose a story about something that can involve your vocabulary words more than once. For example: If your class has just learned about the five senses, you can tell a story about Sally's first time in the park. Talk about what she hears, sees, and smells and use your TPR for each vocabulary word multiple times.

At the end of the story, ask a few students to summarize what happened. They can use the TPR for smells, sees, and hears to help them remember what happened in the story and practice speaking in full sentences.

Have a drama session

Do you sometimes feel like your students are a little dramatic? This is the perfect activity for them! A great way to test their language and TPR skills is to have them do a little improv. You'll play the role of the narrator and decide how the story goes. Choose something light and easy to follow, like a hero's journey.

For this kind of story, you'll need a hero, a princess, and a villain. For a larger class, feel free to add more characters but don't make the story too long or too complicated. You also can't forget to leave some of the class in the audience to watch the chaos unfold!

Use some target language you've covered in class- ex. "Run away!", "Wave Hello", etc. and have the students in the play act using the TPR you covered in class. Don't be afraid to stop the story if someone is confused or doesn't understand. This activity is all about putting the vocabulary they learn in class to good use, so make sure they know what they're doing.

Mime activities

This one's all about total physical response. Your poor student has completely lost their voice! They'll be assigned a partner who has to determine what they need, but they can't say a word. You'll give them a task or phrase they need to make their partner say. For example, "You're looking for your dog." The mime student must convey this entirely through their actions, and the partner must guess the target sentence.

This is a great way to test your student's understanding, as they will have to remember the vocabulary off the top of their heads. This is also a great activity for large classrooms, as you can pair off students and have them race for first place.

Role Play

A simple way to get your students talking and using TPR is to have them roleplay easy scenarios. This is better for more advanced students that have a little more confidence speaking. All you have to do is give them a scenario or a few pieces of target vocabulary and watch them go.

You can do this two ways- you can have two students get in front of the class and perform, or you can pair them off and have them work more independently. Many students can be shy or reluctant to speak when learning a new language, so pairing them off and listening in on a few conversations works well for small classes. No matter what you do though, make sure they're up and moving around!

If your students are reluctant to talk, some teachers find it helpful to set a timer for how long the scenario has to go on. 30 seconds is a good starting point for most classes, and you can give them time to prepare before they start.

Treasure Hunt with a Twist

This is perfect for classes that love to compete. Group your students into four or five groups and send them on the scavenger hunt of their lives! Or at least of their day. Instead of giving your student's paper clues, give them verbally. Whichever team completes the activity first wins for that round.

For example, after teaching action verbs, you can ask your students to "go to the back of the class", "run to the front of the class", "find something yellow", or "jump in place". Be sure to keep track of each teams points, and award the winner with bragging rights (or candy).

This activity is great for getting everyone practicing total physical response, as teams cannot earn points unless all members are participating.

We hope this list of fun activities gets you and your class moving. total physical response is a great language tool for any age or level and can help your students more quickly remember vocabulary and phrases.
Check out these articles to up your language learning game: 5 Reasons to Use the Speech Shadowing Technique 7 Science-Based Methods to Thinking in a Foreign Language The 8 Practical Steps to Learn Grammar Easily

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9 Total Physical Response Activities for Language Learning - Bilingua

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How many times did you almost fall asleep in class as a student? Be honest, everyone's been there at least once. Between PowerPoints and droning teachers, there are a lot of things that can go wrong in a classroom. Teachers who can keep things lively will see students who are more involved and engaged with the material, even if it's difficult.

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Enhancing Oral Language Development for Multilingual Learners

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Enhancing Oral Language Development for Multilingual Learners

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As multilingual learners acquire English proficiency, building oral language skills should be a priority. Oral language provides the foundation for literacy and overall academic success. Students - English speakers and multilingual learners alike - need to develop both productive (speaking) and receptive (listening) language. Vocabulary is a critical aspect of oral proficiency (but it's not the whole story). We know that students with robust vocabularies do well in school because they use their word knowledge to comprehend text and read fluently, to understand lectures and explanations, and to more clearly express their ideas orally and in writing. Students' word knowledge is the driver of speaking and listening and is critical for learning new information.

To get back to the "rest of the story," other aspects of oral language that students need to develop are, for example, syntax, pronunciation, and pragmatics, which refers to socially acceptable ways of communicating such as knowing when more formal speech is required, taking turns in a discussion, or interpreting a comment as intended.

Most multilingual learners enter U.S. schools with weaker oral language skills than their English-speaking peers. They've had much less exposure to the sounds, words, and phrases of English, have had fewer opportunities to develop an innate sense of English grammar, and may have culturally influenced pragmatic practices.

Thus, multilingual learners need daily opportunities to learn and practice oral English in classroom environments that invite collaborative academic discussions, where oral language use is emphasized, and student-to-student interaction is promoted. As students strengthen vocabulary and other oral language skills, their reading and writing skills are more likely to improve.

Multilingual learners benefit from brief interactions to express their understanding (e.g., Think-Pair-Share, Turn and Talk) as well as more extended discussions where they summarize material, grapple with ideas, and build on one another's contributions.

The following activities promote oral language practice through more extended language use, practice that is more likely to develop a deeper level of oral language than brief exchanges. As an added benefit, these activities combine oral language practice with movement. Research shows that movement improves learning and focus as well as reducing classroom management issues. Multilingual learners have double the work, learning new information and skills in a new language, so opportunities to get up, move, and interact provide much-needed breaks from seat work. Establish and practice transition routines so that students move smoothly into the activities.

Take a Stand. This activity provides multilingual learners with listening skills practice. Students agree or disagree with a stated position and provide a rationale for their decision. Sentence frames may be useful for multilingual learners (and other students) such as, I respectfully disagree with ___________ because______________. The activity begins with the teacher making a statement to students related to a topic being learned, a current event, a story or novel, etc. Working in partners or teams with four to six students per team, the partners/team first discuss the statement made by the teacher. They have a chance to grapple with ideas, make connections between others' ideas and their own, build on a peer's contribution, express disagreement, make a counterargument, and come to consensus. On the teacher's cue, "Take a Stand," the partners/team stand or stay seated depending on what they decided. They then explain to the class their rationale for agreeing or disagreeing. Multilingual learners participate orally in the discussion but also practice listening skills within the group and as other partners/groups articulate the rationale for their decision to stand or sit. They also hear vocabulary associated with the topic repeated multiple times by speakers and in their own group discussion. Depending on the age of students, the students themselves can create the statements used for agreeing or disagreeing and ask the rest of the class to respond.

Standing Circle Share. This activity promotes oral interaction among small group members. While appropriate for all grade levels, teachers need to ensure students can accurately paraphrase or summarize text and teachers should take care to select readings at appropriate reading levels for their students. This activity provides differentiated instruction by having texts on the same topic at varied reading levels.

Students in a group are given a short passage or a paragraph from a text to read that is numbered, such as 1-6. Students number off so each one has a section of text to read. After students read their section, they all stand up and form a standing circle joining with their group members. In their groups, each person orally paraphrases what they read in the section of the text. Together, the group of students answers a series of teacher-created questions based on the information they read and shared, coming to consensus about their answers. After students finish their conversation about the questions and the text, they return to their seats and record in their notes three things they learned, or individually answer the questions after having the benefit of listening to the standing circle share.

Example: Math - Fractions Review

1. Students are given one of the following readings: Adding Fractions, Subtracting Fractions, Multiplying Fractions, Dividing Fractions

2. Students read and highlight/annotate their section of the text.

3. Students form standing circles of 4 that represent each of the readings.

4. Students paraphrase their section of the reading.

5. Together, students discuss:

6. "What similarities and differences are there between adding and multiplying fractions?"

7. "What similarities and differences are there between dividing and subtracting fractions?"

8. "What are ways to remember the steps for one of the readings?" (e.g., a mnemonic for the steps of adding fractions)

Frozen Moment. In this activity, students re-enact scenes from a book and freeze in place as they role play for their peers. In this example, students are studying immigration and reading a piece of literature connected to the content. After reading, a book about a Chinese immigrant family, the teacher distributes to each group of four or five students a piece of paper that has a three-or four-sentence scene taken from the story. Each group takes a few minutes to discuss their planned re-creation of the scene in pantomime, requiring that the scene be delivered with absolutely no movement (similar to a tableau), and each person in the group must assume a role. The roles may be characters (such as Mia or Mr. Yao) or stage props (such as the front desk, hamburger, or ledger). After adequate time to practice, students create their "frozen moments" while the rest of the class members close their eyes. When ready, class members open their eyes to view the scene and attempt to identify the which section of the book is being portrayed. (No calling out is permitted. If students think they can identify the scene, they raise a hand or use an agreed-upon signal). After the students have viewed the scene for a few minutes, the teacher joins the performers, tapping one of the actors who then "comes to life." In character, this student describes what he or she is thinking or feeling at that moment. For example, Mr. Lorenz's bright green car might say, "I can't believe I was stolen in the middle of the night. I'm in a strange place now." The teacher ends the soliloquy by again tapping the student, who returns to the fixed, still position. Other players in the scene are tapped until class members have correctly identified the scene that is being performed.

These activities are only a sampling of the many engaging ways to enhance oral language development in general education classrooms. All students benefit from these opportunities but oral language practice is critical for our multilingual learners to become more proficient users of English.

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Enhancing Oral Language Development for Multilingual Learners

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As multilingual learners acquire English proficiency, building oral language skills should be a priority. Oral language provides the foundation for literacy and overall academic success.

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Despite a push to train and recruit more bilingual teachers, school counselors, and school administrators, the US is facing a shortage of educators who can support issues relevant to English language learners.

English language learners - often called ELL students or ELLs - are the fastest-growing student population group, according to the National Education Association. By 2025, an estimated 25 percent of public school students will be ELLs. While the numbers suggest these students are no longer the outliers in today's schools, a look at their support resources suggests otherwise. There were more than 4.6 million ELL students in public schools during the 2015-16 school year, yet only 78,000 teachers dedicated to addressing their needs.

The number of ELLs in today's public schools continues to rise, and so does the demand for those who can teach them. With that kind of growth in a single population, how can it be so difficult to find bilingual educators?

Experts cite a number of reasons for this gap, including a lack of robust educator training, insufficient salary bands, and the overall growth of the ELL population. However, what's most apparent is a significant, systemic issue on both sides: society's perception of students of color.

View the text-only version of this graphic.
"We tend to 'otherize' [English language learners] ... because we think, 'Yeah, they're the other kids,' right? But if we think about it in terms of a global scale, they're the future of this country," said Gigliana Melzi, a professor at Counseling@NYU.

The definition of an ELL according to the U.S. Department of Education is a national-origin-minority student who is limited-English proficient.

ELL students are most likely to attend urban schools, according to Colorín Colorado, an online resource for educators and families of English language learners, but their populations are growing rapidly in rural and suburban districts as well. This increase in ELL students, especially in public schools, means an increase in language diversity across the US. According to the Migration Policy Institute, the majority of ELLs speak Spanish, but not all ELLs are Spanish-speaking students. While 85 percent of language diversity in today's public schools comes from the eight most common languages - Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Vietnamese, Hmong, Somali, Russian, Haitian - there are over 300 languages spoken in US public schools.

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However, this language diversity often goes uncelebrated in today's classrooms.

"These children are often highly intelligent and highly motivated," said Kenneth Patterson, a teacher leader at Woodmoor Elementary School in Baltimore, Md. "The language is a barrier, not their intellectual capacity."

It's important for schools to be thoughtful and capitalize on students' strengths - rather than condemning student differences.

"We need to start developing bilingual programs so that children are learning both languages," Melzi said. "Oftentimes what is happening is that we're focusing only on their lack of English skills and then forget that they have a lot of academic knowledge in their first language."

However, research shows there is a gap between the thoughtful, robust programs needed for ELLs and the resources available in today's public schools. A 2016 report from the Department of Education noted that over half of the US has a shortage of educators certified to work with English language learners. A recent report from the National Academy of Sciences echoes the same concerns.

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A 2017 report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine found that teachers who work with English language learners are often underprepared for the job.

"We need to try and educate all teachers to be prepared to teach to the diverse group of children that make up the United States," Melzi said. "It goes back to this idea that we've seen the kids as they need some kind of 'special support' rather than [the idea that] all teachers should be prepared to deal with all children."

Legislators are attempting to acknowledge this gap. Earlier this year, a collection of Democrats in Congress introduced the Reaching English Learners Act. According to Education Week, the bill aims to "remedy the national shortage of teachers who work with" English language learners, a shortage that reaches beyond classroom teachers and extends to school counselors and administrators.

Schools don't need to wait for legislation, though. Patterson says that shift can happen from inside the school community.

"There must be a strategy focused on second language acquisition, both highlighting the need for bilingualism in our growing global context, as well as the need for more open-mindedness and appreciation for contributions to world progress through other countries and languages," he said.

The move toward a world that supports and celebrates bilingualism starts in the classroom. Rather than "otherizing" these students, as Melzi says, educators should ensure that their classrooms and schools are culturally responsive learning environments.

As schools become increasingly diverse, a recent American School Counselor Association journal article says it is important for school counselors to be "intentional in assuring they can equitably serve all students," including those who are ethnically and culturally diverse.

Patterson, along with other classroom teachers, offers two primary strategies for how schools can create culturally responsive learning environments that support the unique needs of English language learners.

Don't start from zero. Students whose first language is not English are not automatically at a disadvantage, and culturally responsive teaching is not a "remedial strategy." This negative mindset is damaging, Patterson said.

"We must begin with the belief that every student is already a genius and more than capable of shining," Patterson said. "It is our responsibility to do the work of sifting through the cultural barriers and finding the pathways to awaken this genius."

Embed cultures into the curriculum. Students' populations should be reflected in educators' work. Visible efforts to welcome and embrace ELLs "shortcut the connection of the student to the classroom," Patterson says, and shows them they are celebrated and welcomed.

One way to do this is to begin a book club based on books the students like to read, suggests Keila Foster, AVID coordinator for the Maryland public school system. AVID is a school-based college and career readiness program that prepares high school students for success. Allowing English language learners to be a part of the planning and learning process enables their culture to shine from the literature they suggest.

Blair Mishleau, director of personalized learning at Western School of Science and Technology in Phoenix, Ariz., suggests programs like Readworks, Colorin Colorado, DonorsChoose, and FirstBook as accessible tools for educators looking to bring culturally relevant books into their classrooms.

At its core, the key to providing English language learners with school support is simple, Mishleau said.

"Ensure that your curriculum has many windows and mirrors," he said. "Windows being perspectives into lives different than your students; mirrors being reflections of their lives."
Citation for this content: Counseling@NYU, which offers an online master's in school counseling from NYU Steinhardt.

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1 in 4 Students is an English Language Learner: Are We Leaving Them Behind?

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Despite a push to train and recruit more bilingual teachers, school counselors, and school administrators, the US is facing a shortage of educators who can support issues relevant to English language learners. English language learners - often called ELL students or ELLs - are the fastest-growing student population group, according to the National Education Association.

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C0-Author of SIOP MODEL

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Reflections on Teaching English Learners

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Reflections on Teaching English Learners

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The 4 Cs to Create Student Centered Lessons

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Being a 21st-century educator is a tall order. In my 15 years in the classroom, my most important "helpers" are technology, movement, and networking. Here's why.

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The WIDA language proficiency levels and standards provide benchmarks as ELLs progress through their English language development.

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The 2012 Amplification of the WIDA English Language Development Standards, Kindergarten-Grade 12, represented the social, instructional, and academic language students might need to engage with peers, educators, and the curriculum in schools. The 2012 Amplification included examples of how language could be processed or produced within a particular context through Model Performance Indicators (MPIs). MPIs were meant to be examples and not fixed guidelines of the language with which students may have engaged during instruction and assessment.
WIDA intends to fully retire the 2012 Amplification of the WIDA English Language Development Standards, Kindergarten-Grade 12. However, we recognize that all member SEAs have different timelines for implementation of the WIDA ELD Standards Framework, 2020 Edition. With that in mind, the 2012 Amplification will remain in the Resource Library so that educators whose SEAs are still using it may access it as needed.
Resource Details View Download Now

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The 2012 Amplification of the WIDA English Language Development Standards, Kindergarten-Grade 12, represented the social, instructional, and academic language students might need to engage with peers, educators, and the curriculum in schools. The 2012 Amplification included examples of how language could be processed or produced within a particular context through Model Performance Indicators (MPIs).

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The most current, comprehensive view of the field of educational psychology today Educational Psychology , 14th Edition emphasizes the educational implications and applications of research on child development, cognitive science, learning, motivation, teaching, and assessment. Theory and practice are considered together, showing how information and ideas drawn from educational psychology research can be applied to solve the everyday problems of teaching. Infused with real-world issues, lesson segments, case studies, and practical ideas from experienced teachers, Educational Psychology reflects the field and offers unique and crucial knowledge to any who dare to teach and to all who love to learn.14th Edition provides cutting-edge coverage and intelligent examinations of emerging trends in the field and society that affect student learning, such as student diversity, inclusive classrooms, neuroscience, educational policy, and technology. You are purchasing a standalone product; MyLab Education does not come packaged with this content. Students, if interested in purchasing this title with MyLab Education, ask your instructor to confirm the correct package ISBN and Course ID. Instructors, contact your Pearson representative for more information. 0134446801 / 9780134446806 Educational Psychology plus MyLab Education with Pearson eText -- Access Card Package

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Educational Psychology (14th Edition) [Woolfolk, Anita] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Educational Psychology (14th Edition)

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3 to Improve Outcomes for Multilingual Learners

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3 to Improve Outcomes for Multilingual Learners

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Reflections on Teaching English Learners

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I am often asked, What can our school (or district) do to improve the academic performance of English learners (ELs), or multilingual learners (MLLs)?

First, let's put these learners into context. Multilingual learners are the fastest growing population in U.S. public schools. More than 10% or nearly 5 million students in public schools nationwide are MLLs. Interestingly, the majority of MLL students are U.S.-born. In fact, more than 85% of pre-K - 5th grade multilingual learners and 62% of 6 th -12 th graders were born in the U.S. Although most districts have a number of languages represented, Spanish is by far the most common language spoken (74.8%) followed by Arabic (2.7%) and Chinese (2.1%).

To improve outcomes for MLL students, begin by focusing on the following three areas:

Instruction is at the heart of schooling. An optimal education for every multilingual learner starts with high quality teaching. That's the baseline. The approach used needs to be research validated, proven to be effective with MLLs, and implemented to a high degree. For example, teachers consider the linguistic needs of their students and use techniques to make content material comprehensible for all students.

Also, it's important that the classroom environment and lessons therein are culturally responsive. A culturally responsive classroom is one in which teachers have high expectations for multilingual learners, they value students' linguistic and cultural assets and integrate their language and experiences into lessons, they create a safe community of learning and encourage students to interact with one another and build relationships. Further, students have opportunities to think critically about topics as well as to express their thoughts, beliefs, and ideas from their own cultural perspectives.

Lack of high-quality instruction contributes to MLL students becoming long-term English learners (LTELS), those students who have been designated as an English learner for 5-7 years or more. They are essentially "stuck" and are not making sufficient progress in the acquisition of English language and literacy skills. There are various reasons that account for their status. These include:

Weak English language development services at some point in their schooling. Multilingual learners need a specific time each day that focuses on English language development (ELD) so that they can develop the skills necessary to participate fully in all areas of schooling.

Narrowed curriculum (ELD vs. subject area classes). Although ELD is critical, it cannot come at the cost of content area teaching. Students need exposure to grade-level content. MLL students require separate ELD coupled with attention to academic language and content in general education classes.

Attending multiple schools. Mobility is a reality for many multilingual families and with each move it is not uncommon that there is a change in curriculum, approach to literacy teaching, language program offered, e.g., bilingual class, dual immersion or English-only, and so forth.

Missing school: "limited or interrupted formal education" which are SIFE or SLIFE students. Many unaccompanied minors are typically SLIFE but not exclusively. Other students stop out of school for any number of reasons, had interrupted education in their home country or during the immigration process. These students must catch up on academic skills while learning English.

Being enrolled in inappropriate courses and programs due to unidentified or misidentified learning disabilities. Site-based decision-making teams must have representation of individuals knowledgeable about students' cultures and second-language acquisition. There remains a lot of misinformation about MLL students and their families that can be clarified by school personnel with expertise in cultural and linguistic diversity.

2. Consider Instructional Programs

Beyond classroom teaching, the type of programs offered in schools have a direct impact on MLL student outcomes. For example, is the ELD program offered appropriate in terms of focusing on developing speaking, listening, reading and writing skills? Is the class taught by a certified ELD specialist? Are students grouped by language proficiency level to maximize learning? Further, what about the courses offered to MLLs? Do they meet college entrance requirements?

In a recent Reading Research Quarterly summary of what we know about teaching reading skills to ELs, Goldenberg pointed to the important role of oral language. Oral language skills contribute to literacy development at both the word- and text-level. For example, vocabulary knowledge, awareness of cognates, listening comprehension, and dialogue influence the acquisition of literacy skills. Explicit instruction and structured practice are essential for advancing proficiency.

Too often ELD teaching that I've observed is unstructured and while there are opportunities for speaking and listening, it is not always productive talk that is moving learning forward. We know that literacy is the foundation of all learning whether the subject is math, science, or social studies. So effective ELD should include significant attention to oral academic language development such as creating opinion pieces, making presentations on topics, and participating in debates. Teachers should encourage the use of substantive language linked to the core curriculum.

How does ELD teaching differ from what is taught in the general education classroom? The purpose of content teaching in general education is to learn the subject matter found in content standards, curriculum guides, and materials. The lesson's purpose is reflected its content objectives. However, with MLLs, language development is also addressed in lessons, although to a lesser extent than content learning. Teachers consider the language skills needed for students to be successful in the lesson and write language objectives accordingly. General education teachers also capitalize on language learning opportunities as they arise.

The purpose of a separate ESL or ELD time on the other hand, is to learn about how English works. The primary function is to learn the language so that students can advance in their proficiency in reading, writing, speaking, and listening. Content is the vehicle for language learning; ESL time should build on core lessons but not be used as tutoring for completing an assignment or preparation for a test. The motivation to help MLLs pass their classes is noble but it is short-sighted. The time needs to be used to for structured practice of specific language skills.

Equitable Educational Pathways for College and Careers

Another aspect of educational programming is offering all students the coursework that will lead them to achieve their dreams and aspirations. Exposure to college requirements and the option to enroll in college preparation courses needs to be a choice MLL students make, not one that is automatically made for them because of their linguistic status.

There are innumerable examples of MLL students who, with the support of school personnel, were provided access to college preparation courses and achieved their dreams. One example is Jennifer Montepeque Diaz, the 2021 Outstanding Graduate at California State University, Long Beach. A child of Guatemalan immigrants, Jennifer planned to work to help support her family when she finished high school. However, a teacher encouraged her to take college pathway courses, a counselor urged her to become involved in extra-curricular activities to be a competitive college candidate, and a college counselor helped her complete financial aid applications. She not only went to college and graduated with a Master's degree in school psychology, she excelled. Hers is a powerful story and it demonstrates the power each educator has to come alongside students and change lives. But it begins with programs that are accessible to all students.

3. Create a Positive School Culture

Finally, student outcomes are enhanced by a school culture that promotes success for each student. Whether an MLL, a student in special education, or an at-risk student, everyone benefits - school staff, students, parents, and the community - when all students make academic progress.

In many schools, school personnel view multilingual learners as the responsibility of an EL coordinator or similar staff person. Especially in schools with large numbers of ELs or MLLs, a team effort will more likely increase the number of students who reach proficiency, exit EL status, and are equipped to be successful in general education classes. There are several ways schools can develop a culture of moving learning forward.

Implement an "all hands on deck" approach. Without question, individual teachers can have a positive impact on students but imagine the exponential power of a school-wide approach where every administrator and all staff worked together for a common goal. A first step might be to demonstrate each child's importance by meet individually with multilingual learners from 3rdgrade on to discuss the areas they need to improve, i.e., speaking, listening, reading and/or writing. Be transparent about English language proficiency (ELP) assessment results and set goals for improvement in the area(s) of need. These meetings should probably take place more than once a year to keep students and school personnel focused on their set goals.

Ask a group of principals how many students exited their school's EL program the previous year and likely few could answer accurately, probably because they depend on their EL coordinators to check on English learners' progress. Make sure principal and staff are proactive in analyzing each English learner's progress. One principal had butcher paper covering the wall of her office and had every multilingual learner listed with color codes for proficiency levels in each domain and other pertinent information. Any teacher who walked into her office saw a reminder that advancing English proficiency was a high priority.

Get teachers on board. Transparency about ELP scores and other student language/literacy data extends to teachers. Every teacher should be knowledgeable about their students' levels of proficiency and need to be informed when they are close to meeting exit criteria so teaching can focus on specific targeted areas. However, in observing classes, some general education teachers couldn't identify their MLLs when asked to do so much less know their proficiency levels. Instruction can't be differentiated to meet students' needs if their levels aren't known.

A remedy is to create an instructional profile for each student so that teachers know their specific skill levels and can identify areas targeted for growth. For example, many LTELs have solid listening and speaking skills but fall short in reading and writing. Rather than spending lots of time on simple "turn and talk" type activities, teachers should focus on building academic language skills by providing multiple opportunities for MLLs to read (with scaffolds, independently, with a partner, and with the teacher), talk about what they've read, write a response, reaction, or summary, then share it with a peer. Interesting discussions around text coupled with writing activities will advance students' proficiency in all domains.

Get buy-in from students. Many multilingual learners, especially LTEL students, have taken a language proficiency assessment every year since they entered U.S. schools. Some students become weary of taking the same test with the same results. Most are not informed about how they performed on the assessment; they only know that they remain an EL student.

The first way to get students involved in their own language growth is to motivate them with choice. Secondary MLL students typically have limited electives because they take ELD one or two periods a day. Let students know from upper elementary grades on that they will have more choices to take art, band, and other electives if they accelerate their English development.

Also, be explicit with students about their own control over their education. Let them know that if they double down on their efforts during ELD - and all classes - they will likely perform better on the next proficiency assessment.

Finally, encourage students to be responsible by giving their best effort on the test. Let them know that every answer counts so they need to take the test seriously. Emphasize the importance of coming prepared for the test by getting a good night's sleep the night before test day and eating breakfast on the day of the test. Most students (English learner or not) aren't aware of the impact of sleep and nutrition on performance.

Enlist parents' help. This valuable resource is often overlooked. Research shows that when EL parents are asked to assist with schoolwork, they do. We can involve parents by asking them to assist with their student's targeted areas of growth by supervising their work. For example, if reading goals are set, parents make sure their student reads at home each day. Teachers may design an accountability system for reporting work done at home. Further, ask parents to make sure their student attends school on testing day, is on time, and is well rested. When parents are informed that an ELP assessment is high-stakes and impacts their child's education, they undoubtedly will encourage their student to do his or her best on the test and take it seriously.

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Three ways to Improve Outcomes for Multilingual Learners

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I am often asked, What can our school (or district) do to improve the academic performance of English learners (ELs), or multilingual learners (MLLs)? First, let's put these learners into context. Multilingual learners are the fastest growing population in U.S. public schools. More than 10% or nearly 5 million students in public schools nationwide are MLLs.

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Last month, I reviewed Zaretta Hammond's fantastic book, Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. Now I'm proud to have Zaretta here as a guest writer to share some specific strategies with us.

Culturally responsive teaching. Everybody is talking about it. The big question is: How do you actually make lessons culturally responsive? That comes up regularly when I am working with groups of teachers to improve outcomes for diverse students who are struggling. I remember working with a group of sixth grade teachers on improving learning for their at-risk students. These teachers were frustrated that their students, 95 percent of them students of color and English language learners, were not applying themselves to learning.

I suggested that we explore making lessons more culturally relevant in order to accelerate student learning. I remember the reaction of Janice, the science teacher. "I am not going to be rappin' about the periodic table," she said defiantly as she crossed her arms and sat back in her chair.

I couldn't blame her. Google "culturally responsive teaching" and you can find a dozen videos of well-meaning teachers leading some call-and-response chant about exponents or rapping about the Boston Tea Party while students sit back and giggle. That's because we usually talk about culturally responsive teaching only as an engagement strategy designed to motivate at-risk students to take learning seriously. Or we try to find a race-based connection to the content to make it "relevant" to minority students.

One of the biggest misconceptions about culturally responsive teaching is thinking you have to tie the lesson's content to African American or Latino students' racial background. The common belief is if you mention Africa, Mexico, or famous black and brown high achievers, it will spark students' attention. Then they will be motivated to participate.

In reality, culturally responsive teaching is less about using racial pride as a motivator and more about mimicking students' cultural learning styles and tools. These are the strategies their moms, dads, grandmas, and other community folks use to teach them life skills and basic concepts long before they come to school and during out-of-school time.

Culturally responsive teaching leverages the brain's memory systems and information processing structures. Why? Many diverse students come from oral cultural traditions. This means their primary ways of knowledge transfer and meaning-making are oral and active. It's a common cultural tradition that cuts across racial groups: African American, Latino, Southeast Asian, and Pacific Islander communities all have strong oral cultures. Each of these cultural groups uses the brain's memory systems for turning inert information into useable knowledge. They use memory strategies to make learning sticky, like connecting what needs to be remembered to a rhythm or music (that's why we still know the ABC song) or by reciting it in fun ways like a poem, riddle, or limerick.

I asked Janice what area of learning she wanted to help her kids improve. She said science vocabulary; they weren't learning the weekly words and it was getting in the way of their understanding of key concepts. She was frustrated and at the end of her rope. I asked how she was teaching it. She used the typical approach: On Monday, she listed the words on the board. Students copied them down and were required to look each word up and use it in a sentence. On Wednesday, there was a vocabulary test.

I suggested that we design word study to be more culturally responsive by making it more like the students' own cultural learning process. She was open for trying something different.

I offered her these three tips for transforming any lesson into something that looked and felt more culturally responsive to diverse students, something that would allow them to engage more and process the content effectively.

Games are the power strategy for culturally-grounded learning because they get the brain's attention and require active processing. Attention is the first step in learning. We cannot learn, remember, or understand what we don't first pay attention to. Call and response is just a way to get the brain's attention. Most games employ a lot of the cultural tools you'd find in oral traditions - repetition, solving a puzzle, making connections between things that don't seem to be related (Ever play Taboo or Apples to Apples?).

Organizing learning so that students rely on each other will build on diverse students' communal orientation. This communal orientation can be summed up in the African proverb, "I am because we are." Even making learning slightly competitive in a good-natured way increases students' level of attention and engagement. It's why the T.V. show Survivor has been around for so many years; it's a social-based game.

The brain is wired to remember stories and to use the story structure to make sense of the world. That's why every culture has creation stories. In oral traditions, stories play a bigger role in teaching lessons about manners, morality, or simply what plants to eat or not eat in the wilderness because it's the way content is remembered. Diverse students (and all students, really) learn content more effectively if they can create a coherent narrative about the topic or process presented. That's the brain's way of weaving it all together. (Bonus: It also offers a great way to check for understanding and correct misconceptions.)

So Janice took her weekly list of science vocabulary and created a variety of sorting and matching games for students. She built a set of simple card games based on Go Fish or Old Maid. In addition she created some team games. Each week students had different active ways to learn the vocabulary. For 10-15 minutes a couple of times during the week, students got to play these learning games rather than look up words in a dictionary. She gave them instructions for making the games at home if they wanted to.

Instead of the traditional weekly vocab test, she asked them to "storify" their understanding of key concept words like metamorphosis, using vocabulary from past weeks.

When I checked in with the group a few weeks later, she was the first one to share. She said student engagement was like night and day. Now all students were participating. She said she knew they were learning the vocabulary at a deeper level because they were actually using the new science terms during discussions and in their writing with no prompting from her.

The big A-ha's for the group that day were that (1) Culturally responsive teaching doesn't have to be some performance the teacher does to entertain students and (2) It doesn't have to mention race or reference culture at all. Instead, what makes a practice culturally responsive is that it mimics students' own cultural learning tools. They all realized that these practices are helpful for all students, not targeted at minority students.

The real trick is to use these strategies regularly as part of your instructional routine rather than doing them randomly every now and then. Consistency is the key. ♦

Learn more about how to improve diverse students' information processing skills and actually grow their brains in Zaretta Hammond's book, Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students .

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3 Tips to Make Any Lesson More Culturally Responsive

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Google "culturally responsive teaching" and you can find a dozen videos of well-meaning teachers leading some call-and-response chant about exponents or rapping about the Boston Tea Party while students sit back and giggle.

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Webinar: Culturally Responsive Teaching Through Inquiry

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View our webinar with Michelle Sadrena Pledger examining Culturally Responsive Teaching Through Inquiry.

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Pronouncing Names Correctly

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Getting it right; why pronouncing names correctly matters

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What is the impact of mispronouncing a name? In this powerful talk, Gerardo Ochoa shares the four styles of name mispronunciation, and the unseen but profound results of each.

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Spanish Assessments & English Test Equivalent 

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Spanish Assessments & English Test Equivalent 

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Pre-Conference forms Zaretta Hammond 2019

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Pre-Conference forms Zaretta Hammond 2019

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the learning challenge dry-erase poster (corwin teaching essentials)

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education / teaching methods & materials / general

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education/teaching methods & materials - general

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the learning challenge; the learning pit; conceptual understanding; cognitive conflict; deep learning

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education / teaching methods & materials / general

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education/teaching methods & materials - general

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The Learning Challenge Dry-Erase Poster (Corwin Teaching Essentials)

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Amazon.com: The Learning Challenge Dry-Erase Poster (Corwin Teaching Essentials) (9781544305783): Nottingham, James A.: Books

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BICS (social language) vs. CALPS (academic language)

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BICS (social language) vs. CALPS (academic language)

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The acronyms BICS and CALP refer to the length of time required by immigrant children to develop conversational skills in the target language and grade appropriate academic proficiency in that language. Understanding the difference between social language and academic language acquisition is an important concept for teachers working with non-native students. Learn more in our academic language resource section.
BICS = social language
Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS) refer to linguistic skills needed in everyday, social face-to-face interactions. For instance, the language used in the playground, on the phone, or to interact socially with other people is part of BICS. The language used in these social interactions is context embedded. That is, it is meaningful, cognitively undemanding, and non-specialized. It takes the learner from six months to two years to develop BICS.
CALP = academic language
Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP) focuses on proficiency in academic language or language used in the classroom in the various content areas. Academic language is characterized by being abstract, context reduced, and specialized. In addition to acquiring the language, learners need to develop skills such as comparing, classifying, synthesizing, evaluating, and inferring when developing academic competence. It takes learners at least five years to develop CALP. Research from Collier and Thomas (1995) has shown that it may take children with no prior instruction or no support in native language development at least seven years to develop CALP.

The distinction between BICS and CALP was made by Professor Jim Cummins.

Learn more in Explaining BICS and CALP from EverythingESL.

Video: BICS and CALP

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The acronyms BICS and CALP refer to the length of time required by immigrant children to develop conversational skills in the target language and grade appropriate academic proficiency in that language. Understanding the difference between social language and academic language acquisition is an impo…

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Make it "Wise" feedback. start with positive feedback, constructive criticism, and end it with positive encouragement.

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Particularly in this difficult year, providing clear feedback is key to helping elementary students achieve learning goals.

As educators deal with managing the complexities of instruction of remote and socially distanced learning, often the conversation turns immediately to technology and adapting pedagogy. It makes sense that we are all scrambling to get our arms around engagement strategies that leverage online tools-they're crucial to day-to-day instruction-but conversations about the importance of feedback often get lost in the shuffle.

Particularly when many of us are physically isolated from our students, we need to incorporate steady, consistent, and meaningful feedback into our teaching. No matter what the setting, consistent communication with our students about what they are to learn, where they are in terms of mastery, and how to continue to make progress is key to their success, but right now we need to make an extra effort to ensure that those conversations are not falling by the wayside.

What Good Feedback Looks Like

Feedback can take a multitude of forms (comments, redirection, encouragement, critical information), but it's only good if we know it's being received-if it's making an impact in helping our students meet goals, both ours and theirs. Good feedback is rooted in talking with our students, not at them.

Good feedback is also clear and concise; in order to be effective, it should never leave children guessing where they are at, where they are going, and how they will get to the learning outcome. This requires that we, as educators, have a clear understanding of the target we want students to get to and how they will get there.

For example, as elementary students in kindergarten, first grade, and second grade are learning how to write, the expectations and feedback shift. The feedback we give to a kindergartener is different from the feedback we give to a first grader because we have a clear understanding of the target that we want students to meet.

Especially at the elementary level, good feedback is user-friendly-it needs to be provided in a way that students understand. Use vocabulary that students understand, and provide the feedback in a format they can consume it in easily. If, for example, a student is struggling to read, it's important that while we continue to provide written feedback for them to read, we take the extra step to ensure that they can read it and can understand it.

Integrating Feedback Into the Learning Process

If we believe that feedback can be a key lever in the learning process, we must understand deeply where students are and need to go in the learning process. Before we can get students to where we want them to be, we must clearly determine where that is and understand where each student is, beyond the daily target. Understanding this allows us to build a systematic approach to ensuring that we know what we want students to know and be able to do-and a systematic approach to infusing instruction with feedback at multiple junctures.

In the learning process, a systematic approach should yield feedback that is timely, authentic, and consistent. Students shouldn't have to wait for confirmation that they are struggling with a concept until they get a bad grade; they should get it as soon as we see evidence of it so that we can correct, support, and redirect students down the path of learning.

If we use feedback in a timely and consistent manner, we shouldn't be surprised by how our students perform on an assessment-and neither should they. Constant, supportive feedback is critical to making sure that students know where they are, what they need, and where they are going in the learning process, not just for transparency but also so they can develop ownership in the learning process themselves.

Feedback plays a major role in the learning process, following both formative and summative assessments. Often, I hear discussions around how many points something should be worth, rather than what feedback we will give when questions are missed. Our focus and goal is that students continue to progress in the learning process, and feedback provides that lever. The learning doesn't come from the assessment, but rather from the feedback provided.

The value of an assignment is only as meaningful as the feedback that is provided. We try so hard to get "enough" work assigned and creating engaging activities for our students, but we forget about providing feedback on the work assigned. We cannot lose sight of the importance of providing timely and specific feedback, especially when we may not have our kids in front of us.

Leveraging Feedback to Make Grades More Meaningful

I have to be honest here: I'm a little skeptical about the efficacy of grades throughout the educational system. That said, I think that grades serve a purpose and can be constructive if we are intentional about them, and if they are complemented by more nuanced feedback.

The grade a student receives should communicate the level of mastery toward a particular concept, and it should communicate the same thing to everyone (students, parents, and teachers). But if we want grades to truly reflect what students know and are able to do, we should be leveraging feedback from the start; clear, concise, and timely feedback should be guiding them toward that grade all along, alerting them to what they need to adjust to move toward the level of mastery that the grade reflects. If we use feedback that way, then the grade becomes summative and collective, holistic even. Without feedback integrated along the way, grades aren't genuinely meaningful to anyone.

In the end, when we leverage feedback as the driving force to move students forward in learning, our conversations with them are transformed from rearview mirror assessments to proactive plans for next steps. We shift our attention, and that of our students, from how many points something is worth to how to durably correct mistakes and forge a path forward. When we leverage feedback, our conversations change from "What's the coolest way to do this online?" to "What assignment or work allows me to best provide this feedback?"

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Focusing on Feedback in Distance Learning

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Particularly in this difficult year, providing clear feedback is key to helping elementary students achieve learning goals. As educators deal with managing the complexities of instruction of remote and socially distanced learning, often the conversation turns immediately to technology and adapting pedagogy.

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Wise Framing for Feedback

Implement Wise Feedback in your course
Small tweaks in the way you communicate feedback could mean big results for your students

A case for giving wise feedback

Providing students with well framed, quality feedback can jump start your student's growth mindset, leading to increased engagement and positive academic outcomes over time. When students have a clear and manageable pathway forward, paired with messages that encourage them to keep moving forward, they are much more likely to infuse value into their work.

Download wise feedback examples: PDF

Description of Wise feedback: PDF﻿

Examples of wise feedback phrases

"Now that you're getting feedback on your first exam, remember that this is just a measure of what you can do right now. It's not a measure of what you can ever do or whether you're supposed to be here."

"This material will definitely be more challenging than what we just covered, but I am confident in your abilities to master it. I'm here to help you develop the knowledge you need to be successful in this class."

"I've set a high bar for everyone to reach in this course, and it will take a lot of work to get there, to really master the key concepts. But I also know that, with hard work and persistence, you'll be able to reach that bar."

"If you feel uncomfortable with this material, that's OK. Many students do because they're not familiar with it yet, but they tend to become more comfortable with it over time."

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Providing students with well framed, quality feedback can jump start your student's growth mindset, leading to increased engagement and positive academic outcomes over time. When students have a clear and manageable pathway forward, paired with messages that encourage them to keep moving forward, they are much more likely to infuse value into their work.

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Please note: An updated framework for family engagement was released in 2019. You can read a June 2020 article and watch a new video in which Karen Mapp describes the new framework.

When Secretary of Education Arne Duncan visited the Harvard Graduate School of Education in February 2010, Senior Lecturer Karen Mapp asked him about federal support for family and community engagement. She came away with a new assignment: Help the U.S. Department of Education find a new approach that would do a better job.

For the next several years, Mapp and colleagues consulted with USDOE to develop what came to be called the Dual Capacity-Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships, now released by the government as a downloadable, shareable model that schools and districts can use to build the kind of effective, mutually rewarding engagement that will make schools the center of their communities.

The framework lays out a process to guide school and district staff to engage parents and to help parents work successfully with the schools to increase student achievement. "The main problem in terms of developing effective family-school partnerships is that none of the stakeholders have really had any good guidance in how to do that," Mapp says. "There has been limited capacity there." Although many districts have started to offer parent workshops or parent academies, "they're not providing that same type of development and support for their staff," she says.

The framework defines that and other challenges and then goes on to describe both the process of implementing effective interventions and the organizational structures that must be in place to do so. Finally, it talks about the program and policy goals of effective interventions, and how capacity develops in staff and families as a result.

Among the outcomes, Mapp says: Staff who can honor and recognize the wealth of knowledge that families possess, which can in turn assist schools with pedagogical priorities; and families that can negotiate multiple roles - as supporters, monitors, advocates, and decision makers for their children.

***

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Please note: An updated framework for family engagement was released in 2019. You can read a June 2020 article and watch a new video in which Karen Mapp describes the new framework. When Secretary of Education Arne Duncan visited the Harvard Graduate School of Education in February 2010, Senior Lecturer Karen Mapp asked him about federal support for family and community engagement.

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Brain-Based Learning: Teaching the Way Students Really Learn

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Brain-Based Learning: Teaching the Way Students Really Learn [Jensen, Eric P., McConchie, Liesl] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Brain-Based Learning: Teaching the Way Students Really Learn

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Best Sellers Customer Service New Releases Books Pharmacy Registry Early Black Friday Fashion Kindle Books Toys & Games Gift Cards Amazon Home Automotive Computers Find a Gift Shopper Toolkit Coupons Home Improvement Video Games Smart Home Beauty & Personal Care Health & Household Amazon Basics Pet Supplies TV & Video Baby Handmade Sports & Fitness Disability Customer Support

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Teaching Channel-Culturally Responsive Teaching Podcast- Zarretta Hammond is interviewed

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Teaching Channel-Culturally Responsive Teaching Podcast- Zarretta Hammond is interviewed

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[Episode 2] Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain

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Author Zaretta Hammond explains what culturally responsive teaching is, what it isn't and how to being the systems change work needed to include this type of pedagogy in your school or district. She tackles elements from her book, Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain, and gives practical examples for teachers and leaders to begin implementing the CRT mindset today.

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Equity Series: The Dangers of Deficit Thinking w/ Zaretta Hammond (109)

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Getting Started with Teacher Clarity: Ready-to-Use Research-Based Strategies to Develop Learning Intentions, Foster Student Autonomy, and Engage Students (Books for Teachers)

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Getting Started with Teacher Clarity: Ready-to-Use Research-Based Strategies to Develop Learning Intentions, Foster Student Autonomy, and Engage Students (Books for Teachers) [Freibrun, Marine] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers.

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Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind-Eric Jensen

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Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind-Eric Jensen

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Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind: Practical Strategies for Raising Achievement

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Amazon.com: Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind: Practical Strategies for Raising Achievement: 9781416615729: Jensen, Eric: Books

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Powerful Partnerships: A Teachers Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success

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Powerful Partnerships: A Teachers Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success

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Powerful Partnerships: A Teacher's Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success

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Powerful Partnerships: A Teacher's Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success [Mapp, Karen, Carver, Ilene, Lander, Jessica] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Powerful Partnerships: A Teacher's Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success

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Close Reading Activity-Understanding Cuba Beyond the Palm Trees, Beaches and Salsa Music!

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Understanding Cuba Beyond the Palm Trees, Beaches and Salsa Music

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Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Self-Actualization Test

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Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Self-Actualization Test

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Self-Actualization Test - Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs — Mind Mastery

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Take the Self-Actualization Test. Explore which of your needs you are focused on the most right now.

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Translanguaging Podcast w/ Dr. Ofelia Garcia interviewed by Tan Huynh

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Translanguaging Podcast w/ Dr. Ofelia Garcia interviewed by Tan Huynh

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Ep 65. Dr. Ofelia García - The joys of translanguaging | Teaching MLs

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A fierce advocate of translanguaging, Dr. Ofelia García shares how it can be transformational for a school community. To learn more about one of Tan’s work, go to https://www.empoweringells.com @TanKHuynh

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EP 5 -- Teaching Bilinguals (Even if You're Not One): The Benefits of Bilingual Ed

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Translanguaging Video Part 2 min 1-7 only

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Translanguaging Video Part 2 min 1-7 only

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Translanguaging: an interview with the presenters | Cambridge Assessment Podcasts

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Translanguaging: a dynamic bilingual perspective on pedagogy, assessment and research - interviews with Dr W Gwyn Lewis (Bangor University), Helen Imam and Stuart Shaw (Cambridge International Examinations)

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University of Florida Literacy Institute-Lessons & Decodables

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University of Florida Literacy Institute-Lessons & Decodables

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Alphabet knowledge includes knowledge of the letter names, knowledge of the letter sounds, knowledge of letter formation, and the ability to access this knowledge automatically. The lessons in this unit are designed to build students' alphabet knowledge and decoding and encoding skills.

NOTE: The lesson resources for the Alphabet Unit include a slide deck to accompany each lesson plan, but some of the other resources only become available later in the unit, as students develop the skills needed to use them. For example, the Decodable Passages begin at Lesson 8.

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Lessons 1-34 Resources | UF Literacy Institute

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Alphabet knowledge includes knowledge of the letter names, knowledge of the letter sounds, knowledge of letter formation, and the ability to access this knowledge automatically. The lessons in this unit are designed to build students' alphabet knowledge and decoding and encoding skills.

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These ELL strategies include step-by-step guides, ideas for differentiating strategies, and resources such as videos and practical examples. Find them by grade, language proficiency, etc.

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Colorín Colorado is a national multimedia project that offers a wealth of bilingual, research-based information, activities, and advice for educators and families of English language learners (ELLs). Colorín Colorado is an educational service of WETA, the flagship public broadcasting station in the nation's capital, and receives major funding from the American Federation of Teachers and National Education Association.

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Translanguaging Article "The Science of the Bilingual Reading Brain"

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Translanguaging Article "The Science of the Bilingual Reading Brain"

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The Science of the Bilingual Reading Brain

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AI (Artificial Intelligence) concept. “We are plural. The I is an illusion: bilinguals know this, they are hybrid like the words inside them, surprised halfway on the translation path.” (Jurgenson, 2014, p. 115). Yes, we have always been and will always be plural. That is, until we are taught to div…

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Translanguaging Lesson &  Recommended Books-En Communidad Collective

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Translanguaging Lesson &  Recommended Books-En Communidad Collective

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This article provides an overview of how to use language objectives in content-area instruction for English learners and offers classroom-based examples from different grade and subject levels.

This article written for Colorín Colorado provides an overview of how to use language objectives in content-area instruction for English learners and includes:

what a language objective is

steps that teachers can take to create language objectives

how to implement language objectives in a general education classroom

how to align objectives to content and language standards

ideas and resources on how to support teachers as they become familiar with this practice

how to use language objectives in distance learning environments.

Language Objectives: An Overview
Mrs. Shell has been teaching eighth grade math for twelve years. She has deep content area knowledge and wants to provide all of her students with authentic activities and tasks to relate the significance of the mathematical concepts that she teaches to their lives. Mrs. Shell has always felt successful at teaching her classes but this year has been different. Her sections include students with more diverse backgrounds than previous years, particularly more English learners. As Mrs. Shell was beginning to feel frustrated with her inability to reach all her students because of their needs, she learned about one way to make her content more comprehensible to all her students - creating and posting objectives that tell the students not just what content concepts they will learn in each lesson, but also the academic language they will need to learn and use to meet the state's math standards. With this knowledge, Mrs. Shell is now confident that she not only knows what to teach, but also how to teach it so that all her students can be successful.

Generally speaking, academic English is the language of schooling and the language that helps students acquire and use the content area knowledge taught in schools (Anstrom, DiCerbo, Butler, Katz, Millet, & Rivera, 2010).

Teaching content to ELs: The challenge

In my work supporting general education and ESL/bilingual teachers who provide sheltered instruction for English learners (ELs), I have met many teachers like Mrs. Shell. While these teachers want to provide effective instruction for their ELs, often they don't see themselves as language teachers and so they aren't sure where to begin with their students.

These teachers aren't alone, however, and they are facing a challenge shared by teachers across the country. We know that for school-age students, academic language is crucial for school success (Francis, Rivera, Lesaux, Kieffer, & Rivera, 2006). In addition, research allows us to state with a fair degree of confidence that English learners best acquire English when language forms are explicitly taught and when they have many opportunities to use the language in meaningful contexts (Goldenberg, 2008).

Yet while the explicit instructional support that ESL and bilingual teachers provide is essential to English learners' academic language development, English learners receive a majority of their instruction from general education and content area teachers who may not have experience teaching academic language development.

The question becomes then: What do general education classroom teachers need to do in order to support the academic English development of language learners in both face-to-face and virtual environments, especially when English learners are one of many types of students they serve?

Teaching content to ELs: The solution

One principle that teachers of English learners can begin to apply immediately is creating and posting language objectives for their lessons (whether in the classroom or online in a virtual space. Many teachers are familiar with using content objectives to identify what students will learn and be able to do in the lesson. However, they are less likely to include language objectives that support the linguistic development of their students.

Implementing language objectives can be a powerful first step in ensuring that English learners have equal access to the curriculum even though they may not be fully proficient in the language. This is because the second language acquisition process requires opportunities for the language learner to be exposed to, practice with, and then be assessed on their language skills (Echevarria, Short, & Vogt, 2008).

To this end, language objectives:

articulate for learners the academic language functions and skills that they need to master to fully participate in the lesson and meet the grade-level content standards (Echevarria, Short, & Vogt, 2008).

are beneficial not only for language learners but for all students in a class, as everyone can benefit from the clarity that comes with a teacher outlining the requisite academic language to be learned and mastered in each lesson.

Now let's take a closer look at some examples and how to write language objectives.

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Writing Language Objectives

Interview with Dr. Jennifer Himmel

Learn more about language objectives in this podcast interview with Dr. Himmel from Teaching Multilingual Learners, produced by Tan Huynh.

What is a language objective?

Language objectives are lesson objectives that specifically outline the type of language that students will need to learn and use in order to accomplish the goals of the lesson. Quality language objectives complement the content knowledge and skills identified in content area standards and address the aspects of academic language that will be developed or reinforced during the teaching of grade-level content concepts (Echevarria & Short, 2010).

These objectives involve the four language skills (speaking, listening, reading, and writing), but they can also include:

Below are examples of language objectives for different content areas and grade levels. They come from the Common Core State Standards for Math and English Language Arts (2012) and state standards in New York and California.
Sources:
How do I create effective language objectives?

Dr. Cindy Lundgren discusses the process of writing language objectives in this excerpt from her Meet the Expert interview.

Language objectives are directly correlated to content objectives. Once a teacher determines the lesson topic from the appropriate content standards, the teacher will want to begin thinking about the academic language necessary for English learners to complete the tasks that support the content objectives. This identification of the academic language embedded in the lesson's content will become the basis for the lesson's language objectives.

You can use the following guidelines to start thinking about appropriate language objectives for the lesson:

1. Decide what key vocabulary, concept words, and other academic words students will need to know in order to talk, read, and write about the topic of the lesson. Those words might be taught as a language objective. They should include technical terms, such as ecosystem, and terms like distribution that have different meanings across content areas. Other terms to highlight are those that language learners may know in one context, such as family (as in parents, siblings, etc.), but that have a different use in science (e.g., family of elements in the periodic table).

2. Consider the language functions related to the topic of the lesson (e.g, will the students describe, explain, compare, or chart information). See your state English Language Proficiency (ELP) standards for examples of these functions for English language arts, math, science, and social studies for all English proficiency levels and grade-level clusters.

3. Think about the language skills necessary for students to accomplish the lesson's activities. Will the students be reading a textbook passage to identify the stages of mitosis? Are they able to read a text passage to find specific information? Will they be reporting what they observe during a scientific demonstration to a peer? Do they know how to report observations orally? Acquiring the skills needed to carry out these tasks might be the focus of a language objective.

4. Identify grammar or language structures common to the content area. For example, many science textbooks use the passive voice to describe processes. Additionally, students may have to use comparative language to analyze two related concepts. Writing with the passive voice or using comparative phrases might be a language objective.

5. Consider the tasks that the students will complete and the language that will be embedded in those assignments. If students are working on a scientific investigation together, will they need to explain the steps of the procedure to one another? The language objective might focus on how to explain procedures aloud.

6. Explore language learning strategies that lend themselves to the topic of the lesson. For example, if students are starting a new chapter in the textbook, the strategy of previewing the text might be an appropriate language objective.

(Adapted from Short, Himmel, Gutierrez, & Hudec, 2012. Used with permission.)

Aligning Language Objectives and Standards

English Language Proficiency (ELP) standards

Developing appropriate language objectives for lessons involves becoming familiar with a state's content area and ELP standards. Whereas the content standards will provide the topic of the lesson and what exactly the students should be doing with that topic (e.g., solving problems, creating models, ranking ideas), the English language proficiency or development standards help to identify language skills and functions that students should be working on to achieve academic language fluency. These ELP standards can help to identify:

English Language Arts (ELA) standards

Other resources in addition to the ELP standards are a state's English Language Arts standards or the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in History, Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects (CCSS). The English Language Arts and Literacy CCSS might be especially useful to teachers of English learners due to its attention to literacy across the content areas.

Additional resources to consult, especially if a state is a member of the WIDA consortium, are the Model Proficiency Indicators (MPIs) outlined in their ELP standards. The MPIs outline what an English learner at a specific level of English language proficiency can do in a language domain (e.g., listening) by addressing the language functions embedded in an example topic for that content area with appropriate scaffolds or support (Gottlieb, Cranley, & Cammileri, 2007). Classroom texts and other materials (e.g., science investigations, primary source documents) are other good sources to consult when preparing a lesson.

Getting Started

How can I get started?

Careful lesson planning

In creating measureable and student-friendly language objectives that support the content objectives, it is important that learner tasks in the lesson are aligned with the objectives. It is not enough to have well-written objectives that promote language acquisition if the lesson is lacking in tasks that support the objectives. If the language objective for a middle school social studies lesson is for the students to orally retell the key characteristics in a historical event using sequential language, it is important that the teacher previews sequential language with the students, such as providing sentence stems or frames, and builds into the lesson some structured pair work so the students have an opportunity to retell the event to a peer. Therefore, careful lesson planning is another essential step in preparing effective language objectives.

Collaboration

It is also useful for content area and ESL/bilingual teachers to plan lessons together, as we saw with the 7th grade science lesson scenario involving Mr. Zhang and Mr. Lewis. In this co-planning scenario, each teacher used his expertise to better integrate content and language instruction for the language learners. This type of collaboration can help a teacher like Mr. Zhang learn more about the second language acquisition process of his students and can help a teacher like Mr. Lewis become more familiar with the grade-level content expectations that his English learners encounter in content area classes.

How do I know which language objectives are best for my students?

The language objective that the teacher selects will depend on what the English learners in the class need most at that point in the year and what language is most important to understanding the content concepts. If the students have already spent a good deal of time working with new vocabulary, then the teacher might consider having students use that vocabulary to develop their writing skill by writing a summary of the process they followed.

Conversely, the teacher might want to help students become more proficient with a particular type of graphic organizer in order to develop more strategic language learning. As all teachers know, teaching is a dynamic and complex process that requires a multitude of decisions to be made. However, the advance planning required in creating language objectives allows teachers to better anticipate the academic English needs of all students thus increasing the comprehensibility of the lessons.

It is important for teachers to realize that even though their lesson may include all four language skills (it is good if they do, since the language skills reinforce one another), they do not need to post a language objective for every language-related item addressed in the lesson. Teachers address many instructional needs in a 50- or 60-minute class period. Rather than highlighting all language uses in a particular lesson, it is important for the teacher to think about what is non-negotiable in that lesson.

In other words, the teacher should keep the perspective of the English learner in mind and ask, "Of all of the skills and functions addressed in my lesson, which is most important for helping students meet the grade-level standard and develop their language proficiency?" These objectives then must be measureable (i.e., can you see or assess the student's mastery of that objective?) and written in language that accounts for the linguistic and cognitive development of the students.

How can I make language objectives "student-friendly"?

Both of the above objectives are measurable, but both also take into account appropriate developmental stages of the students. Teachers of young students (e.g., PK or K) may even want to consider further adapting the objectives. For example, we have seen kindergarten teachers use symbols such as a pencil to symbolize "write" and a mouth to symbolize "talk" when they post their objectives for the children to see. We have also seen teachers of young learners rely on pictures to show the key terms they want the students to use or to convey the topic of the lesson (e.g., a picture of a ruler and of hands to discuss standard and non-standard measurement).

One way that teachers can ensure that their language objectives are measureable and student-friendly is by using appropriate verbs. Because language objectives should provide students with practice in the four language skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking, verbs related to those skills might include, but are not limited to, the following:

List

Retell

Summarize in writing

Record

Read

It is also important to not equate low language proficiency with limited cognitive ability. Therefore, teachers will want to make sure that the language objectives they create also reflect tasks that fall on the higher end of Bloom's Taxonomy and use verbs (e.g., orally justify) accordingly.

As noted above in the guidelines to creating language objectives, language functions are also a potential source for language objectives. Verbs related to language functions might include:

When should I share language objectives with students?

To help students take ownership of their learning and provide explicit direction to students, especially the English learners who are processing content in a new language, it is important that objectives be stated at the beginning of the lesson and reviewed with the students at the end of the lesson to allow them to assess if they have met the objectives (Echevarria, Vogt & Short, 2008).

How this happens may differ according to the grade level and content area of the class. Some teachers like to have the students choral read the objectives, while teachers of older students sometimes have them record the language objectives in their journal in addition to asking an individual student to read them aloud. Some teachers, such as those who teach science, like to reveal the objectives later in the lesson, perhaps after the warm up or exploratory activity, so that they can maintain an inquiry-based approach (Echevarria & Colburn, 2006).

Should I differentiate language objectives based on my students' language proficiency?

Although all teachers have students of varying language proficiency and skill levels in their classes, it is not necessary to differentiate language objectives by creating and posting multiple language objectives that reflect these proficiency levels. Rather, teachers should have one language objective that is appropriate for all students to meet. To provide the appropriate differentiation, the teacher would provide different scaffolds (e.g., adapted text, visuals, sentence frames) for students to use in order to reach the objectives.

For example, an appropriate language objective for an upper elementary language arts class might be for the students to be able to orally list text features found in a non-fiction book. For lower proficiency language learners, the teacher may give them a word bank from which to choose the text features; therefore, the students are meeting the same objective but with the appropriate amount of linguistic support from the teacher.

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Using language objectives in a distance learning environment

While teachers like Ms. Shell understand that the characteristics of good teaching for English learners does not change in a virtual environment, they do understand that instruction will necessarily need to look different in order to account for the challenges that distance learning presents for many learners.

Accordingly, teachers will need to think through how to:

Presenting language objectives

Many different ways exist for teachers to present language objectives in remote learning. For example, teachers might:

begin every virtual class by orally reading and presenting the content and language objectives in their Google slides and then asking students to briefly summarize in the chat box the activities they will be doing in that lesson to meet those objectives.

post the objectives at the top of a shared digital document that serves as a capture sheet for the lesson. A teacher might then ask learners to self-assess their progress towards meeting those objectives at the end of the document.

use live or recorded videos, especially when working with English learners with lower English proficiency. These videos can include props, for example ears to signify a listening objective.

use realia, such as rocks, if one of the lesson's language aims is for students to orally describe different types of sedimentary rocks.

Monitoring student understanding and engagement

Teachers in distance learning environments must also carefully consider how they will assess learner understanding and engagement throughout the lesson. Given the challenges virtual learning platforms present towards capturing data on learner comprehension (e.g., paralinguistic cues such as facial expressions, gestures, posture) teachers working in virtual environments know that it is more important than ever to ensure that students clearly understand the content and linguistic aims for each lesson.

Using comprehension checks and assessing progress

It is also essential that students understand how teachers will measure their progress towards meeting each objective. Towards this aim, teachers must build in multiple comprehension checks throughout the lesson that align to the lesson's objectives. Teachers can:

At the conclusion of a lesson, teachers can assess student progress towards meeting objectives via:

tickets out that are submitted digitally

the recording of a Flipgrid or use of another video platform where learners respond to a prompt that requires learners to use the academic language highlighted in the lesson's objectives.

Teachers can respond to the submitted tickets out or video with feedback that explicitly targets the students use of the language. When appropriate, teacher can provide learners with additional resources and/or support towards mastering that particular language skill or function. Teachers might also use that linguistic data to inform mini-lessons conducted to small groups of English learners during office hours or intervention time.

Next Steps

How can I learn more?

For more information on the SIOP Model, see Making Content Comprehensible for English Learners: The SIOP Model (Echevarria, Short, & Vogt, 2008).

Although language objectives can be implemented in any lesson design approach, they are especially congruent with sheltered instruction and the SIOP Model. Since language objectives ensure that teachers meet the unique linguistic needs of English learners, they are sometimes easier to implement in the context of instructional practices espoused by the SIOP Model.

Practices that focus on explicit academic language teaching include:

Below are other resources that can help you learn more about creating language objectives and about integrating academic language into content area classes.

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Final Thoughts

We realize that it takes teachers some time to become very comfortable with creating language objectives, but our experience has shown that the implementation of language objectives can bring immediate benefits to instruction. Some immediate benefits include teachers understanding more concretely that they are both a content area and language teacher - as one teacher said in a CAL SIOP Model workshop, "I now see myself as a math teacher AND a language teacher".

We have also observed that when teachers consciously plan to meet the academic English needs of their learners, they end up with better planned learner tasks, and students begin to have more ownership of their content area and language learning. When it comes to building proficiency in academic English, as many teachers in our workshops remind us, "If you want to see it, you have to teach it." Therefore, if teachers want to see language development, language objectives are a great first step in helping teachers explicitly teach it.

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Recommended Resources

Further reading

Short, D., Himmel, J., Gutierrez, S., & Hudec, J. (2012). Using the SIOP Model: Professional development for sheltered instruction. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.

Echevarria, J., Vogt, M.E., & Short, D. (2010). The SIOP Model for teaching mathematics to English learners. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Echevarria, J., & Short, D. (2011). The SIOP Model: A professional development framework for a comprehensive school-wide intervention. Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE) Brief. http://www.cal.org/create/resources/pubs/professional-development-framework.html

Himmel, J., Short, D., Richards, C., & Echevarria, J. (2009). Using the SIOP Model to improve middle school science instruction. Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE) Brief. http://www.cal.org/create/resources/pubs/siopscience.html

Short, D., Vogt, M., & Echevarria, J. (2010a). The SIOP Model for teaching history-social studies to English learners. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Short, D., Vogt, M., & Echevarria, J. (2010b). The SIOP Model for teaching science to English learners. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Vogt, M.E., Echevarria, J., & Short, D. (2010). The SIOP Model for teaching English language arts to English learners. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Jennifer Himmel is the Project Director for the National Center for English Language Acquisition at the Manhattan Strategy Group. She previously served as the SIOP Manager at the Center for Applied Linguistics, a non-profit organization for language education research, policy, and practice in Washington, DC. She has served as a curriculum developer and research associate for the U.S. Department of Education funded project, Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE) that is investigating academic achievement of ELLs in grades 4th-8th, and as a language testing specialist for the WIDA ACCESS for ELLs® language proficiency test. She currently manages the SIOP Model professional development service line and provides technical assistance and professional development in sheltered instruction to districts and schools.

Video Clips: Language Objectives

How to Write Language Objectives: Tips for ELL Educators

In this video from Syracuse, NY, Jesus Ortiz, a bilingual teacher, learns how to write a language objective from Areli Schermerhorn, a peer evaluator with expertise in ELL and bilingual education.

Dr. Cynthia Lundgren explains language objectives

In this excerpt from her Meet the Expert interview, Dr. Cynthia Lundgren explains the value of writing language objectives when teaching English learners.

Anstrom, K., DiCerbo, P., Butler, F., Katz, A., Millet, J., & Rivera, C. (2010). A review of the literature on academic English: Implications for K-12 English language learners. Arlington, VA: The George Washington University Center for Equity and Excellence. Education.www.ceee.gwu.edu.

Echevarria, J., & Colburn, A. (2006). Designing lessons: Inquiry approach to science using the SIOP Model. In A. Lathman & D. Crowther (Eds.), Science for English language learners (pp.95-108). Arlington, VA: National Science Teachers Association Press.

Echevarria, J., Vogt, M., & Short, D. (2008). Making content comprehensible for English learners: The SIOP Model. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Echevarria, J., & Short, D. ( 2010). Programs and practices for effective sheltered content instruction. In California Department of Education (Ed), Improving education for English learners: Research-based approaches. Sacramento, CA: CDE Press.

Francis, D., Rivera, M., Lesaux, N., Kieffer, M., & Rivera, H. (2006). Practical guidelines for the education of English language learners: Research-based recommendations for instruction and academic interventions. Portsmouth, NH: RMC Research Corporation, Center on Instruction. www.centeroninstruction.org/files/ELL1-Interventions.pdf

Goldenberg, C. (2008). Teaching English language learners: What the research does-and does not-say. American Educator, Summer 2008, pp. 13-44.

Gottlieb, M., Cranley, E., & Cammilleri, A. (2007). Understanding the WIDA English Language Proficiency Standards: A resource guide. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System, on behalf of the WIDA Consortium.

Short, D., Himmel, J., Gutierrez, S., & Hudec, J. (2012). Using the SIOP Model: Professional development for sheltered instruction. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.

World-Class Instructional Design and Assessment (2007). WIDA English Language Proficiency Standards. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System, on behalf of the WIDA Consortium http://www.wida.us/standards/elp.asp

You are welcome to print copies or republish materials for non-commercial use as long as credit is given to Colorín Colorado and the author(s). For commercial use, please contact [email protected] .

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Language Objectives: The Key to Effective Content Area Instruction for English Learners

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This article provides an overview of how to use language objectives in content-area instruction for English learners and offers classroom-based examples from different grade and subject levels.

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