Teachers of English learners face many decisions. They must decide not only how to teach these children but also how to interact with them throughout the day.
So what happens when a student’s pronunciation or grammar is a bit “rough around the edges”? Should the teacher correct it? Or move on as if nothing happened?
Lesson learned: as someone who married a sweet EL from the Philippines, I have a few suggestions based on fifteen years of happy marriage.
Over the summer months, you may find yourself making a few extra trips to the library. Though your children will enjoy finding their own books, they are bound to choose some titles that are beyond their reading levels. Attempting to read beyond their levels may be fun for awhile, but can also become discouraging. You may be tempted to help choose the books they read in order to avoid this problem. However, allowing them to select their own books is extremely important.
Congratulations to the winners of our anniversary contest! We had a lot of funny entries so we thank all our readers who posted captions.
The five winners chosen at random:
Lisa, Jim, Carter, Eric, Paige
The Judge’s choice winner:
#2- “Shark and Awe” by Charles
To claim your Imagine Island DVD set please send an email with your shipping address to taylor.rose@imaginelearning.com.
How much do you know about the cultural and linguistic backgrounds of your English learners? According to one researcher, this knowledge plays a key role in successfully teaching students for whom English is a second language.
In her article published in 2000, Arlette Ingram Willis says, “Effective literacy instruction builds upon the cultural and linguistic backgrounds, ways of making meaning, and prior knowledge that all children bring to the classroom. Such instruction also acknowledges the important role of culture in language and literacy learning. Understanding and respecting the array of different cultures and languages represented in their classrooms helps educators adopt strategies for teaching literacy that will encourage and support student achievement.” In other words, it is as important to know the student as it is to know the subject matter.
You may have noticed that some students seem to lose academic ground over the summer break. Well, you’re right. This phenomenon, sometimes referred to as the “summer slide,” can indeed affect student achievement levels in the fall. In fact, some students lose up to three months of reading achievement over the course of one summer.
But while you may already be familiar with the affect summer sliding can have on student achievement levels, have you ever wondered how to stave off those summer learning losses?
