English Language Learners

When a tenth grader enters in a foreign language classroom, he/she is anxious and nervous about learning a foreign language. There are many ways to modify assignments and assessments to help English learners, including using sentence frames, sentence starters and vocabulary banks. These modifications provide support structures that allow them to better articulate their thoughts and opinions without having to nervously struggle with every single word. Modifications can also help reduce the fear of judgment because they have tools to guide them to the correct way to verbalize or write their responses. Once they become more advanced, those sentence starters and vocabulary words will become second nature, and you can build on that support structure

Mainstream students in any given grade level that have a firm grasp of the English language are given the opportunity to strengthen their own literacy and basic skill abilities through the use of content area instruction. Under the Common Core Curriculum Standard (CCCS) guidelines with specified macro-curriculum development ideologies mainstream students will master language skills and build upon their own common knowledge through the many different course offerings in public schools. This ideology is not directly transferable to the instruction of ELLs because many of the new arrivals from other countries do not have the cultural understanding or awareness that allows for their ultimate comprehension of the material being taught; let alone the language it’s being presented in. Certainly, in the past few decades, government policy makers and educational firms and universities have come together to try to narrow the achievement gap between the ELLs and mainstream students in a variety of ways. On a larger curriculum development level, standardized tests are the main focal point of these attempts because within education measurable accountability is the paramount evaluation method. Unfortunately, standardized tests in many ways make it more difficult for the ELLs to master the English

The SIOP Model consists of eight interrelated components: Lesson Preparation, building background, comprehensible input, strategies, interaction, practice/Application, Lesson Delivery, review & assessment.” (http://www.cal.org/siop/about/) This strategy focuses on listening, reading, writing, and speaking instead of skill and drill techniques. Language acquisition for an ELL takes “3 to 5 years [for oral proficiency] to develop, and academic English proficiency can take 4 to 7 years.” (Hakuta, Butler, & Witt pg. 15) Offering this method of sheltered instruction will enable ELLs to build upon their language skills instead of presenting them with content that they won’t have the cultural perspective to understand in hopes of using it [the content-based approach] to assist language acquisition. A more effective approach, with regard to content, for an ESL teacher, would be to get to know the classroom culture of the students by inviting them to learn about their own history, language, and ancestral origins. This strategy, along with and in conjunction with the SIOP model, offers a better strategy for ESL instruction because it honors each ELLs language of origin, cultural personality, an opportunity to acquire English while preserving their own identity.