The Best Practices for Teaching New Learners of English

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1 Hi Everyone! Teaching internationally, we are all English as a Second Language teachers at times unless of course we teach French or Arabic or Urdu! I hope that the following pages will be helpful to you. I have included general information about ESL from a wide variety of sources, and also several tips and strategies that you can use with your students in the classroom. These techniques are also quite useful for dealing with various learning styles and helping those who are having difficulty in certain subject areas. Contents English as a Second Language Best Practices for Teaching New Learners of English English Language Learners in Grade-Level Classrooms: Assuring Success Teaching Strategies for Classroom Use with ESL/ELD Students Especially for Elementary School Teachers Of Particular Interest to Middle and High School Teachers Happy Reading! You do not need to bring this document with you to the workshop It is simply helpful information for your use. Looking forward to our interactive, hands-on workshop Handouts covering these activities will be provided on site. Kathy Dyba

2 English as a Second Language Research Shows A child may understand simple instructions on the playground, but not understand English in academic setting. It takes an average of five to seven years for second-language learners to acquire the language skills necessary to participate fully in the all-english classroom. Teachers need to be aware of cultural and individual differences in learning styles of ESL students and provide opportunities for small group work, cooperative learning, peer tutoring/interaction and individualized instruction. Knowledge of home experiences and home culture affect the values of language use and help determine the ESL student s interpersonal style and success with language. ESL students need situations and settings where the student is an active learner, including interaction with native speakers. ESL students need to be challenged, yet successful in the classroom. Teachers need to be empathetic to what it takes to learn a foreign language. Students need to thoroughly develop their first language skills in order to be good second language learners. Teaching ESL in the Classroom Three of the most important factors in learning a language are Aptitude, Motivation and Opportunity. Although these are mostly internal factors, there are some things we can do to help children when they are learning a new language. Aptitude Nurture the native language and continue with its development Observe weaknesses in native language and anticipate potential problem areas in learning English Motivation Provide stimulating and fun opportunities to learn in English Set up situations where the child will need to learn English in order to enjoy an activity Set a good example by showing an interest in the language Opportunity Give the chance for exposure to English outside the classroom Allow children the chance to interact as much as possible with native speakers or even students with a different native language How Teachers Can Help to Maximize Learning Provide comprehensible input. Your students will only learn when the information you teach is meaningful. Model the language at every opportunity. Make the environment as stress free as possible. Provide numerous opportunities for students to hear and speak the language. Provide a network of support. Have clear and unmistakable guidelines. Setting Up a Stress Free Environment Students who are relaxed and self-confident learn better and faster. Show genuine interest in the students, their language and their culture Make your students feel secure. Even if you can t speak their language, you can reassure them and demonstrate interest and concern through gestures and tone of voice. Make your student feel that they should never be embarrassed or ashamed of their errors. Errors are a part of learning anything. If students are given the message that errors are bad, they will only

3 use forms they are perfectly sure of, thus closing the door to learning new forms through practice. Look at mistakes from an analytical perspective: use them to tell you what your student needs to learn in the future. Let them guide your instructional practices. Continually reinforce students progress. Keep charts, save their early papers in cumulative folders, and show them how far they ve come. Encourage your students to share their backgrounds and cultures. ESL students often long to talk about their homelands and cultures and are seldom given this opportunity. Asking students about their homelands not only provides them with the chance to talk about their countries, but also to use English while speaking about topics familiar to them. And other students in your class will benefit from immediate exposure to a variety of cultures. Best Practices for Teaching New Learners of English Make sure that students comprehend whatever they are expected to learn Students do not need to understand every single word they hear, but they must understand the general idea of what is being expressed. Meaning is essential, or the lesson becomes pointless. Use gestures, facial expressions, demonstrations and tone of voice to help students understand the message you are trying to convey. Bring in real objects and other visuals such as pictures Provide real-life, hands-on experiences for the students, if possible. Model what you want the students to do before asking them to do it. Language is a process New learners of English start out in the silent/receptive stage. The length of time a student will stay in this stage will vary with each individual. Students should not be forced to speak during this time, but they can follow comprehensible directions and listen to comprehensible stories, nursery rhymes, songs and chants. Listening and speaking activities precede reading and writing. Confusion is good, Confusion shows the students are thinking and trying to find meaning. It also gives the teacher a great opportunity to clarify. Be a language facilitator Make language as meaningful as possible for the students. If the objective is to teach English, speak only English, but do whatever necessary to make it comprehensible to students. If translation is always included, students will just wait for the translation and subsequently tune out the English. Second language acquisition is driven by need and motivation. Acknowledge that second language acquisition is difficult, but possible. Remember, second language learners are doing double in the classroom. Model comparisons Oh, you say weiss in German. We say white in English. Model cognates Mediate students language. Provide words to describe your actions or the actions of children. Talk out loud as you or the students perform actions and activities. You may want to provide picture dictionaries to help them find the vocabulary they need to be able to communicate. Provide a low anxiety atmosphere When a student is speaking, the focus should always be on the message. Only content is corrected, not grammar or accent. Avoid humour and sarcasm. Humour can confuse and sarcasm can be insulting and embarrassing to many other cultures. Cherish the knowledge and prior experience new learners of English bring with them.

4 Emphasize peer interaction Language is social. New learners of English must have numerous opportunities for meaningful interactions with peers, especially proficient English speakers. When using a buddy as a translator, know when to remove the support and facilitate English learning. Create heterogeneous groups to assure English is used to make meaning. Make talking expectations clear and create focused opportunities for students to talk together. Make sure students are receiving content instruction Thematic units created around content provide a way in which to cover concepts and vocabulary in meaningful ways. The meat of content provides a vehicle for language learning. New learners of English learn language and learn about language through content. Experience from hands-on content activities/experiments creates language Key vocabulary must be practised numerous times, in a variety of meaningful contexts to be learned. Assess what the students already know about the topic. Relate the topic to their personal experiences. Provide background experience/information and concept development, if necessary. (This may be an appropriate time to use the native language.) Introduce new learners of English to literacy as soon as possible Start to read good picture books to the students immediately. Encourage students to read comprehensible stories, poems, songs and chants along with you Utilize shared reading and writing approaches to involve students in literacy activities using common experiences. Go from the concrete (oral production) to the symbolic (letters/sounds/text). Continue to challenge students as they progress Continue to make sure content is comprehensible even when students begin to appear fluent. They still may have gaps in their cognitive academic language. Call attention to multiple meanings and idioms as they occur, since they can seriously interfere with comprehension. Use your ESL support wisely English Language Learners in Grade-Level Classrooms: Assuring Success

5 Transitioning: Establish Classroom Routines Write the daily schedule on the board. Use the same format for assignments and worksheets until the students are comfortable with them. Provide example sheets of the correct format and procedures for written work. Consistently post homework assignments on a particular portion of the board. Ask students to use an assignment book to record homework assignments. Pair ELL with average students who have been in the school at least a year. Use Effective Teaching Strategies Provide ample wait time for students to respond to questions. Allow students to work at their own pace in small groups. First, ask factual, concrete questions, and then proceed to inferential questions. Use global strategies: Preview the chapter or lesson. Show a related video or other visual. Read portions of the chapter aloud to model fluency. Give students opportunities to read silently before reading aloud. Summarize. Identify key points. Focus instruction on the perceptual channels: seeing, hearing, touching, smelling and tasting. Involve the whole body in learning - paint, play games, use manipulatives and the computer. Extensively use visuals especially overheads, power points, photos, videos, drawings and graphics. Cue students tell them when an important word or concept is coming. Condense lengthy directions. Provide time for students to ask questions about written directions. Teach study skills. Anticipating Student Difficulties in Content Classes The presentation of information and the interrelationship of concepts can overwhelm. Content teachers should speak more slowly and check comprehension regularly. Students are more accustomed to reading material of narrative nature not content texts. Many concepts may be introduced on one page of text. This requires slow intensive reading to understand the relationship between the concepts. Concepts are usually presented in an ascending scale of difficulty, so the reader must use previous knowledge and experiences to gain comprehension. A student must sense relationships and think critically while reading or listening to a lecture. Study skills are essential. Students must be able to access reference information from text and the internet. Vocabulary for terms, place names and concepts is not often used outside the classroom. It is school only vocabulary. Use it repeatedly. Reading and following instructions is particularly important in certain subject areas. Balance the presentation of factual content with processes for learning. Alert students to recurrent patterns in text and procedures so that they can learn them quickly. Locate alternate books of texts that provide similar content knowledge written at a lower readability level. Help students access their experience and knowledge to apply to the task. Supplement to assure that everyone in the class starts with the same background knowledge. Design Lessons and Activities and Choose Resources That Recognize Students Background Knowledge and Experiences. Encouraging students to share information with one another about their own languages and cultures strengthens all students awareness of language and culture and helps to give them a sense of belonging and of being respected.

6 Use Subject Content as a Vehicle for English-Language Instruction. Providing students with opportunities to acquire language in a context that is interesting and relevant will assist the language-learning process. As well, students need to begin as soon as possible to use the language of instruction to acquire important concepts and skills in the various subject areas of the curriculum and to develop higher-level thinking skills (e.g., problem solving, inferring, analyzing, synthesizing, and predicting). Adapt Programs to Allow Students in the Early Stages of Learning English and/or at Early Stages of Development in English Literacy to be Successful. Appropriate adaptations include the following: modifying some or all of the subject expectations; adapting instructional strategies to include simplified vocabulary and increased use of visual cues, graphic organizers, and peer tutoring; using students first languages at strategic times; using a variety of learning resources, including visual materials, simplified texts; and bilingual and picture dictionaries; modifying assessment strategies (e.g., by providing extra time, using conferencing, and having students complete graphic organizers and cloze activities for assessment tasks that depend heavily on proficiency in written English). Highlight the Different Ways in Which Language is Used in Various Subject Areas. All students, but especially ESL/ELD students, need to acquire the specialized vocabulary and language skills appropriate to each discipline. For example, in science and technology, students need practice in using the passive voice to write reports or describe processes. In mathematics, students need to understand and use expressions for comparing quantity, speed and size, as well as words and phrases related to mathematical operations, in order to communicate knowledge related to concepts, procedures and problem solving. In history and social studies, students need to become familiar with a wide range of tenses, words and phrases that indicate chronological and/or cause-and-effect relationships among ideas and events. Work Collaboratively With All Teachers of ESL/ELD Students. Share information with other teachers about the student s classroom behaviours, academic progress and willingness to participate in a variety of classroom activities and groupings. Share tips about effective ways of helping the student become familiar with the vocabulary and concepts of particular subject areas. Teaching Strategies for Classroom Use with ESL/ELD Students It is important for teachers to identify language that may be confusing to ESL/ELD students and to substitute clearer alternatives. Teachers can help maximize learning by providing comprehensible input. Students learn language best when they can understand what is said by inference: that is, by making connections to what they already know. To help students do this, teachers can use the following techniques.

7 Allow sufficient response time when interacting orally with ESL/ELD learners. Students need time to think in the first language and compose a response in the second. Use many non-verbal cues. Gestures, facial expressions and mime will help learners grasp the meaning of what you are saying. Be aware, however, that some gestures (e.g., pointing at people) may have negative meanings in some cultures. Use clear, predictable, guessable teacher talk. When adults or native-english speakers speak to each other, their speech is full of stops, starts and incomplete phrases. Consciously making adjustments in your speech to your ESL students is the most helpful way to speak to them. Speak naturally and only slightly more slowly than for native speakers of English. This means at a relaxed rate, not unnaturally slow. ESL/ELD learners have to learn to recognize English as it is actually spoken. It may be necessary to explain contractions such as don t and non-standard spoken forms such as gonna. Simplify vocabulary whenever possible. Choose simple, straightforward words that are in everyday use. For example, most students will understand Learn the new words more easily than Review the new vocabulary. This should not include technical vocabulary. Content areas have many technical words that are central to concepts being studied. You should not substitute these words for simpler ones; the students must know them to grasp the central meaning of the lesson. In other cases, finding simpler synonyms for words can make your speech easier to grasp. Expand the one-word or two-word sentences that students produce. When a student says, for example, Book home, you can respond, Oh, your book is at home. Here, use this one. Recycle new words. Reintroduce new words in a different contest or use recently learned words to introduce or expand a concept. Use contextual cues. Words and sentences are more comprehensible when they are used in a context that is understandable. Concepts, such as larger, smaller, fewer and more are easily understood when they are demonstrated with real objects such as coins. Make frequent use of a variety of concrete and visual supports. These might include models, toys, math manipulatives, pictures, charts, flashcards, vocabulary lists, key visuals, posters and banners. Demonstrate procedures and provide related hands-on activities. Monitor your sentence length. Don t make your sentences too long. Lengthy and complex sentences are often too hard for students to sort through. Simplify sentence structure. Avoid complex sentences and passive verbs if possible. For example, instead of The homework must be completed and handed in by Friday, it would be better to say You must finish the work and give it to me on Friday. Try to use the active voice and positive sentences. The passive voice is much more difficult to understand. For example, There will be no homework assignments handed in after January 10 th is harder to understand than You must hand in all homework by January 10 th. Be aware of figurative language. For example, saying Run that by me again or Now we re cooking! may confuse second-language learners. Avoid using slang and unusual idioms with beginning ESL/ELD learners. Idioms are notoriously untranslatable, that is, if you try to explain them word for word, their meaning is lost. Think of trying to explain such expressions as off the wall, out of the blue, keep it under your hat, or give me a ballpark figure. With students who have progressed beyond the beginning stage, develop techniques for explaining the use of non-literal expressions: for example, post a list of the week s idioms on a bulletin board, or have students illustrate the literal meaning. (This can be a lot of fun!) Give clear instructions. Number and label the steps in an activity. Reinforce oral instructions for homework and projects with a written out line to help students who may not be able to process oral instruction quickly enough to understand fully. Use linguistic cues or attention getters, such as look or watch to direct the students attention to important points. These signals alert listeners to the fact that you consider those points particularly important.

8 Use key words. Choose several words that are critical to the current lesson, write them on the chalkboard and use them frequently during the discussion so the students will get exposure in several different contexts. Use phonological cues, such as tone and stress, to emphasize these words and call the students attention to them. Highlight key ideas. Pause to get students attention before making an important point and make sure all students can see you. Use gestures for emphasis; raise the pitch and volume slightly; repeat or rephrase, or ask a student to do so. Review instructions and concepts periodically with the class to reinforce students comprehension. Use key visuals. Key visuals are teacher-developed graphic organizers that show how ideas are related. T-charts, Venn diagrams, flow charts, story maps, time lines, and decision trees are examples of organizers that are not dependent on language knowledge and that promote the development of thinking skills such as classifying, relating cause and effect, comparing and contrasting, or following a sequence. Check often for understanding. Stop to see if your ESL students are comprehending the material. Watch for body language, facial expressions, or signs of frustration that will alert you to whether or not the students are understanding. At frequent intervals say, Tell me what you have to do next. Simply asking Do you understand? is not enough. Many students will not admit they don t understand, either because they are ashamed or because they have been taught that their failure will be a sign of disrespect and an affront to the teacher. They may tell you they understand even when they are completely lost. Find alternative ways to check their comprehension, such as asking them to paraphrase a key point. Encourage them to tell you when they don t understand. Develop signals such as a little throat-clearing so that they can alert you without overtly stating so. If you teach in chunks, plan an activity to allow them to demonstrate their understanding in non-verbal ways before you go on to the next section. Provide notes that highlight key ideas and new words. Use the chalkboard or post a chart in the classroom for ongoing reference. Provide a summary sheet so that students can refer to it when studying at home. Provide bilingual support. For students who are in the early stages of learning English, bilingual peers can clarify instruction, provide translations of key words that are difficult to explain in English, and help you to determine whether a student understands. Use more than one method. Give assignments and lectures orally as well as by writing them on the chalkboard. Show a movie or a filmstrip on the same material as your lecture. Have a hands-on project in addition to reading assignments. Give feedback, such as a nod, a frown, or a look of bewilderment, so students know how well they are getting their attempts at communicating across. Especially for Elementary School Teachers Easing into English Basic Sheltering Strategies

9 Sheltering is a broad term that includes many different strategies for providing second-language learners with language they can understand. Here are some basic tips for teaching and communicating with students new to English: Slow Down Speak more slowly and pause between sentences. Wait patiently for the student to answer, even if there seems to be a long, uncomfortable silence. Show and Tell Use props. If you were teaching a unit on deserts, for instance, a cupful of sand, a handful of rocks, little plastic lizards, a cup of water, and a picture of a cactus would all give students a visual anchor and aid comprehension. Move the objects around to demonstrate your ideas: Cacti store water [hide water behind picture] or Lizards live in the sand [put lizard on sand]. Let students handle the objects as you say the object s name, and encourage them to repeat the names after you. Use visuals. Pictures, lists, charts, graphs, graphic organizers such as Venn diagrams, and maps all help students move concepts from the abstract to the concrete. Write it out. Being able to see words rather than just hear them is one more inroad into learning a language. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat Repeat words, sentences, instructions, and questions several times slowly. Students may be concentrating intently on each word and need repetition to put them together. Pantomime Act out words, sentences, and ideas. Simple hand movements ( come here, one minute ) can greatly aid comprehension of a more complicated message. Basic messages time to eat, push in your chair, good work can all be communicated with a small gesture. Use games such as role-playing and charades. You may notice cultural differences in children s understanding of hand gestures. For instance, the Western practice of curling the index finger to gesture come here or patting the head to show affection may be perceived as rude in some other cultures. You might explain the difference directly or demonstrate the gestures with other children first, rather than singling out the second-language learner. Use Manipulatives A shoebox full of small objects can serve several important purposes. It can be a visual-cue box from which you can pull visual references during your lessons. For instance, the sentence Birds migrate south in the winter can be acted out with a plastic bird, a calendar, and a small map. You can also illustrate prepositional concepts use a cloth and a doll to illustrate sentences, such as He is under [on top of, next to, etc.] the blanket. Manipulatives are perfect for counting or vocabulary practice. You might say, Count 20 marbles or Put the tiger next to the giraffe. You can also provide story starters by putting several of the items in a bag and asking students to pick an object and then write or tell a story involving what they chose. Here is a sample list of helpful classroom manipulatives: toy people; animals; cars and trucks; marbles in different colours and sizes; a folded cloth; calendar; small map; stamps or coins from a student s country of origin; a box of crayons; and several blocks in various shapes, sizes and colours. Preview Pre-teach important vocabulary. Write five or six key words on paper and illustrate their meaning. When talking about the desert, for example, draw pictures (or use images clipped from magazines) on chart paper next to the words lizard, sand, cactus, rocks and water. This will help new-language learners understand the meanings of words more quickly. Preview the lesson. Have an English-speaking volunteer, who also speaks a new student s language, briefly explain key points from the lesson in the student s first language. For instance,

10 Deserts have very little water. You might find cactus, lizards, and sand dunes in a desert. In your lesson, you ll learn how plants and animals survive in deserts. Simplify Choose your words carefully. Use high-frequency words as much as possible (e.g., choose fast over rapid or quick). Use simple, subject-verb-noun sentences. Use proper names rather than pronouns to avoid abstraction. For example, Tomas goes to the store, or Mikhail runs home. Break down questions. Simplify your questioning strategies. For instance, Look at the picture. [Indicate picture; child looks.] Where is the lizard? [You might act like a lizard; child points to lizard in picture.] Is the lizard sleeping or running? [You imitate both actions; child answers with one word.] Similarly, break down large chunks of information into smaller chunks. For instance, choose three key points that you want students to take away from the lesson. When asking questions, stick with simple who, what, when, and where, avoiding why and how. Keep it short. When reading aloud from a book, keep passages short and check comprehension as you go. Make it Relevant When students can relate concepts in English to their own lives, they will likely remember and understand the information. On a world map, for instance, you might point out where the second-language learners are from and explain, This is [is not] a desert. Make It Clear That Mistakes Are Okay Most children will take risks in a new language only if they feel it s safe to make mistakes. Anxiety, low self-esteem, shyness, perfectionism all can contribute to the raising of the affective filter (Krashen, 1982), the emotional block that hinders learning. When we re stressed, we don t perform as well. When the affective filter is down, however, language can flow freely to and from the learner. You can help keep the affective filter low by keeping the student s language demands appropriate difficult enough so that the children are learning, but easy enough as to be achievable. One way to do this is to correct errors indirectly. For instance, if a student says, Yesterday I make cake, you might respond, Yesterday you made a cake? Great! Modelling language in this way is extremely important in developing the child s ear for the sound of English. Work Together Working cooperatively in small groups gives students more opportunity to speak and interact meaningfully with others. Strategies for making small-group work successful include assigning specific roles and giving the second-language learner one challenging yet achievable task, such as labelling certain parts of a picture with simple words. Of Particular Interest to Middle and High School Teachers Integrating Language and Content

11 Students can learn content and language at the same time. In fact, integrating language and content learning the content material and the language needed to understand the content at the same time is more effective than simply learning language and only then trying to learn content. Integrated instruction brings both cognitive development and language. Content provides real meaning, not just structures of language that are abstractions and may seem to be of little value to the learner. Language instruction is most effective if it teaches language that provides access to subject matter, texts, discussions and class activities. When students learn subject and language together they are more motivated because the content is interesting and valuable to them. The language used in school is different from the language used outside the classroom. Students can master basic interpersonal communication skills with a year or two, but these do not carry over into the content areas where other kinds of language demands are made. Basic interpersonal communication skills are inadequate to attain the higher level skills of problem solving, inferring, analyzing, synthesizing and predicting, which are essential for academic success in content areas. Students are often asked to obtain information by reading texts that have few pictures to help guide comprehension. It takes five to seven years to acquire the academic language skills needed. Potential Problems The academic language of content-area classes can pose many problems for ESL students, especially in the areas of vocabulary, syntax and pragmatics. Vocabulary Each subject has its own particular set of terms that the students may not yet have learned. Many words used in everyday language have a specialized meaning within specific content areas, such as product or square in math, kingdom and matter in science, or primary and inflation in social studies. Many words are abstract and cannot be explained simply, such as justice. Syntax Textbooks commonly use the passive voice, reversing the normal word order, a form students come to understand and use only later on in their acquisition of English. Texts often use complex sentences whose meanings hinge on transition words like because or although, which students may not understand or notice. Pragmatics Students may not have enough English proficiency to understand the textbook or your lectures. Students may not know how to read difficult material for various purposes or have strong enough study skills to extract information from their textbook or reference materials. Many times they read narratives the same way they read expository prose or editorials, as if they were facts. Students may not have essential background or general knowledge needed to understand some content. Strategies Teach the language of the subject, including specialized vocabulary and language structures that occur with high frequency. Write key words on the board and use visual and other non-verbal cues wherever possible, to present key ideas. Use directed reading activities. Guided reading assignments will help students read purposefully and to better effect than if they simply attempt to wade through a chapter with the help of a dictionary. With ESL students, it is often better to discuss before they read, rather than the reverse. Consider: Previewing the text, focusing on chapter headings, illustrations, glossaries, etc. so that students have a sense of the organization and content before they begin to read. Providing a pre-reading question about the main idea(s) as a focus for reading. Having students keep vocabulary notebooks to record subject-related words and explanations along with contextualized usage examples. Providing follow-up questions that refer students back to the text to find details that support an argument or to draw inferences from their reading. Provide written notes, summaries, instructions and pre-reading. ESL students may not be able to process oral information quickly enough to understand fully or to make their own meaningful

12 notes. Your notes can highlight key ideas and new words. Written instructions are particularly useful to students when homework or major projects are assigned. Use cooperative learning strategies and peer tutoring ***Information compiled from a wide variety of sources