How can esl teachers support teachers in other
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How Can ESL Teachers Support Teachers in Other Mainstream Subjects? Presentation For AGIS By Lindsay Raggett Leipzig International School
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Transcript of How can esl teachers support teachers in other
How Can ESL Teachers Support Teachers in Other Mainstream Subjects?
Presentation For AGIS
By Lindsay Raggett
Leipzig International School
Who are the ESL students teachers need support for?
• Beginners in English?• Intermediate English learners?• Upper intermediate or advanced English
learners who may have exited the ESL programme?
• The majority of students in our mainstream class?
Remember what research says.
• Students schooled in two languages take four to seven years to reach norms on standardised achievement tests.
• Younger students who have had no schooling first in their Mother Tongue may take up to ten.
Collier (1979) and Cummins (1984)
Add text from German text book.
How must it feel for our English learners?
″ Effective education for ESL students is only possible if ‘every teacher is an ESL teacher.’ ″
Maurice Carder, 2007, p42
1. How can mainstream teachers themselves support ESL students in their classes?
2. How can ESL teachers support students in subjects beyond English?
3. How can ESL teachers and other teachers support each other?
What teachers can be doing already
• Thoughtful use of words and slower speech, awareness of TTT
• Vocab lists for topics, preview vocab, vocab notebooks from A-Z
• Subject dictionary• Bilingual dictionary• Display vocabulary and pictures on the wall• Allow the use of MT in the classroom
What teachers can be doing already
What teachers can be doing already
• Thoughtfulness in grouping• Keep in mind your ESL students when
selecting a text book• Use a text book and jotter • Visuals, demos, hands-on material• Graphic organisers• Give students time to process. • Share objectives with class (write them up)
What teachers can be doing already
What teachers can be doing already
What teachers can be doing already
• Range of classroom participation opportunities, e.g. agreement circles
• Range of interactive activities, e.g. Tic-Tac-Toe; Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Echevarria et al.
2008 p127)
• True/False, matching, gap-fills etc preceding more lengthy reading exercises
• Students give feedback to short texts with symbols e.g. x ? ; Clunk Click Sadler 2001
• Comprehension checks e.g. Blockbuster style
What teachers can be doing already
• In tests provide more time for students who need it
• Graduated testing from cloze to longer answers
• Share your rubrics with students• Let students propose alternative ways to
accomplish goals Tomlinson et al 2006
• Adapted texts• Homework Club
What teachers can be doing already
• Parental involvement• TESMC course• Don’t make assumptions about what your
student does/doesn’t know• Have language objectives as well as a
content objectives in planning • Give feedback (language and content)• Drafts, redrafts and redrafts again
What teachers can be doing already
Ultimately the aim is for all teachers to not only facilitate academic achievement, but to also support the English learners’ academic proficiency.Goal Adapted from Virginia P.Rojas Presentation Tokyo Int School 2009
What about the ESL department?
Is it our job to support students in other academic subjects?
In Primary
Pull out or push in?• A pull-out program with a language based
curriculum with little or no coordination with the mainstream classroom is not suitable.
• If the ESL lessons are too relaxed in pace or the mainstream is too difficult, acquisition is slowed down. Calderon (2007)
Pull out or push in?
• ‘Ownership’ of the ESL students can be an issue. ESL teachers feel the need to protect from discomfort in the classroom. Classroom teachers are concerned when ESL students are not keeping up with the curriculum and can blame it on their time away from the class.
• Pull-out risks the students falling behind.
Pull out or push in?
• The pull-out lessons need to be content as well as language based and balance academic rigor with sensitivity
• Communication between teachers• ESL attendance at Grade Level meetings• Creation/adaptation of worksheets• A folder• Time is needed for the ESL teachers to
familiarise themselves with materials
In Secondary
A Sheltered Instruction programme in addition to normal ESL classes
″Sheltered Instruction is an approach for teaching content to ELs in strategic ways that make the subject matter concepts comprehensible while promoting the students’ English language development. ″Echevarria et al. 2008 p13
The Pitfalls of Sheltered Instruction
• Getting the students on board• Where can we pull the students from?• Reassuring students that they aren’t
missing out• Timetabling nightmare
Getting started in Sheltered Instruction
• Become a student• Communication with the mainstream teacher• Share objectives with the students• Work together with the teacher to achieve
specific language objectives for individuals• Share resources both ways• Provide scaffolding for lessons/Mini-lessons• Find alternative resources, e.g. GCSE revision
Aids adapted
How can we help each other?
• Give colleagues feedback regularly so that progress is being monitored carefully (this should happen in both directions)
• Share the material that will help scaffold the content. This is often very useful for many students.
• Partner Grade level or subject teachers with an ESL specialist
• Set aside some time to read and discuss research.
How can we help each other?
• Remember, ESL or Sheltered Instruction teachers cannot meet all of the linguistic and academic needs of the English language learners by themselves. Rojas, 2009
• ‘We’re all in this together.’ High School Musical
