Reading with English Language Learners

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Reading with English Language Learners
We learn language, we learn through language,
and we learn about language. (Freeman Freeman,
2004)

• Dr. Susan Rutledge, Ph.D
• Curriculum and Instruction in TESOL
• woyaoni_at_yahoo.com

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Empathy Exercise

• Close Your Eyes Listen
• Song
• Open your eyes
• How do you feel? Lets listen again!
• Now how do you feel? What made this experience
  different?

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READING
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Who are ELL learners?

• ELL learners come from a variety of backgrounds
• Spanish speakers represent the largest number of
  ELL learners nation wide.
• Some are 1st generation, some are 2nd generation,
  and some are 3rd generation.
• They can be from a foreign country and they can
  be born in the U.S.

• They may or may not have an educational
  background.
• They may or may not be literate in their native
  language.
• They may or may not be able to write in their
  native language

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English/ Second Language Reading is Complex
Phonological processing abilities in English
Oral language abilities in English
Print Related abilities/ experiences in English
Background Knowledge in English
LITERACY IN NATIVE LANGUAGE
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What Can Teachers Do?

• Have a deep Understanding of English?
• What does this mean?
• Phonology, Morphology, Syntax, Semantics,
  Pragmatics
• Understand First and Second Language Acquisition
• First Language Stages
• Second Language Stages

• Language is a moving Target (Levine, 2008)
• Social English
• 1-3 years
• Academic English
• 5-7 years
• Teaching any Subject requires teaching the
  language, vocabulary, and organizational
  structures

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What Can Teachers Do?

• Understand and utilize your ELL learners
  proficiency level to guide your instruction.
• What is proficiency? The degree of skill with
  which a person can read, write, speak, or
  understand a language. (Richards Schmidt,
  2002)
• How do you know your students proficiency level?
• ASK the English language learner teacher/ tutor
• Understand the Proficiency Assessment Used
• CAN DO Descriptors

• Informed
• Ask questions!!
• Has the student gone to school in his/ her home
  country?
• Is the student literate in his/ her native
  language?
• What is your students English proficiency?
• What does the proficiency test examine?

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What Can Teachers Do?

• Limited English Proficiency affects learning
  assessment
• Not familiar to them culturally and
  linguistically
• Reading is a cognitive and socially constructed
  pursuit
• Incorporate students cultures
• Multicultural Literature
• Multicultural Video

• Compare English to the Students native language
• Oral
• Written
• Communicate clearly
• Does not mean talking loudly to student!!
• Clear goals expectations
• Collaborative
• Work with the ELL provider
• Talk with the parents!!!!!!!

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Cultural Influences

• Culture produces and develops background
  knowledge, words, sentences, and text structures
• Spanish speaking students are accustomed to a
  phonetically stable alphabetic spelling in which
  each letter represents a sound
• English readers use less consistent letter and
  word cues to determine the meaning and the
  grammatical function of a word.
• The Chinese character system has no link between
  speech sounds and the written symbol.
• Reading directionality also varies among
  languages.
• Languages such as English and Russian are read
  left to right, top to bottom, while Arabic is
  read right to left.
• Making inferences, where students challenge or
  reinterpret text, is a critical reading
  comprehension skill for American readers, but is
  considered inappropriate and even disrespectful,
  in other cultures.

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Oral Language

• Classroom Talk is IMPORTANT!
• Multiple opportunities to talk with peers and
  teachers
• Primary source of information and language about
  the topics being discussed
• Learners internalize and use to express their own
  meanings.
• adaptations may include speaking slowly, using
  short sentences, paraphrasing the same message
  several different ways, and explaining word
  meanings.
• use gestures, pictures, and props to make meaning
  more clear.
• Teachers need to model how adults converse about
  books.
• Literacy requires large blocks of time for
  reading, but it also must provide for discussion,
  conversations, reflection, and revision
  (Allington Cunningham, 2002).

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Word Level

• Word Study Activities Help ESL students
  understand and use Academic Language
• Content Specific
• Plasma, Square,
• Other Vocabulary
• Directions, fill-in the blank,
• Factor, compare, similar
• Words that have multiple meanings such as wave
• Wave of immigrants vs. Ocean wave

• Examples
• Vocabulary
• ClosedCaptioning Television
• offers a novel experience for students to
  interact with the spoken and printed word
  simultaneously.
• TPR helps the least proficient ELL students
  actively and physically understand vocabulary and
  concepts.
• The idea is for the teacher to choose words or
  concepts that are easily demonstrated physically
  such as commands, movement directions,
  prepositions, and body parts.

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Whole Text

• Paired Reading
• pairing a skilled reader with a less-skilled
  reader.
• The skilled reader demonstrates appropriate
  reading rate, inflection, and pausing for the
  less-skilled reader
• The skilled reader in each pair reads the
  connected text first. Then the less-skilled
  reader reads the same text
• The less-skilled reader has a role model of
  fluent reading, as well as repeated exposure to
  text
• Writing to Read Gaining Knowledge from Texts
• Helps meaning construction and comprehension
• Formal writing such as personal narrative,
  comparison/contrast, and expository compositions
  assist ELL students make deeper connections to
  their reading
• Allows students to analyze and synthesize texts
• Think of your experience as an immigrant.
  Describe a special experience you have had as an
  immigrant? Why was it special? What did that
  experience teach you about the immigrant
  experience in the U.S? Relate your experience to
  the section we read on immigration to the U.S.

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CARS Content Area Reading Strategies

• Content Texts are Expository
• What does this mean?
• Specific actions readers take to make meaning
  from text.
• Reading is like a conversation between author and
  reader.
• Authors make decisions about how to effectively
  communicate through a piece of writing.
• Readers use specific strategies to help them
  understand what authors are trying to
  communicate.
• Before, During, and After Reading
• What are they?
• Higher order Thinking Skills/ Questions
• Reading Strategy

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Examples

• Dual Language Books
• Spelling City
• Sight Word Activities
• WordSift
• ESL Class Introduction

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Why?National Statistics

• ELL students comprise the fastest growing K-12
  population in the U.S. (Reeves, 2002
  Karabanerick Clemens-Noda, 2004)
• 10.3 of K-12 population (Batalova, Fix,
  Murray, 2006)
• 44 of 4th grade ELLs scored below basic in
  Math 70 scored below basic in Reading (NCES,
  2007)
• 69 of 8th grade ELLs scored below basic in
  Math
• 70 of 8th grade ELLs scored below basic in
  Reading

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Mississippi ELL stats

• ELL Population Approximately 1 of total student
  population
• 75 free-reduced lunch
• 6 special education
• Number of years student has been an ELL
• Less than 1 11.2
• 1 year 18.3
• 2 years 19.3
• 3 or more years 29.2
• Monitored 22.1
• (Kasse, AMTESOL, 2008)

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MississippiReading Achievement on the MCT
(2005) (Percent of Students Scoring Proficient
or Advanced)
(Kasse, AMTESOL 2008)
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Conclusion

• Remember to think of the LANGUAGE first.
• words not only have direct and literal dictionary
  meanings, but also have affective meanings and
  connotative meanings
• Crawl, Walk, Run
• Explain Demonstrate
• Practice
• Perform

• Improvement in reading skills depends mostly on
  what students do with what they read how they
  engage the text

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We are ALL Language Teachers

• Spasiba

Doh-mo - ardei ga-toe
XIE XIE
Kamsa hamnida
THANK YOU!!!
GRACIAS
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Resources

• Colorin Colorado www.colorincolorado.com
• Mary Lou McCloskey www.mlmcc.com
• Chen Mora-Flores, (2006). Balanced Literacy
  for English Language Learners, K-2.
• Bear, Helman, Templeton, Invernizzi, Johnston,
  (2007). Words Their Way with English Language
  Learners Word Study for Phonics, Vocabulary,
  and Spelling Instruction

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Resources

• Smallwood Haynes (2008). Singable books sing
  and read your way to English proficiency. Center
  for Applied Linguistics
• Freeman Freeman (2004). Essential Linguistics
  What you need to know to teach reading, ESL,
  spelling, phonics, grammar.
• Balanced Reading http//www.balancedreading.com/se
  condlang.html
• Dual Language Books http//thornwood.peelschools.o
  rg/Dual/index.htm

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Resources

• Helman, L. Burns, M. (2008). What does oral
  language have to do with it? Helping young
  English language learners acquire a sight word
  vocabulary. Reading Teacher, 62(1), pp.14-19.
• Frys Word List http//w4.nkcsd.k12.mo.us/kcofer
  /fry_words_pg.htm
• Elementary Literacy http//knowledgeloom.org/pract
  ice_basedoc.jsp?t1bpid1427aspect3location2
  parentid1426bpinterid1426spotlightid1393test
  flagyes1

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Resources

• Allington, R.L., Cunningham, P. (2002). Schools
  that work (2nd ed.). New York Longman.
• Mora, J.K. (1999) Using Multicultural
  Literature to Teach Reading Processes
  http//coe.sdsu.edu/people/jmora/MulticulturalLit/
  
• Hispanic American Images http//comminfo.rutgers.e
  du/professional-development/childlit/ChildrenLit/h
  ispanic.html

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Resources

• Asian American Images http//comminfo.rutgers.edu
  /professional-development/childlit/ChildrenLit/asi
  an.html
• Word Sift http//www.wordsift.com/
• Kasper, L.F. (1996). Writing to read Enhancing
  ESL students reading proficiency through written
  response to text. TETYC
• Kinsella, K. (2006). Academic Vocabulary
  information.

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Resources

• Karabenick, S.A. Clemens-Noda, P.A. (2004).
  Professional development implications of
  teachers beliefs and attitudes toward English
  language learners. Bilingual Research Journal,
  28 (1), 55-75. Retrieved October 15, 2005, from
  http//brj.asu.edu/content/vol28_no1/art4.pdf
• Batalova, J., Fix, M., Murray, J. (2007).
  Measures of change The democracy and literacy of
  adolescent English learners -A report to Carnegie
  Corporation of New York. Washington, DC
  Migration Policy Institute.
• Reeves, J. (2001). Secondary teachers attitudes
  and perceptions of inclusion of ESL students in
  mainstream classes. Doctoral dissertation.
  Dissertation International Abstracts, (UMI No.
  3062322)

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Resources

• Law and Eckes, (1995). Assessment and ESL A
  Handbook for K-12 Teachers.
• Using Paired Reading To Help ESL Students Become
  Fluent And Accurate Readers Reading Improvement,
  Summer, 2001 by Daqi Li, Sandra Nes
• Capps, R., Fix, M., Murray, J., Ost, J., Passel,
  J. Herwantoro, S. (2005). The new demography
  of Americas Schools Immigration and the No
  Child Left Behind. Washington, DC The Urban
  Institute