12 Ways to Support ELL Students in the Mainstream Classroom

This article includes 12 ways to support ESL students in the mainstream classroom but can easily be applied to my ELL students in South Burlington. Check it out!

12 Ways

Journal #9

Journal #9

    Unfortunately, I was the only one in my group that was able to attend tutoring today, but it provided me with a fun challenge to see if I could tutor multiple students. Jeff and Doma were able to attend tutoring today, but Carol was unable to. It was nice to work with Doma again because I was able to connect on an emotional level during our initial tutoring session. Her only assignment was to take notes on an article. I tagged this journal entry under Learners Growth and Development because while Doma was taking notes, she was able to sum up the main ideas in her own words. When I first worked with her, she was only able to copy the words straight from the text when taking notes.However, I have seen a major improvement in her comprehension of texts.

    It was my first time working with Jeff because he normally does not attend tutoring sessions. This is typical of ELL students because they are probably so mentally exhausted by the end of the school day that they just want to go home and rest. In our first session, Jeff was very attentive and appreciative of the help. I would say Jeff is at level 3, Developing, of the WIDA standards because he had some general and specific language of the content area (Math), but often confused many of the terms. Moreover, he had a few syntactical errors in his oral language that sometimes impeded communication. I hope to see an improvement in his oral language after speaking more with him when he attends more tutoring sessions.

Developmental Matrix #2

Age	Relation to ELL student	Theorist	Category
11-15/20	Carol is able to think logically and abstractly; however, when she formulates hypotheses, it is hard for her to test them systematically (for example: Agrees that Obama should send troops to Iraq because it will be beneficial to Americans but doesn’t know to back up this hypothesis with evidence on her own) When reading her book, she was able to pick up on the metaphors (for example: “the mom is a bear”) She is capable of choosing a position but struggles with backing up her position	Piaget Manning Brighton and Stevenson	Cognitive/Language – (Formal Operations) – Capable of thinking logically and abstractly, capable of formulating hypotheses and testing them systematically; thinking is more complex, and can think about thinking (metacognition) Start to understand the nuances of metaphors, derive meaning from traditional wisdom, and experience metacognition Increasingly able to think through ideological topics, argue a position, and challenge adult directives
Young Adolescents 10-11 12-15	Language barrier causes anxiety in Carol (for example: said “my brain hurts” and was very restless when we were trying to do an assignment because she is mentally exhausted at the end of the day) She was opening up to me about the struggles of her two identities and when her peer came up, she quickly changed topics, maybe because she was afraid of how they might respond She says she is very good with fashion and identifies herself as a fashionista. She switches up her style in a way that allows her to explore and experiment with different roles (for example: One day she was covered in accessories from her culture, and another day she dressed like  an adolescent from Vermont)	Kellough & Kellough Scales Erikkson	Affective/Emotional – Have a tendency to be moody, restless, and may exhibit erratic and inconsistent behavior including anxiety, bravado, and fluctuations between superiority and inferiority Highly self-conscious and highly sensitive to criticism of their perceived personal shortcomings Industry vs. Inferiority when they identify themselves by the tasks and skills they perform well Identity vs. Identity when they explore and experiment with various roles and experiences
Young Adolescents	She talks a lot about her friends and how she wants to be accepted by them She opened up to me about how she sometimes feels she has to act a certain way in order to fit in She became upset on the phone with her dad when he said she could not spend time with her friend after her tutoring session She struggles with her true identity in front of her friends and has to speak English with them while speaking French at home	Scales Wiles et al. Brighton	Social – Have a strong need to belong to a group – with peer approval becoming more important and adult approval decreasing in importance May experience with new behaviors as they seek social position and personal identity May experience conflicting loyalties to peer group and family Torn between their desire to conform to their peer group and family
Young Adolescents	She always talks about the importance of family and how she has always appreciated it She often says how important her family is but wants to be independent and make her own decisions (for example: moving away from Vermont after high school)	Brighton Scales	Moral/Spiritual – Many of the attitudes, beliefs, and values that young adolescents develop remain with them for life Move away from blanket of acceptance of adult moral judgment to the development of their own personal  values; however, they usually embrace the values of parents or key adults

Journal #8

Journal #8

    Carol's language development has come a very long way. As I discussed before, she was very quiet in her initial meeting because she was afraid to make mistakes. English is Carol's fourth language and she is bound to make errors. Over time, after I constantly reiterated that making mistakes is vital in the learning process, she went out of her comfort zone and started to speak more with me. For example, after sharing words with me in French, she asked me to teach her a few words in Spanish. It was amazing to see her new-found interest in unfamiliar languages. While it is important to meet the needs of the whole group, it is also important to meet the needs of the individual, especially when working in a classroom with English language learners. In order to benefit the language development of all learners, doing vocabulary cards on Quizlet is a fantastic option. A simpler vocabulary set should be made for the English language learners as well to help them learn the vocabulary more efficiently. In my blog post titled, “Journal #1”, I note towards the end about how beneficial it is to break down certain vocabulary into simpler terms for English language learners.

    I tagged this under Learners Growth and Development because she often learns from her mistakes, which is a huge step in the right direction. The fact that she speaks so much with me now is very rewarding because she is not afraid to make the mistakes that help her grow. Moving on from here, I would like her to teach me more words in French so she further takes pride in her culture.

Journal #7

 

Journal #7

   Over the course of working with Carol, I have been able to see a major profession in her, in terms of her social, moral/spiritual, cognitive, emotional/affective and language development. When I first met with her, she was very shy, and seemed hesitant to talk a lot. This makes sense because when I refer to my developmental matrix, according to Scales, young adolescents have a strong need to belong to a group-with peer approval becoming more important and adult approval decreasing in importance. I saw Carol's decrease in care for her parent's approval when, during our first meeting, her dad called her and she became very upset with him when he told her she couldn't spend time with her friend after our tutoring session. Her tone was much different with me and her peers as opposed to her father. Moreover, Scales discusses how individuals at her age may experiment with new behaviors as they seek social position and personal identity. Carol was very vulnerable with me and opened up about her struggles with fitting in after coming in from a new country. However, as soon as a few of her peers came over to see what we were doing, she quickly changed subjects because she didn't want her other peers to know her struggles. Now, after many meetings with her, I have noticed that she isn't as ashamed of her true identity. I often asked her to teach me words in the language she was most comfortable in, French, because I thought it was fascinating. This consequently made her much prouder of where she comes from and shared some new words with her friends, as well.
    I tagged this under Learners Growth and Development because I often see her experimenting with her different identities and finding ways to cope with her struggle in dealing with two different identities. She is learning how to identify herself and find one identity that she can stick with but the more time I spend with her, the more I see her taking pride in her background. Moving forward, I want to tell her that she should share more about her culture and her past with her friends because many of them will find it interesting.

Scaffolding Techniques

I found this great article and graphic on scaffolding! They both encompass a variety of interesting scaffolding techniques that I want to use with my ELL student now and when I am an educator in the future. Check it out:

Scaffolding

Journal #6

Journal #6

    Today was a success! Carol attended today's tutoring session and was in a very happy mood. She had to continue to work on her PSA and had to work more on the design aspect of it. I decided to give her a simple tutorial about how to use the art features in Word. First, I showed her how to use the word art feature. Her face lit up when she realized how you are able to make a simple text look more appealing to the eye. It was a perfect, eye-catching addition to her PSA to have the name of the disorder in big and blue bubble letters.

    Next, I showed her how to insert pictures into her PSA. This was very beneficial for her because she was never sure how to use it. She was very excited to learn how to use the clip art feature of Word because it is the best way to efficiently get a picture onto a Word document. Overall, her progress is outstanding with Word and she is able to navigate it much better than before.
    I tagged this under Learners Growth and Development because I have seen a major improvement Carol's technology skills. She is able to use more features in Word than she ever has the capacity to do before. I want to continue to help her in this area by showing her the ins and outs of more applications like PowerPoint and even NearPod.

 

Journal #5

Journal #5

    Today was definitely a challenging day for me. I can't help but take it personally when some of the people in our tutoring group don't show up. It makes me wonder what I can do differently to make attendance higher. Maybe it would be smart to shorten tutoring to once a week for an hour because the tutees might be more motivated to show up.
    Luckily, Carol ended up attending our tutoring session, but since no one else did, Emily, Megan and I had to tutor her. Carol said she was so grateful that she had three tutors because she loves the attention, which I thought was sweet.
    Her assignment for the day was to do a PSA about a health-related topic. She pulled up an old document we had worked on about eating disorders and decided to choose the topic of Bulimia. She was very successful in finding relevant information about Bulimia for her PSA on Google, but was unable to add any sort of creativity to the PSA because she wasn't familiar with the design elements of Word. I wonder if, when I become a teacher, I should do a lesson on the different aspects of Word to compensate for those who do not have much knowledge on it.
    I tagged this under Learners Growth and Development because she picked up new skills in Word regarding the design of her document. I want to continue to teach her more elements of Word that can improve the design of her document. For example, I can teach her how to do borders or even how to make pamphlets on Word. 

You Are Not Alone

    

    It was very sad to hear about the tragic loss in the life of the person Olivia and Dan are tutoring. It is even more disheartening to see the effect it has had on him. He feels like he is alone and doesn't feel as though he has support he needs to get through this difficult time. As a future educator, I want to make each and every one of my students feel like they are not alone. I want to foster a community where everyone feels like they can count on each other to make them feel better about themselves, especially when they are going through a tough time.

      One of my ideas for fostering a positive community in my classroom is doing an activity called, "You Are Not Alone" where everyone in the class shares something they are going through, or have gone through. Chances are, someone else in the class has shared a similar experience or can understand what they are feeling. Thus, it will validate for them that they really aren't isolated because someone else is, or has been, in their shoes. 

Developmental Matrix

Developmental Matrix

Age	Theorist	Categories
11-15/20	Piaget Manning Brighton and Stevenson	Cognitive/Language - (Formal Operations) – Capable of thinking logically and abstractly, capable of formulating hypotheses and testing them systematically; thinking is more complex, and can think about thinking (metacognition) Start to understand the nuances of metaphors, derive meaning from traditional wisdom, and experience metacognition Increasingly able to think through ideological topics, argue a position, and challenge adult directives
Young Adolescents 10-11 12-15	Kellough & Kellough Scales Erikkson	Affective/Emotional – Have a tendency to be moody, restless, and may exhibit erratic and inconsistent behavior including anxiety, bravado, and fluctuations between superiority and inferiority Highly self-conscious and highly sensitive to criticism of their perceived personal shortcomings Industry vs. Inferiority when they identity themselves by the tasks and skills they perform well Identity vs. Identity when they explore and experiment with various roles and experiences
Young Adolescents	Scales Wiles et al. Brighton	Social – Have a strong need to belong to a group – with peer approval becoming more important and adult approval decreasing in importance May experiment with new behaviors as they seek social position and personal identity May experience conflicting loyalties to peer group and family Torn between their desire to conform to the peer group norms and their aspiration to be distinctive and independent
Young Adolescents	Brighton Scales Kellough & Kellough and Scales Kohlberg and Roney	Moral/Spiritual – Many of the attitudes, beliefs, and values that young adolescents develop remain with them for life Move away from blanket acceptance of adult moral judgment to the development of their own personal values; however, they usually embrace the values of parents or key adults Tend to be idealistic and possess a strong sense of fairness As they progress into the interpersonal conformity stage, young adolescents begin to reconcile their understanding of people who care about them with their egocentricity

I can relate to Jean Piaget’s formal operational stage because when I was around the age of 11, I began to think more abstractly. I remember my teachers always encouraging my love of problem solving around this time. I would often use deductive reasoning by drawing conclusions from abstract concepts using logic. I also remember my mom getting frustrated with me because at this age, I would constantly ask, “What ifs” to think more abstractly. She never had any concrete answers for me because my questions were always pretty out there like, “What if the sun doesn’t come up tomorrow?”

Here is another interesting diagram by the theorist, Erik Erikson