Teachers who work with English as a Second Language learners will find ESL/ESOL/ELL/EFL reading/writing skill-building children's books, stories, activities, ideas, strategies to help PreK-3, 4-8, and 9-12 students learn to read.
Social Studies Instruction for ELLs
Educating Language Learners: Getting at the Content
Author: Yu Ren Dong; ASCD
Summary: In "Getting at the Content" Yu Ren Dong proposes that by teaching language learning strategies, content area teachers can accelerate content mastery for their English language learners. Dong recommends actively teaching content-specific language while providing ample opportunities for students to use that language both in meaningful class discussion and in writing. The article includes vignettes from science and social studies classrooms that demonstrate how language instruction can be interwoven with content instruction.
Tags: Comprehension; Content Areas: Science; Content Areas: Social Studies; Curriculum; Differentiated Instruction; Vocabulary;
Target Population: All
Research Questions the Report Poses: How can teachers integrate language and content in mainstream subject-matter classes to facilitate English language acquisition?
Findings:
Our mainstream subject-matter classes are becoming increasingly linguistically and culturally diverse. It is imperative that subject-matter teachers sensitize their instruction to English language learners' backgrounds and needs and teach subject-matter knowledge through language.
Policy Recommendations:
- Subject-matter teachers should systematically teach discipline-specific language. They should also pay attention to the functional use of language in classroom discussions.
- Teachers should use writing as a tool to promote language development by aligning writing assignments with language-development needs.
- Teachers also need to be aware of students' English proficiency levels and cultural and education backgrounds so they can tailor their instruction to specific language needs.
Dong, Y.R. (2005). Educating language learners: getting at the content. Educational Leadership, 62(4), Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/dec04/vol62/num04/Getting-at-the-Content.aspx
Making Social Studies Meaningful for ELL Students: Content and Pedagogy in Mainstream Secondary School Classrooms
Author: Michelle Yvonne Szpara, Iftikhar Ahmad
Summary: In "Making Social Studies Meaningful for ELL Students: Content and Pedagogy in Mainstream Secondary School Classrooms," Szpara and Ahmad describe a study that partnered university faculty with high school social studies teachers in an effort to make social studies content accessible to English language learners. The social studies curriculum poses particular challenges for ELLs because it assumes both culture–specific background knowledge and proficiency in English literacy skills. To be successful, students must master material with a high cognitive load that includes extensive specialized vocabulary and abstract concepts. Szpara and Ahmad suggest a three-tiered approach to social studies instruction for ELLs that includes creating a socially supportive classroom, providing explicit instruction in strategies that support comprehension, and reducing cognitive load without reducing content. For each of these tiers, the authors list specific, concrete strategies that the university–school partnership identified as best practices for the social studies classroom.
Tags: Comprehension; Content Areas: Social Studies;
Target Population: Middle, High School
Research Questions the Report Poses: What are the challenges and successes in developing an effective instructional environment for teaching secondary–level social studies curriculum to a sheltered population of ELLs?
Findings:
- Indeed, social studies instruction for English-language learner (ELL) students presents a second, uniquely embedded challenge —not only are the ELL students learning a new language and culture while in the classroom, they must learn a different interpretation of historical events, develop a different conception of government, and learn a different philosophy of citizenship.
- The ELL population encounters a number of critical barriers which may impede their citizenship education: lack of prior exposure to elementary school social studies curriculum, a rudimentary understanding of the cultural context, and more importantly, their lack of English literacy skills which are vital for comprehending social studies material, acculturation, and socialization in the dominant culture.
- Best practices for ESL students can also benefit all students in the mainstream classroom, including those who may have lower reading abilities, learning disabilities, attention-deficit disorders, or other challenges which may affect their comprehension and/or production capabilities in the classroom.
Policy Recommendations:
The authors' recommendations fall into the following categories:
- The Development of Socially Supportive Classroom Environment
- The Explicit Teaching of Academic Skills under the Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA)
- Approaches for Reducing Cognitive Load and Increasing the Accessibility of Complex Content Knowledge
Szpara, M.Y., Ahmad I. (2006). Making Social Studies Meaningful for ELL Students: Content and Pedagogy in Mainstream Secondary School Classrooms. Essays in Education, 16. Retrieved from http://www.usca.edu/essays/vol162006/ahmad.pdf
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