When I started this course, I had very little idea who English learners were. I did not know the different classifications or the various purposes for learning English. When starting this chapter, I was struck by the first two sentences. “Language is a powerful means of communicating the deepest and highest desires, dreams, and ideals of humanity. Language helps use to fulfill our potential, to share our inner selves with others, or to act on the world powerfully” (Diaz-Rico, p. 1). The English learners, in America and around the world must feel as strongly about their native language as we do in America. Are we the only ones who force people to learn our language when they immigrate? After reading this chapter, I know that we are not the only country to ask this of our students. It appears, though, that we are failing in educating our ELs in public education. In many inner-city schools the EL constitute a large percentage (sometimes half) of the dropout population. Pre-K now stresses the need for educating our ELs. “The future productivity of the U.S. workforce depends on our current commitment to providing high-quality early childhood education programs for all children, but especially for the quickly growing Latino population” (Pre-K Now, 2008).
This article can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/article/26098.
Response to Peers:
“I have to admit that when I think of English Language Learners I think of Latinos or individuals from Hispanic descent. This comes from my background experience of working in school districts the service a predominantly Latino community,” said Jose Tapia. Like Jose, I have had a very limited view of who ELs are. I work in a school where the only second-language learners are Spanish speakers. This chapter was an eye opener for me as well. There are so many people trying to learn English and there are a variety of reasons for them to learn English. When I was reading the chapter, I was interested in the fact that they spread of English is putting other languages at risk. Amanda Wright addressed this same concern. She said, “I also learned that languages are actually endangered, I have grown so accustomed to English it is hard for me to imagine our native language would be gone forever; just like other languages have disappeared.” It is sad to think that people’s languages, and possibly cultures, will be gone forever. Do they even realize what they are giving up.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Chapter 13 BLOG
The focus of this chapter is teaching English in context. One thing that I rarely think about struck me as sad and factual. It was the section called Attitudes toward Dialects. In the interview with a woman from England, she expressed that she believes her dialect to be the “right one”. While people may not admit it, that is how we feel. I know we have all taken classes in which the teacher was a non-native English speaker who was difficult to understand. You spend so much time trying to decipher what they are trying to say that you miss the message of the lesson. While I do not think the person with an accent or with a specific dialect, I may be judgmental of their speech. As a teacher, I cannot let my inability to understand someone’s dialect interfere with my interactions. “Teachers who communicate dialect bias in the classroom do not merely damage the teacher-student relationship through prejudice or impair students’ academic success through their low academic expectations for them…the student who is made to feel inferior for reasons of accent internalizes the shame associated with discrimination” (Diaz-Rico, p. 339). I do not want my bias to color my relationship with my students. I do not want to make them feel inferior because of the way they speak. I would like to find ways to avoid doing this and having my students treat others with disrespect because of their speech patterns. In Context Counts in Second Language Learning, Walqui states, “Language attitudes in the learner, the peer group, the school, the neighborhood, and society at large can have an enormous effect on the second language learning process, both positive and negative. It is vital that teachers and students examine and understand these attitudes. In particular, they need to understand that learning a second language does not mean giving up one's first language or dialect. Rather, it involves adding a new language or dialect to one's repertoire” (Walqui, 2000). This further supports the dramatic impact that teachers and peers have on the ELs in the classroom. What can we do to help them?
This article can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/article/99.
This article can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/article/99.
Chapter 12 BLOG
The dual language immersion, or two-way immersion program, is becoming more popular in California. There are two of these classes in my district. The purpose of the program is to place an equal number of English and non-native speakers into one classroom. Instruction is provided in both languages throughout the day. Students will be learning curriculum and language skills in both languages. After reading previous texts about language of the majority being a feature of power, I can see how this program would promote equality and acceptance among the students. While there are many people who support the program, and I think it is necessary for English speakers to learn Spanish, it has critics that present valid points. “Experts concede that the greatest challenge in two0way bilingual programs if to ‘reduce the gap’ between the language abilities of the two groups. This gap appears as content classes in English are modified for English learners to ‘catch up,’ or as content delivery in the primary language is slowed for Spanish-as-a-second-language students” (Diaz-Rico, p. 322). Is learning the language more important than content? It seems that these programs are placing a greater value on language acquisition than the rate and quality of content instruction. “In current research (Thomas & Collier, 1995), when examining interactions among student background variables and instructional treatments and their influence on student outcomes, we have found that two-way bilingual education at the elementary school level is the most promising program model for the long-term academic success of language minority students” (Collier, 1995).
This article can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/article/100.
Response to Peers:
While reading Michelle Greco’s BLOG on this chapter I was interested in the student she described. She says, “We had a student enroll in the school after being in the US for 3 weeks. He had no L2 whatsoever. He was placed in an English only classroom, and there were no supports on campus to help with his language transition and acquisition. Because he did not understand the language, he started to act out. He became a major behavior on the campus.” She goes on to say that she put herself in his place. I know that I would be incredibly bored and feel insignificant in an environment where I didn’t understand what was being said, and where no one came to help me. I would fail! Alternatively, Amanda Wright talks about the benefits of the dual language immersion program. She says, “Being equipped with more than one language under your belt is becoming more and more common among teachers since our classes are always changing with new ethnicities in the classroom.” While this is true, what can be said for the students’ progress in content areas? Many times the pace must be slowed to address the language needs of both groups. Amanda also talks about “Language Time” in her class. She says she allows the students to ask her questions in their native language and she responds in the same language. I think this is awesome!
This article can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/article/100.
Response to Peers:
While reading Michelle Greco’s BLOG on this chapter I was interested in the student she described. She says, “We had a student enroll in the school after being in the US for 3 weeks. He had no L2 whatsoever. He was placed in an English only classroom, and there were no supports on campus to help with his language transition and acquisition. Because he did not understand the language, he started to act out. He became a major behavior on the campus.” She goes on to say that she put herself in his place. I know that I would be incredibly bored and feel insignificant in an environment where I didn’t understand what was being said, and where no one came to help me. I would fail! Alternatively, Amanda Wright talks about the benefits of the dual language immersion program. She says, “Being equipped with more than one language under your belt is becoming more and more common among teachers since our classes are always changing with new ethnicities in the classroom.” While this is true, what can be said for the students’ progress in content areas? Many times the pace must be slowed to address the language needs of both groups. Amanda also talks about “Language Time” in her class. She says she allows the students to ask her questions in their native language and she responds in the same language. I think this is awesome!
Chapter 8 BLOG
This chapter is all about teaching kids to use their imagination and developing their language skills through artistic means. This includes: stories, poems, music, role playing, and drama. While I am all about being silly with my kids (and they love it when I burst into random songs or jingles), I struggle with bringing drama into my classroom. What if my students, like me, do not like the attention of putting on a play or speaking in front of others. To make up for where I am lacking, I use poetry and creative writing. When we are doing an interactive writing activity, they struggle with developing details of their stories. They love for me to act out the story and ask them questions as we go along. At school last week, we had an amazing assembly on the writing process. It included developing details, deciding on a genre, and editing through dramatic role playing. I would like to be able to incorporate drama into my classroom. Diaz-Rico states, “Drama is a language laboratory for oral communication skills, enabling students to acquire speaker-listener experiences and increase their ability to decode and encode ideas. Drama makes it possible for both teacher s and students to escape from familiar patterns of language interaction…” (p. 214). It seems like students and teachers could benefit from some time thinking and interacting outside the box.
On a side note, Reading Rockets has created an idea developed around family involvement, fiction, non-fiction, hands-on activities, and imagination. They are called Family Literacy Bags. The bags are themed include: 2 books, instructions, and several activities. The parents are supposed to read with the child and participate in the hands-on or imagination building activity with their child. Is there a better way to develop literacy? I think it would be a great tool in the classroom to use as activity centers. It can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/content/pdfs/literacybags/time_08.pdf.
Response to Peers:
Amanda Wright states that imagination is an important tool in the classroom and should be used by teachers. She says, “The reason is if you read a story to a class of thirty-six students, you are going to have thirty- six different pictures to that story because they all visualized different things.” This is true! My students all see things differently. When we write stories together, they come up with a variety of ideas that are based in their imagination. I think we should find more ways to access the imagination of our students in the classroom. Michelle Greco also supports the use of imagination based activities in the classroom. She says, “This is a great way for students to be excited to write, use their imagination, and then be able to organize their stories in a way where they can be performed.” I am a proponent of anything that I can do to get my students excited about writing and reading. Michelle also talks about a program called Academic Enrichment. It is centered around drama, story writing, and performing. I hope I can find more information about it.
On a side note, Reading Rockets has created an idea developed around family involvement, fiction, non-fiction, hands-on activities, and imagination. They are called Family Literacy Bags. The bags are themed include: 2 books, instructions, and several activities. The parents are supposed to read with the child and participate in the hands-on or imagination building activity with their child. Is there a better way to develop literacy? I think it would be a great tool in the classroom to use as activity centers. It can be found at: http://www.readingrockets.org/content/pdfs/literacybags/time_08.pdf.
Response to Peers:
Amanda Wright states that imagination is an important tool in the classroom and should be used by teachers. She says, “The reason is if you read a story to a class of thirty-six students, you are going to have thirty- six different pictures to that story because they all visualized different things.” This is true! My students all see things differently. When we write stories together, they come up with a variety of ideas that are based in their imagination. I think we should find more ways to access the imagination of our students in the classroom. Michelle Greco also supports the use of imagination based activities in the classroom. She says, “This is a great way for students to be excited to write, use their imagination, and then be able to organize their stories in a way where they can be performed.” I am a proponent of anything that I can do to get my students excited about writing and reading. Michelle also talks about a program called Academic Enrichment. It is centered around drama, story writing, and performing. I hope I can find more information about it.
Chapter 7 BLOG
We have been taught, in this program to use a Balanced Literacy Approach. This should include: shared reading, teacher read-alouds, reading workshop, shared writing, interactive writing, writing workshop, and work study. I use a lot of the components of this in my classroom. It is effective! My students gain confidence through reading stories over again and achieving independence. They feel successful when they see their ideas as part of the interactive writing we do. Additionally, my classroom environment is a print-rich environment, in which my students can see their work, read stories, and review posters they have made. When they have participated in creating the things on the walls, they have a sense of ownership and pride. I would, however, like to develop activities based around the Language Experience Approach, in which students tell stories and we write them down. “The texts they create can be used for specific lessons on vocabulary, grammar, writing conventions, structure, and more” (Diaz-Rico, p. 172). The idea of using their stories as the basis for lessons teaches them that their ideas are valued and will continually show them how we make mistakes and can make our writing better. In an article on the reading and writing development of ELs, researchers suggest that teachers should, “Utilize personal narratives and writing workshop techniques to help learners become comfortable with the craft of drafting, sharing, and revising their pieces” (Hudelson). The article, called Children's Writing in ESL can be found at http://www.readingrockets.org/article/287. This sounds a lot like the ideas presented in the chapter advocating the Balanced Literacy Approach.
Response to Peers:
The language experience approach and balanced literacy approach have value in our classrooms working with Special Education and ELs. Michelle Greco talks about the way that our teacher preparation classes have supported the balanced literacy approach. Like Michelle, I took the class with Stan Swartz last quarter. I found the literacy support cycles and the balanced literacy approach to be an asset to my classroom. When looking at Melissa Hale’s BLOG, I was surprised by her quote, although I read it myself. She refers to the fact that students who don’t learn to read in elementary school are far behind in high school and high risk as drop-outs. We do all we can to help our students succeed in reading and writing. The fact is, in special education, some of my students will never read on-level or independently. I do everything I can to help them succeed, but like Melissa, the lack of home support has a significant impact on their continued progress.
Response to Peers:
The language experience approach and balanced literacy approach have value in our classrooms working with Special Education and ELs. Michelle Greco talks about the way that our teacher preparation classes have supported the balanced literacy approach. Like Michelle, I took the class with Stan Swartz last quarter. I found the literacy support cycles and the balanced literacy approach to be an asset to my classroom. When looking at Melissa Hale’s BLOG, I was surprised by her quote, although I read it myself. She refers to the fact that students who don’t learn to read in elementary school are far behind in high school and high risk as drop-outs. We do all we can to help our students succeed in reading and writing. The fact is, in special education, some of my students will never read on-level or independently. I do everything I can to help them succeed, but like Melissa, the lack of home support has a significant impact on their continued progress.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Chapter 6 BLOG
This chapter focuses on the two main components of oral language: listening and speaking. There are a variety of strategies that teachers can use to assist students in developing their listening and speaking skills in their secondary language. Primarily, teachers used to use repetition of phrases and chants to aid language learners in acquiring listening and speaking skills. The chapter refers to Carol Graham as having interesting chants to use with students. There are three books out there: Small Talk; Jazz Chant Fairy Tales; and Singing, chanting, telling tales. You can find a printed version of Jazz Chant Fairy Tales at http://www.scribd.com/doc/20570495/Carolyn-Graham-Jazz-Chants-Fairy-Tales. Apparently, “jazz chants provide rhythmic presentations of the sentence intonation patterns of English” (Diaz-Rico, p. 147). This book, specifically, is better for younger students working with longer texts. When looking at this text, I am impressed at the fun quality of the chant without being too young for my students. We use Into English for EL1 and EL2 in school. There are chants embedded within the text but the topics are very young, making my students feel like they are doing work for babies.
Additionally, I loved the games listed in Table 6.4 (Diaz-Rico, p. 162). They appeared fun and simple, allowing for groups to work and compete with each other. After reading some reviews online, I discovered that this book contains some redundancies in activities; they are, for the most part, fun and useful as language building tools.
Response to Peers:
Michelle Greco stated that she felt that her EL students have a difficult time trying to figure out what to say and when to say it. Like Michelle, I forget that some of my students do not have the support at home. Their parents may not know English and may only converse with them in Spanish. With my students, I am always reinforcing their language and restating what they have said. It is sad to think that the reinforcement of English language use ends when they walk out the door of my classroom. After reading Michelle’s BLOG, I looked at Amanda Wright’s. She addressed the learning of BICS through listening to students. She says, “Sometimes we tend to forget that in order to help the students we really need to take time to listen to them.” I wonder if I am doing enough listening to my students. It is easy to get bogged down in the day to day stress and activity of teaching. We all need to take the time to listen, really listen, to our students.
Additionally, I loved the games listed in Table 6.4 (Diaz-Rico, p. 162). They appeared fun and simple, allowing for groups to work and compete with each other. After reading some reviews online, I discovered that this book contains some redundancies in activities; they are, for the most part, fun and useful as language building tools.
Response to Peers:
Michelle Greco stated that she felt that her EL students have a difficult time trying to figure out what to say and when to say it. Like Michelle, I forget that some of my students do not have the support at home. Their parents may not know English and may only converse with them in Spanish. With my students, I am always reinforcing their language and restating what they have said. It is sad to think that the reinforcement of English language use ends when they walk out the door of my classroom. After reading Michelle’s BLOG, I looked at Amanda Wright’s. She addressed the learning of BICS through listening to students. She says, “Sometimes we tend to forget that in order to help the students we really need to take time to listen to them.” I wonder if I am doing enough listening to my students. It is easy to get bogged down in the day to day stress and activity of teaching. We all need to take the time to listen, really listen, to our students.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Chapter 11 BLOG
This chapter talks about developing English language proficiency among students through constant use of the new language. This is not just through repetition and memorization, which is what most American classrooms rely on. The chapter stresses the importance of meaningful use of language. Students benefit most from opportunities to express thoughts and interpret meaning in English. When developing instruction for English language learners, teachers should look at the amount of time they are talking versus the amount of time the student is talking. The point is to speak to students in a manner that they understand. “Teachers who are sensitive to varying cultural styles are aware that in some cultures students are reluctant to display knowledge before a large group. They will take care to organize other means for students to demonstrate language and content knowledge, such as small-group discussions” (Diaz-Rico, p. 303). This is where the Instructional Conversation comes in. It is an opportunity to develop oral language proficiency. This should be done in a small group format in which all parties are responsive and contributes to the conversation equally. An IC is an opportunity for the teacher and students to interpret, predict, and construct meaning through discussion about the text. ICs should provide opportunities for students to think, reflect, express ideas, and argue positions as they develop an understanding of the text. The concept of ICs is that students can use the knowledge of their peers and teachers to understand things that were too difficult for them alone.
There is an article called, “Extending English Language Learners' Classroom Interactions Using the Response Protocol” by Kathleen A.J. Mohr and Eric S. Mohr. It can be found at http://www.readingrockets.org/article/26871. It is a valuable tool for developing appropriate instructional conversations and assisting teachers with questioning strategies that expand students’ use of language.
Response to Peers:
This chapter addressed the kinds of discourse used in the classroom to address the needs of English learners. Jose Tapia focused on the recitation pattern. He said that he recognized that he uses this pattern in his classroom regularly. I too, as well as most teachers I know, use the recitation pattern in the classroom. It is a way to structure the conversation and get quick feedback on what they are learning. I wonder if we are doing a disservice to our students if this is our primary form of interaction. Alternatively, Amanda Wright addressed the recitation pattern in her BLOG. She viewed it positively and says, “…from witnessing this in use in another teacher’s class it was amazing to see the growth. Basically it is a question answer session creating a higher level of thinking and thought provoking.” I disagree with the higher level thinking skills being addressed in the recitation pattern. I see it as asking the student to regurgitate what is being taught or what they already know. Additionally, I have seen the recitation pattern used in other classrooms. There is growth, among a certain type of student. Are those students showing growth the ELs?
There is an article called, “Extending English Language Learners' Classroom Interactions Using the Response Protocol” by Kathleen A.J. Mohr and Eric S. Mohr. It can be found at http://www.readingrockets.org/article/26871. It is a valuable tool for developing appropriate instructional conversations and assisting teachers with questioning strategies that expand students’ use of language.
Response to Peers:
This chapter addressed the kinds of discourse used in the classroom to address the needs of English learners. Jose Tapia focused on the recitation pattern. He said that he recognized that he uses this pattern in his classroom regularly. I too, as well as most teachers I know, use the recitation pattern in the classroom. It is a way to structure the conversation and get quick feedback on what they are learning. I wonder if we are doing a disservice to our students if this is our primary form of interaction. Alternatively, Amanda Wright addressed the recitation pattern in her BLOG. She viewed it positively and says, “…from witnessing this in use in another teacher’s class it was amazing to see the growth. Basically it is a question answer session creating a higher level of thinking and thought provoking.” I disagree with the higher level thinking skills being addressed in the recitation pattern. I see it as asking the student to regurgitate what is being taught or what they already know. Additionally, I have seen the recitation pattern used in other classrooms. There is growth, among a certain type of student. Are those students showing growth the ELs?
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