ESL Strategies for ESL Strategies for Gifted and Talented Gifted and Talented

StudentsStudents

Liliana SletmoenLiliana Sletmoen

GT ConsultantGT Consultant

Irving ISD, August 3Irving ISD, August 3rdrd 2005 2005

House keeping rules•Turn your cell phones off•What is said here stays here,

but what is learned here goes with you

•Take care of yourself•Please do not talk at the same

time the presenter is talking

Presentation Goals• Participants will review/learn about

gifted and talented traits, and behaviors of second language learners.

• Participants will review/learn about ESL teaching techniques that will aid the language acquisition process.

• Participants will learn the difference between the Salad Bowl and the Melting Pot Theory

Presentation Goals cont.

• Participants will learn about Black Board course information, and the documents contained in it.

We learn:• 10% of what we read• 20% of what we hear• 30% of what we see• 50% of what we both see and

hear• 70% of what we discuss with

others• 80% of what we experience

personally• 95% of what we teach someone

elseWilliam Glasser

Kingore’s Diversity Analogy

Being gifted is like having a real nice

car. But the environment in which

you drive affects your forwardmomentum.

Misconceptions and stereotypes

-There is a series of misconceptions and stereotypic expectations which were fostered in the early 20’s. Based on

longitudinal research which began with Terman (Burks, Jensen & Terman, 1930; Cox, 1926; Terman, 1925; Terman and

Oden, 1947, 1959), a wide spread assumption existed:

• Gifted children have high IQ’s.• Score well on achievement tests.

• Exceed norms in all areas of development.

• Are good looking.• Are motivated.• Are mature.

Could we identify those Could we identify those who are gifted when we who are gifted when we

first step into a first step into a classroom?classroom?

- How do we identify those who are gifted? Through behaviors

- Which behaviors are we trained to look for? Those studied by researchers like Renzulli.

How should we see English as a Second Language

Students?• If educators view English as a

Second Language (ESL) students as having bilingual and bicultural skills, rather than viewing then with a deficit view or lacking English Language skills, culturally and linguistically different students can be considered as a cultural resource.

Dorothy A. Sisk – Tempo Winter 2005

Behaviors of Mexican and Mexican-American

children• First and Second generation

Mexican, and Mexican American students have a deep respect for elders, the law, and authority. These children are seen as inefficient through the eyes of a teacher in a school system that values competition, initiative, and self-direction

(Cohen, 1990)

Behaviors cont.• The language barrier and the risk

of being ridiculed by his/her peers will turn a child into a silent learner thus affecting the socialization and adaptation process.

Behaviors – Cont.• An explanation for which a

potential gifted student will not verbalize deals with linguistic shock (Hadlich, 1971). English is a Teutonic language, it is direct(-----). Spanish is a romance language, it is not direct (~~~~~>). Being direct is a sign of rudeness in countries with Romance languages (Gartz, 1983).

Behaviors – Cont.• Do Spanish speakers go directly to

the point - being clear and concise when they speak?

- NO!!! Due to cultural reasons, and the language structure of the Spanish language, native Spanish speakers are educated to embellish and beautify every thought (i.e. Cantinfleando).

Behaviors – Cont.• What happens to those students who

resort to silence?- Krashen (1998) offers an explanation in

what he calls language alienation. Krashen explains that language is a maker of social group membership, and a child with limited English would rather go silent than to expose his social background.

- Spanish here in the USA is seen as the language of illegal aliens.

MacrocultureLanguage 2

Nationaloriginclass

region

community

personality

typeOf

giftedness

LevelOf

giftedness

age

religion

tiesto

MicroclutureL1

Gollnick and Chinn, 1990Modified by

Liliana Wright, 2004

• In communities across the country there are gifted English language learners who manage to successfully navigate both value systems [language and culture 1 and language and culture 2]. This demonstration of resiliency is a characteristic of gifted culturally and linguistically diverse students.

• Rance-Roney (2004) Tempo Winter 2005

The Social and Emotional Development of Gifted

English Language Learners• The acquisition of the language of

the new culture is closely intertwined with the changing of identity, for it is through the language of social interchange and the language of the classroom that an individual is led to continue renegotiation of self.

The Social and Emotional Development of Gifted

English Language Learners Cont.

•As the individual meets success in integrating into the second culture, there is an increasing danger of losing affirmation from peers of the first culture who have not yet integrated or have chosen not to integrate at all.

Rance-Roney (2004) Tempo Winter 2005

Is there an instrumentfor Hispanics?

• There is an instrument that studied the behaviors of Hispanic children. This instrument is called Hispanic Bilingual Gifted Screening Instrument. The researchers who created this instrument are Dr. Irby and Dr. Lara.

•www.teachbilingual.com

Remember that second language learners have the following

disadvantages in the classroom:• Language structure of mother language

versus English language structure.• Learning a language while learning

concepts.• Week or ill understood Second

Language Program.• Teacher’s lack of understanding of the

stages for language acquisition.• Stereotypes• The catch-up effect.

Kingore’s second language analogy

•The language different gifted has the car, but the signs and directions are in another language so it cannot go anywhere.

Kingore on culturally diverse gifted

•The culturally diverse gifted has the car, but it has a shrink-wrapped cover over it which clouds its potential.

Three powerful ESL Strategies

1.Vocabulary2.Think Alouds3.Readers Response

Essential Components of Scaffolding

1. Phonemic Awareness2. Alphabet Principles &

Phonics3. Word Study4. Fluency5. Vocabulary6. Comprehension

How successful children are in building their

vocabulary repertoires has

significant impact on their ability to read,

write, think, and learn.

Vocabulary/ Overview

Vocabulary Growth(listening, speaking, reading

and writing)

Build a word-rich

environment

Modelingword

learningbehavior

Children asIndependent

word learners

Think Alouds

Think alouds•Why do you think it is

important to observe children while processing information?

•Why is that we should model think alouds?

Readers Response Section

Readers Response• What is readers response?• How will this help the ESL students

in my classroom?• Will I be able to effectively

implement these strategies in the time allotted?

Salad Bowl vs. Melting Pot

In terms of immigrants, which theory do we

embrace?• Melting Pot?

• Why?

• Salad bowl?

• Why?

Definitions•Melting pot- All the

ingredients are placed in a hot pot. The flavors are mixed to produce one only flavor.

•Salad bowl- All of the ingredients are placed in a bowl keeping each ingredient whole due to the ingredient’s own qualities.

How do we see our non English speakers?

• With a language defficit that needs to be addressed by subtracting the mother language for the English language.

• With a language defficit that needs to be addressed by adding the English language to the mother language.

•Irving ISD Blackboard 6