Authors Jane D. Hill and Kathleen M. Flynn provide a different approach to Classroom Instruction that Works and Marzano’s Instructional strategies, one that includes the ELL perspective. This text provides instructional strategies that can be applied to ELL students in every grade level and includes specific steps and guidance for educators that will boost the achievement levels of ELL students.
This resource is available via the Gale Virtual Reference Library.
We are always working at moving students toward grade level curriculum. The work we do to provide students English language development with text that is accessible for their language level is crucial in helping them progress through the four domains of language.
Please examine the supports we’re providing. These supports give students a chance to rehearse academic language, skills, and strategies that they will encounter in their general education classrooms while using text that is accessible with teacher support and text that is accessible independently. Both are vitally important as we scaffold and solidify language for kids.
K-1 Planning with the Reading Continuum Exemplar
2-5 Planning with the Reading Continuum Examplar
K-1 Blank planning template as a PDF
2-5 Blank planning template as a PDF
K-1 Blank planning template that you can adapt
2-5 Blank planning template you can adapt
“What do I do? This student has no English! They can’t possibly…”
Ah, but they can! We just have to do a few things differently! Our Level One students are acquiring language all day long. We have to make “input” more comprehensible for them and try to create as many “i+1” moments as we can by providing scaffolds and reframing our brain about what “output” can look like.
Language is acquired through “input.” But “output,” or using that language to share your thinking and understanding, is what makes you smarter! Level One students can share their thinking in many different ways. Some helpful ways to support language input and output for Level One ELLs can be found in the resources below.
Level One Scaffolds and Supports
To see one of those scaffolds in action, click here to watch!
The following websites are great for Read Alouds and can easily be paired with a retelling activity, or simply drawing “I liked the part when…” One suggestion…preview the texts beforehand to make sure they are comprehensible! Sometimes, it is difficult to understand the story if the pictures don’t flow well with the text.
Language Notebook Response Ideas for Online Read Alouds
Sundance Literactive Readers: Leveled Readers Meegenius
You can even find some celebrities reading books aloud here:
Storyline Online Read to Me Speakaboos
World Book-Early World of Learning (which has books AND learning games!)
Find great introduction and practice for English language structures, vocabulary and early literacy skills at…
To access language support from Lincoln City Libraries, follow the steps found here.
***To make your own Level One Kit, find a list of all the ingredients here!***
In order for English Language Learners to work at an independent level on grade level materials, we need to focus on the language of the learning. When ELL students are in general education classrooms, what strategies will they be using? What will it look like? What will it sound like and what will they be expected to do to be an active member in the classroom and access learning at an independent level?
Get to know your students. Where are they in both BICS and CALP language development? How will we use the instructional materials provided in our classrooms such as McGraw-Hill, Rigby and the like as a vehicle to teach academic language and concepts?
To access the General Education pacing guides for reading, the language required for each skill taught and the common strategies that are used across grade levels, please see the following supports generated by the ELL Instructional Coaches:
ELL Language Support Guides by Grade Level
Language Continuums
Language Continuum for Comprehension Skills and Strategies
Language Continuum for Grammar
Langauge Continuum for Vocabulary Strategies
Pacing Guides Across Grade Levels
Comprehension Strategies Pacing
Click here for supports in planning and using online resources, as well as for recommendations about what pieces would be most appropriate for use in instructing language learners.
Click here for supports for Kindergarten and First grade in using online resources.
To utilize some of the components McGraw-Hill Wonders curriculum in your ELL classroom digitally, please click here.
For further information about why ELLs need to have language presented at their language level and scaffolded instruction in order to progress through both language learning and speaking, listening, reading, and writing, please read more here.
We’ve had the opportunity to share more about ELL and the perspective of students acquiring more English through our Professional Development offering of ELL Symposium II. During this PD, participants had the opportunity to build on the theories and practices shared in ELL Symposium I, explore how these foundations are applied throughout learning communities and examine the impact of English Language Learners within their building community and how to ensure learning is comprehensible throughout the day.
We wanted to share some additional resources with you that we mentioned during this presentation:
ELL Rubric Checklists:
Elementary ELL Rubric Checklists
Secondary ELL Rubric Checklists
Professional Development Offerings for ELL Teachers:
Enhancing Writing in the ELL Classroom: Featuring the whys and hows of instructing ELLs in a variety of writing genres, as well as information about shared and interactive writing and writing for an authentic purpose
Enhancing Reading in the ELL Classroom through Guided Reading: Featuring a look at guided reading for ELLs, as well as how to examine leveled reading assessments through an ELL lens
Enhancing Reading in the ELL Classroom through Comprehension and Questioning : Featuring Information on examining Reading Fluency for ELLs as well as comprehension and questioning
Independent Reading Practice for ELLs: Featuring a look at how independent reading is a gradual release process for ELLs
ELL Essentials: Featuring a look at implementing strategies that work well to provide access and rehearsal for ELL students
So you say you want to use Photobooth to publish student work? What a great idea! Did you know that Photobooth is so versatile because it is…
Resources to Get Started:
Using Photobooth to Publish Planning Guide
Examples of Photobooth Publishing Recordings to share with kids:
Let’s learn our Photobooth Publishing Do’s and Don’ts!
Presentation Templates:
For Primary:
Presenation Flip cards in PDF format
Edit the Presentation Flip cards, if you wish, in Comic Life
For Intermediate Grades:
Resources For When You’re Ready to Record:
If you’re not sure how to use Photobooth or need a refresher, check out one of these resources that will help walk you through the process:
Photobooth Basics–a step by step guideline
How to Use Photobooth–a step by step guideline
At our ELL flex session focusing on comprehension and questioning, we had the opportunity to talk more about what supporting these two things across language levels looks like and how doing so provides support for language acquisition. ELL teachers participated in the sharing of three big ideas throughout the session: ELL implications on reading fluency, the comprehension strategy of questioning, and a chance to apply more comprehension strategies across language levels.
Fluency We began by investigating how reading fluency consists of two components: word identification or decoding and the comprehension or construction of the meaning of text. Both of these components must be happening simultaneously for students to be considered fluent readers. We considered the ELL implications on fluency disruptions, fluency support, and fluency measurement.
The find the Powerpoint presentation of only the Reading Fluency portion of this session, please click here.
Questioning We discussed how to scaffold the reading strategy of questioning across language levels. Teachers had the chance to think about how to access higher order thinking skills, even with low language levels, and rehearse the reading strategy of questioning at the same time.
Access this questioning activity and the resources for higher order thinking skills below:
Tiered Thinking Across the Stages of Second Language Acquisition
Comprehension Strategies Finally, teachers had the chance to apply what partnering a research based comprehension strategy with higher order thinking skills looks like when scaffolded across language levels.
The strategy handouts and additional resources to support the strategies are:
Graphic Organizer used to scaffold comprehesion strategies across language levels
Teachers shared their ideas about scaffolding comprehesion strategies across language levels in a Googledoc. Check out their great ideas here.
To find the entire powerpoint, including all the information about fluency, questioning, higher order thinking skills, and comprehension strategies, please click here.
DRA, LRP, Benchmark Books…whatever name they go by, the bottom line of each of these reading assessments is to hopefully allow teachers to get a better understanding of students’ reading proficiency.
ELL students have extra steps when they read. Not only do they have to think about the code of the language and actually reading and pronouncing words (phonics and phonemics) but, they also have to negotiate the language structures in text, and use them to create meaning and understanding (semantics, syntax, and comprehension). And do all this in a language that isn’t their first! Phew! That is a lot for them to think about!
With that in mind, then, there are a few considerations to keep in mind when doing and examining these assessments with ELLs.
First, look carefully at the students’ oral reading proficiency assessment. If they are making errors, what do those errors tell you? Are they language errors like dropped endings, mispronunciation, or trouble with certain language structures? Or are they skill-based errors like phonics miscues or trouble with sight words? What do those errors tell you about the student’s English language proficiency? How can you use that knowledge to continue to address both language-based and skill-based instruction in their guided reading groups?
Second, what does the comprehension piece of the reading assessment tell you? Did they pass the reading accuracy and fluency portion of the assessment but struggle on the comprehension? If so, then they will require explicit instruction on how to slow down, read for meaning, and check themselves to make sure they are understanding text. Did they pass the comprehension portion but had a low fluency rate (reading rate)? What is the reason behind that? Were they reading word-by-word and struggling with decoding? Or were they simply reading slowly because they were going through a meaning-making process and working hard to make sense of text? We want to make sure that we are placing ELLs in guided reading groups where they are comprehending text. This may mean that their instructional reading level is higher than their fluency level (reading rate) might dictate. We want them to be reading at this instructional level, as we continue to work on reading fluency through guided reading and other portions of their days.
If you’d like to talk more about looking at reading assessments through an ELL lens, please contact your building’s ELL Coach! We can share the language acquisition perspective and talk about how to use those assessments to guide reading instruction with ELL in mind.
To get a closer “how to” look at giving a DRA, LRP, or Benchmark Book to an ELL student check out the ISELL post A How-Two Guide to Assessing Reading Proficiency with ELLs which tells you all about it!
We’re delighted to have the privilege to present about ELL to elementary staff throughout this school year. We’ve been able to share some common misconceptions about ELL students such as:
Exposure and interaction will result in English Language Learning
Examining these misconceptions, we’ve learned that instruction for ELLs must be Purposeful, Intentional, and Explicit! We must always think, what is the language the ELL student needs in order to complete their tasks at school. The language must be present and accounted for to ensure ELL student success.
These handouts, shared at the session, describe a few strategies which can be used to ensure instruction for ELLs is Purposeful, Intentional, and Explicit and that the language students need is present in your classroom. Contact an ELL Instructional Coach to hear more about any of these strategies!
Introducing Cooperative Learning Introducing Graphic Organizers
Introducing Sentence Frames Introducing Vocabulary
Stages of Language Acquisition Chart
We had a wonderful response to the videos we shared in the session. They helped put a “real face” on the sometimes abstract-sounding idea of language acquisition. If you are interested in watching or downloading the Powerpoint, please click below.
Math word problems are often a challenge for ELL students; not because they can’t do the computation, but because they get hung up on the language. Working with Kelly Long, a third grade teacher at Arnold, we’ve developed some ways to make solving word problems more comprehensible and concrete for ELL students. We’ve had great success with these strategies and hope you do, too!
Hey…what does Kelly have to say about all this? She was gracious enough to share her thoughts on the work we’ve done! Click here to watch!