22

ELL Facilitators Manual

Regional Workshop

Helping Pre-Service Teachers Create Quality

Education for English Language Learners

Facilitators Manual Part 2

Dr. Minda Morren Lpez

Associate Professor

Texas State University

San Marcos, Texas

Kappa Delta Pi, International Honor Society in Education

www.kdp.org

The Mission: Kappa Delta Pi strives to sustain an honored community of diverse educators by promoting excellence and advancing scholarship, leadership, and service.

The Vision: Kappa Delta Pi desires to help committed educators be leaders in improving education for global citizenship.

1. Welcome back, lets jump right in.

Do you recognize this man?This is Jim Cummins. He is a professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education in Toronto. He informed much of what we will be studying next.

http://www.oise.utoronto.ca/ctl/Faculty_Staff/Faculty_Profiles/1464/James_Cummins.html

http://iteachilearn.org/cummins/

2. When looking at language broadly, any language, Cummins describes language as divided into two categories (now his research has expanded on this notion, but here is the original concept in a simple form). They are BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) and CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency). Some educators think about BICS as equivalent to playground language and CALP as classroom language or the language of textbooks, content areas, and standardized tests. You can think about it as informal and formal language, also.

3. This is helpful for us as educators to think about when we approach how ELLs will learn English and also what type of language is required for various tasks.

4. Language can also be deceptive. Often students who have learned BICS and are very proficient in BICS may appear to have mastered English. But this is only one domain or area of language. Students typically learn BICS quickly and they learn to fit in with their English-speaking peers in social settings. But when it comes to academic language or CALP, they struggle. So when assessing ELLs we must take into account both BICS and CALP. We shouldnt be fooled by a students command of social English.

1. This visual helps us to see how ELLs catch up quickly to their English dominant peers in BICS but take longer in CALP. Our BICS or social language doesnt change as drastically over our lifetimes. Our academic language does.

2. Some reasons for the gap or difficulty in acquiring CALP include: all students are learning difficult and abstract academic language and concepts, so ELLs are trying to catch up to a moving target. CALP is also used less frequently, so the lack of repetition makes learning the academic vocabulary more difficult at times.

1. Have participants turn to p. 17 of their participants manual. There is an activity called BICS and the language of the content areas. Go over the first one together.

2. Talk about how ELLs will typically learn small before they learn microscopic -- but microscopic could be a word that approximates small and used in a science context. Other words for small that are used in science include: micro, atom, atomic; in math: fraction, less than; in social studies: minority, sparse; in language arts: diminutive, petite, tiny, short (as in short story).

3. The differences in language or discourse used in classrooms is even more pronounced at the secondary level, where teachers are trained differently and have stronger identities in the content areas. Often in elementary school, ELLs are with the same teacher throughout the day, so that teacher is able to make more concrete connections between words and concepts across content areas. In secondary school, this happens less, making the disconnect between the social and academic vocabulary in various content areas even more pronounced.

5. Ask participants to imagine that they are an ELL and they are going from class to classin one class the teacher uses the word microscopic to mean small, in another class they use diminutive and so forth. Stress how confusing that can be for ELLs and how we, as educators, can scaffold for our ELLs. Even though the academic terms are not EXACTLY the same as the BICS word and our students need to understand nuanced differences, helping them understand the connection back to the BICS word does help our students with overall understanding, then nuances are explained in further detail.

6. Encourage participants to go through the table with a partner or in table groups, filling out as many as they can. Then share aloud the different terms. Have a discussion about how BICS and CALP are evident in classrooms, the various ways we can scaffold for our students so that they understand the CALP more quickly, and any additional strategies they come up with.

Concept Map or Web: This is one example of how you can make the connection between BICS and CALP more explicit with your students.

1. This slide is a recap and lets participants know that there is much more to language than just BICS and CALP but this is a starting place for thinking about the wide variety of vocabulary and language understanding and usage that is required of a language learner.

1. This is a culminating activity a scaffolded way for participants to reflect on their learning in this section.

1. Metacognition Frames are intended to help participants in this workshop and also are a helpful strategies to use with your students for the same purposes. Debrief the activity as a group. Why is this strategy good for ELLs?

This is the end of section 3. Dismiss participants for lunch, reminding them of the start time for the next section of the workshop.

Part 3: What are some important considerations for programs and pedagogy for ELLs?

Approx 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 pm (60 Minutes)

1. It often surprises educators (especially those who are familiar with Special Education policies and mandates) that for ELLs there is no set program or approach for supporting ELLs at the federal level. There is federal legislation that states must decide how to support their ELLs but ultimately the type of support and programs is up to the state education agency.

1. Some states have adopted the Common Core; others have not. See page 20 your participants manual.

1. Go over the 3Ws strategy (p. 19 of the Participants manual). Let them know that this is a strategy that helps students with reading comprehension by chunking large parts of text into smaller sections, stopping and thinking about what you read, then sharing with a partner and negotiating understanding. Stress that students (and they) should stop at certain headings or subheadings, and then discuss with their partner.

2. Hand out the article by Honigsfeld on different programs for ELLs. Give participants some time to practice the strategy with the first portion of the article (5 minutes) and let them know they should read the intro and then stop at the heading Program Models on p. 167 to fill out the 3 Ws for the first time. After filling out the first two columns, they need to discuss with their partner and jot down notes in the third column (What my partner said).

3. Debrief and then give them time to finish the rest of the article, giving them instructions on where to stop and discuss. Then they continue reading the next section until Structured English Immersion (p. 168). Stop and fill out 3 Ws. Then read until English as a Second Language (p. 168). Stop and fill out 3 Ws. Then on to Bilingual Education (p. 169), stop and discuss, read on to to Dual Language Programs (p. 170) Stop and fill out the 3 Ws. Finally, finish the article to the end and fill out the 3 Ws. This means you should have 6 different 3 Ws filled out, and you should have stopped and discussed after each one (6 times).

4. You may have them simply fold a piece of paper in thirds to use for the strategy or to use notebook paper and draw three columns.

5. Debrief overall. Why is this strategy good for ELLs?

1. This is on p. 20 of the Participants Manual.

2. Now we are going to talk briefly about standards and our specific contexts. Each state has slightly different ways of serving ELLs (as discussed earlier).

2. For more info on Common Core: http://www.tesol.org/docs/advocacy/overview-of-common-core-state-standards-initiatives-for-ells-a-tesol-issue-brief-march-2013.pdf?sfvrsn=6

1. For this section we are going to ask participants to understand their own contexts by reading a policy brief that is relevant to your area. Facilitators: Feel free to add specific state policies, mandates, etc. here. It would be a great idea to talk to participants about what program options you have in your state (i.e. some states have adopted bilingual education, others have abolished it).

2. Policy Brief Options:

If you are in a Common Core state: http://www.tesol.org/docs/advocacy/overview-of-common-core-state-standards-initiatives-for-ells-a-tesol-issue-brief-march-2013.pdf?sfvrsn=6

Otherwise, you could have participants read this brief: http://www.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/PolicyResearch/ELLResearchBrief.pdf

Part 4: How can I become a more effective teacher of ELLs? Approx 2:45 p.m. to 4:00 pm (75 minutes)

1. Ask participants to give examples of each category. This is also on p. 21 of their Participant Manual.

1. This is found on page 21 of the Participant Manual.

2. If the hyperlink doesnt work, here is the URL: https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/modeling-strategy-getty Watch the video together (approximately 5 minut