Strategies: Educators can incorporate TalkinPoints into the classroom to translate passages read aloud into students home languages so they can participate in discussions, or to translate documents being sent home to parents.

Padlet: Padlet allows for teachers and students to build interactive bulletin boards.

Strategies: This resource can be incorporated into the classroom to display class work, encourage and engage students in classroom discussion, and provide organized visuals for topics being discussed (Continental Press, 2023). Or, like this presentation, it can be used to provide professional development!

Read & Write: Read&Write is an assistive technology that can be used in the classroom to build ELL students confidence and independence in reading and writing (Continental Press, 2023).

Strategies: Read&Write can be used in the classroom to provide students with text-to-speech, speech-to-text, simplified summaries, voice notes, and picture dictionaries (Continental Press, 2023).

Beth Skelton: Beth is an ELL teacher, and her website provides educators with free tools, webinars and podcasts about teaching ELLs. Educators just have to enter their email address, and she sends you information, tools, strategies, etc.

Strategies: These tools can be incorporated into the classroom in the form of new instructional strategies and ways in which to meet the unique needs of bilingual and ELL students.

Equipping: This is a paid subscription site that has a ton of resources for all grades and language proficiency levels.

Strategies: Equipping can be utilized into the classroom by using the resources as building block for content area units. It can also be used for newcomer units for elementary and older students.

Nearpod: Nearpod is an interactive slideshow application.

Strategies: Nearpod can be incorporated into the classroom to teach new ideas or provide review by sharing with students a class code. Students are either guided through or asked to work through the slideshow on their own. There is an option to add interactive assessments, discussion boards, games, etc.

Teaching for Change: Teaching for Change provides educators with helpful tips, strategies, and materials for bringing student cultures and backgrounds into the classroom. They also provide workshops, books, and lessons for teaching students from different regions around the world.

Strategies: Teaching for Change can be used in the classroom by providing educators with new strategies and ideas, as well as classroom books and lessons for culturally responsive teaching.

Awareness Activities: These activities provide educators with ideas on how to build classroom norms that build community, understandings topics such as prejudice and discrimination, and so much more. This is a great tool for educators who are looking to become more educated on the diverse needs of students from unique cultures and incorporating those differences into the classroom.

Strategies: These activities can be incorporated into the classroom to celebrate diverse student holidays or days of significance, or to provide students with diverse classroom materials that relate to the topic being taught.

islcollective: This resource has great videos for different content areas, and it has quizzes embedded.

Strategies: You can assign these videos individually through google classroom or do them whole group with white boards for showing answers. You can even create your own video quizzes from any video on youtube.

Reference

Continental Press. (2023). How to use technology to help ELLs achieve language mastery. Continental Educational Publisher. https://www.continentalpress.com/blog/how-to-use-technology-to-help-ells/

Krashen Theory focuses on increasing a students comprehensible input by lowering the affective filter. This ensures students are able to fully focus on the information being presented to them, because they feel safe, confident, and motivated to do so (Gonzalez, 2020). This can be done by adding visuals to speech, giving low pressure opportunities to participate in speaking after hearing multiple examples, and speech recast with correct academic grammar and vocabulary after the student tries. The Krashen Theory can assist educators in building a personal teaching philosophy by informing you of the importance of creating a predictable and safe environment for students to learn in.

Interactionalist Theory

The Interactionalist is the belief that students learn best when they can interact with their environment (Oviedo, 2017). This occurs when students have access to word banks, visual aids, word lists, etc. This theory can assist educators in creating a personal teaching philosophy by ensuring the classroom environment is rich in academic tools that are accessible and useful in helping students to succeed.

Personal Teaching Philosophy

All educators should build a professional teaching philosophy that guides them in providing students with the education and success they deserve. Professional teaching philosophies state an educators purpose, their goals, and their choices that align with their beliefs on teaching and learning. To build your own teaching philosophy, follow these steps:

1. Reflect on Your Values and Beliefs: Reflect on your values and beliefs related to teaching and learning. Ask yourself: What do you believe the purpose of education to be? What are your core values as an educator? What do you hope to achieve through teaching?

2. Influences and Experiences: Reflect on the experiences, educators, and theories that have shaped your thoughts or feelings on education. Think about how these influences have helped guide your beliefs about effectively teaching your own students.

3. Teaching Approach: After reflecting, describe the approach you may take for teaching. This can include your preferred teaching methods, your views on differentiated teaching strategies, your approach and thoughts on assessments and feedback, and your ideas on creating a positive learning environment.

4. Writing Your Philosophy: Write a clear and brief summary on your teaching philosophy. Voice your core beliefs about teaching and learning and explain how those beliefs influence your instructional practices, classroom management, assessment strategies, and relationships with students.

5. Revisions: As you begin your teaching journey and build your understandings and strategies, revise and adapt your teaching philosophy as needed. Your teaching philosophy will change as you perfect your practices and gain more insight throughout your teaching career.

Reference

Gonzalez, V. (2020). What is the affective filter, and why is it important in the classroom? Seidlitz Education. https://seidlitzblog.org/2020/09/22/what-is-the-affective-filter-and-why-is-it-important-in-the-classroom/

Oviedo, D. (2017). Theoretical paradigms on L1 acquisition. Revista Vinculando. https://vinculando.org/en/theoretical-paradigms-on-l1-acquisition.html

It is important that educators reflect on their teaching practices to ensure they are meeting the unique needs of their students. Below you will find three strategies to become a self-reflective practitioner.

1. Request Feedback: Seek out feedback from administrators, colleagues, and students. Constructive feedback is a great way to perfect and adjust your practices to make sure your students are receiving what they need to succeed both academically and in their language acquisition.

2. Professional Development: Participate in workshops, conferences, or school courses that teach on the importance of self-reflection and academic practices/strategies. This can also be done by observing other teachers and noting their practices to develop your own teaching strategies.

3. Collaboration: Seek collaboration opportunities with fellow educators to share new strategies, hear new ideas, and discuss what is and is not working within your classroom. The support and input from other educators can help you to adapt your own teaching practices to ensure your students success.

   
   

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1. Sentence Stems: Sentence stems support ELL students in building well written responses. They help ELL students to organize their thoughts and express themselves more effectively.

2. Word Banks: Word banks provide ELL students with vocabulary scaffolding when completing written responses. This accommodations helps to guide their thinking and allows for them to more clearly express their thoughts.

3. Simplified Language: Providing test questions in simplified language supports ELL students in being able to understand the content and the directions/questions.

1. Language Program Observations: If possible, take time to observe and participate in the English language program within our school. By observing the teaching strategies utilized within a classroom focused on teaching ELL and bilingual students, educators can take note of the effective language acquisition instruction that is occurring, as well as the culturally responsive teaching strategies being implemented.

2. Professional Learning Communities (PLC): PLCs focused on supporting ELL students allows educators to collaborate with colleagues and administrators. PLCs provide opportunities to share best practices, evidence-based strategies, and problem-solving ideas to ensure ELL student achievement.

3. Workshops/Professional Developments: Workshops and professional development built around supporting ELL students in the classroom can provide educators with evidence-based and culturally responsive teaching strategies that can be implemented into the classroom.