Some homework ... Readings of interest...

****copied and pasted from Janet McQueen's blog post on the vln network.

Hi everyone

I am sharing a few readings that I have recently discovered from around the virtual world. I don’t expect you to read them all just pick and choose according to your interests.

I know that many of you also discover great web pages, apps and readings etc. I would love you to feel free to share them with our ESOL community. I really want to make ESOL Online your site rather than just'Janet' sharing her thoughts and ideas. Therefore please share as I really am not the font of all knowledge.  Many of you have far more knowledge and experience than me!  So next time you find something exciting that you think other teachers would love to know about then please share it.

Readings of interest

·         Focusing Formative Assessment on the Needs of English Language Learners by Laura Alvarez, Sri Ananda, Aída Walqui, Edynn Sato, and Stanley Rabinowitz. Whilst the context is American this report is packed full of great advice and information. It not only looks at formative assessment but also teaching English across the curriculum and how to integrate the two. This might be good to share with classroom teachers as a discussion starter.

·         The importance of hands-on learning and movement for English learners, Erick Herrmann Wednesday, August 13, 2014, Multubriefs exclusive.  This article looks at how the maker movement and project-based learning (PBL) incorporate the fundamentals of hands-on learning for all students.  However it goes beyond this to examine why these are  helpful approaches for ELLs and highlights some useful strategies to support language learning through using these methods of teaching.  

·         Chapter 2. Diverse Teaching Strategies for Diverse Learners, by Marietta Saravia-Shore Educating Everybody's Children: Diverse Teaching Strategies for Diverse Learners, Revised and Expanded 2nd Edition Edited by Robert W. Cole. This writer provides many practical strategies for teaching diverse students followed by a classroom example for each illustrating the implementation of the strategy.

·         53 ways to check understanding from Edutopia. I discovered some great new strategies for checking student understanding in this list.

·         The end of dyslexia? Julian G. Elliott and Elena L. Grigorenko argue that the label is a cultural meme that remains unscientific and conceptually problematic. A thought provoking read for those of you interested in this topic.

·         Student presentations Tom Hayton, 29 September, 2005 - 13:00, Teaching English, British Council. A practical post with tips and advice on helping ELLs prepare and deliver presentations.

·         Cutting to the Common Core: My Students Can’t Read So How Will They Write? Hillary Wolfe recommends building strategic scaffolds to assist adolescent writing, The Journal of Communication and Education Language Magazine.

·         Inspire Thoughtful Creative Writing Through Art,  by Denise Cassano, AUGUST 6, 2014,on  Edutopia.  Great to spark some new ideas and she has some great questions teachers can use with students when discussing art.

·         Brain imaging proves second language learners can process language to native like levels, by Christine Metz Howard in the Medical Press.

·         Teaching writing to ELLs across the curriculum: Strategies for success Erick Herrmann, Tuesday, July 01, 2014 Multibriefs Exclusive

·         Tips for focusing ELL student presentations, Eva Sullivan, Wednesday, July 30, 2014, Multibriefs Exclusive

·         Teaching Maths like a foreign language, Visible Thinking in Math- Part 1, March 31, 2014, Langwitches blog

·         Blended and Flipped, Exploring new models of effective teaching and learning,  Special Report  University of Wisconsin

·         3 Ways to Plan for Diverse Learners: What Teachers Do, July 23, 2014, John McCarthy Edutopia

·         A Short Guide to Adaptive Learning in English Language Teaching by Philip Kerr, the round. This is free to download. This  guide  will  explain  in  simple  terms  what  adaptive  learning  is, and  what  it  is  likely  to  become.  He takes a critical look at the subject. He encourages you to think  about  a  range  of  issues  including:•the  role  of  technology •the  nature  of  learning, and  •the  politics  of  educational  change.  

·         University of Sydney papers in TESOL these are all free to read on line.

·         Archive Australian Review of applied Linguistics archive, these articles are all downloadable to read for free.

Happy reading 

Janet 

--

Janet McQueen

Facilitator: Primary ESOL community

Week 4, term three, has finished already!
My learning journal so far…

• Running Records (of oral language).  Thanks to our schools' resident expert in reading, I learned I have been making a key error when analyzing the reading in terms of M/S/V - my mistake using M to mean 'does the word the child said mean the same as the word in the text?'  but have leaned the question I need to consider is 'up until that point in the reading (when the error occurs) does the reading make sense?'  We may be having more whole school PD is this area to ensure all teachers are recording our students' reading correctly/consistently.  I like what Owhata literacy has done on their wiki space where all the info a teacher needs can be found, and the running record protocol for this school is made very clear in an attached document.
• in-school PD to learn about using the ELLP  (English Language Learning Progressions) matrices to determine which stage an ELL (English Language Learner) is at.
• familiarizing myself with the ESoL support documents will be ongoing.  Am finding the SELLIPS books very helpful so far, also the ELIP resource.  
• remembering what a great resource we have in the National Library.  On their website are links to some great digital resources.
• I have been working with ST, a 10 year old student from Tonga who has recently enrolled in our school and who does not speak much english yet.  So far much of the work has been one-one.  This week I found some readers in Tongan at the public library so asked ST to read one to me.  The book was a ministry of education publication 'Ka kau he vai kaukau' '.  We talked about the pictures (and I tried to make meaning of the text).  It was interesting for me to hear ST read as it did not sound like he could read fluently.  Reading was stilted, and I was able to help him sound some words out.   This is not reliable data as I have no idea of text difficulty besides the fact it was short text.  Also whether or not it was a confidence issue for ST.  Unfortunately many of the Tongan texts printed by the Ministry of Education are no longer available for purchase, nor can I find any in our resource room (yet).  Something we learned was the importance of continuing  the ELL students' literacy in their first language as well as in english.

And one way we have used the iPads so far is with the Book Creator app.  

ST and I went for a walk around the school taking photos.  We then wrote a simple text to go with the pictures (i.e. Here is a …. - this followed the pattern of an emergent PM text we were reading "Here is a House" ).  We recorded ourselves reading the text on each page also.  This book is now in iBooks on his class' iPad. (Each class has 6 iPad, one in each class is a white 'teacher's' iPad - so I am trying to use that one with him so it's easy to see which one his work is saved on.

One of the literacy groups also made a copy of their reading text "Grandma's Stick" - we took photos of the pictures in the book and recorded the text for each page.  

And a goal…to have some pictures for next post!  A change in colour of the text will have to do for now :)

Kia ora,

Room 5, Park Estate School is a Literacy Room.

I will be working with literacy groups and English Language Learners.  Term 2, 2014 is my first term in this teaching position.

I am interested in how e-learning can help increase our students' literacy skills, and how we can use the iPads to support the learning of ELLs.

I will use this blog as a learning diary for me and the students, and reflect and share things we do and what we learn.

Currently my teacher registration status is 'STC' - Subject to confirmation.  I am going to label posts in this blog to align with the NZ Registered Teacher Criteria.

I have set up this blog with the help of  Jacqui Sharp's websites.

Another NZ site that has much info and discussion re e-learning and literacy is the  Virtual Learning Network.

Cheers,

Gretchen