Reflection

Reflection Blog

Now that we are at the end of this course I am sad to see it go. One of the components to this course was keeping this blog and responding to other student’s blogs.  I LOVED the creativity this assignment allowed us. Sometimes in Master level classes we get a lot of APA papers to write and nothing to really engage us as learners.  As teachers we LOVE any opportunity to be creative and really dive deep into our craft of learning. I say that to say I did not find a lot of time myself to get as creative and fancy with my blog as I had hoped but the assignment it self was great.

I found reading other student’s blogs priceless. My peers in this class have a breadth of knowledge that is amazing. I would be honored to have my own children in anyone of their classes.

The only downfall for me in keeping a blog is that it was tricky for me to keep track of all of my peers blogs so I feel I missed out on some great conversations because I never made it to their blog or missed a post here or there that they wrote.

Once I am done with school and get my family settled in with our new baby, I would love to keep a blog-but only if I had the time to get creative and have fun with it! I would definitely assign a blog project for students in higher-grade levels other than kindergarten! However I have been contemplating keeping a class blog for parents.

Dayna~

Entry # 9 Graphic Organizer

Entry # 8 Sheltered Lesson

Shelter Instruction Videos

What does the teacher do to promote comprehension? What do the students do to         promote comprehension? List the strategies used in the video.

Previewing

The teacher first gives explicit review of reading strategies the students should use while they are tackling the book. The teacher also stops to help make background connections with the students. An important part in the comprehension strategies is previewing the key vocabulary words. In the video the teacher used pictures, stories, integrating the student’s native language, and asking students to sing the song that was referenced in the story.

The students were engaged in the lesson asking questions as they went along and participating in the vocabulary previewing by providing examples and meanings to the vocabulary words addressed. 

During

Teacher reads aloud slowly and clearly making sure to review vocabulary as it comes up in the story. The teacher also uses the projector so that students have an extra visual to the story being read aloud. Throughout the story the teacher asks questions to probe for understanding and comprehension. The questions also allow students to connect the story to their background knowledge.  When asking questions the teacher uses wait time to allow for thoughtful answers and allows the students to process the information given to them.

After

After the story is read students are asked to come up with ways they can connect the story to their background knowledge and what questions they may have.

Strategies

*Creating content and language objectives

*Connect to background knowledge

*Questioning

*Using pictures, songs, stories

*Using academic language

*Preview key vocabulary

*Provide context to key vocabulary

*Connect to cultural experiences

*Make predictions, group work, relate to students cultural backgrounds, make comparison charts

*Read stories aloud slowly and clearly

*Allow wait time to process information

*Help make connections from text to background knowledge

*Model reading strategies

*Teach students how to write well-written questions

Entry # 7 Word Recognition

I recently had the opportunity to Give The DRA assessment to my literacy class. I am thankfully pleased with the results but I have to admit I was a little surprised by some of the results. I thought I had done enough assessments along the way to know exactly what my ESL student’s struggles and strengths lye. I was excited that reading fluency seemed to come easily for my students however comprehension and meaning were not as strong as I had hoped.

One of my Spanish-speaking students consistently kept switching words around in the sentence but corrected her by using the pictures as clues and attempting to make meaning of what she was reading.

One of my Ethiopian students left words out of the sentences, they did not use picture clues as well as some of the other students, which made it a little tougher to sound out words.

Another one of my Spanish-speaking students read above grade level fluently but comprehension was completely lost.

It is important to note each student has different cultural experiences. The first Spanish-speaking student never went to pre-school and spoke very little English coming into kindergarten. The other Spanish-speaking student mentioned above went to pre-school but a Spanish speaking pre-school.

I believe it is important to be careful we do not intentionally label our students into categories.

My next steps in teaching strategies will be to work on vocabulary building to help with fluency and comprehension skills.

Entry # 6 Learning vs. Acquisition

Learning/Word Recognition vs. Acquisition

The Students:

L- Look up words in the dictionary to write definition

L-Make a Venn diagram to compare to stories

L- Practice sounding out words

A- Read in round robin fashion

A-Correct peers when they make mistakes during reading

A-Identify words on a big book page that start with the same sound

AL-Group cards with classmates’ names by a criterion on such as first or last letter

A-Write rhyming poetry and then discuss different spellings for the same sound

L-Ask the teacher how to spell any word they don’t know

A-Read a language experience story they have created with the teacher

A-Work in pairs to arrange words with a familiar chant into sentence

L-Divide words into syllables

L-On a worksheet, draw a line from each word to the pictures that starts with the same sound

A-Make alphabet books on different topics

The Teacher:

L-pre-teaches vocabulary

A-Does a shared reading with a big book

L-Makes sure students only read books at their level

L- Has students segment words into phonemes

L-Writes words the students dictate for a story and have students help with the spelling of difficult words

A-Asks students to look around the room and find words that start with a certain letter

L- Uses decodable text

A-Set aside time each day for SSR

L-teaches Latin and Greek roots

L-Has students meet in Literacy circles

L-Conducts phonics drills

L-Chooses predicable text

A-Teaches student’s different comprehension strategies

A-Does a picture walk of a new book

L-Uses worksheets to teach different skills

This was really a tough task but made me think about the practice and not just the theory. I am positive that some of my answers would change depending on the context of the activity I would be using in the classroom. As I went to label each of these statements I tried to think about how the student would perceive thee activities. Would they feel like they were learning a language? Would hey feel like they were having fun, and enjoying the moment with their peers? What would be the long-term affect of each of these activities? Would this be a quick learning tool or something that the students would remember long term? As I have said before context is everything and there is probably a time and place that each of these learning strategies would make sense to some students. In my humble opinion it is all about how we use these strategies to differentiate instruction in order for our ELL students to thrive.

Freeman, D., and Y. Freeman. Essential linguistics: What you need to know to teach: reading, ESL, spelling, phonics, grammar. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Entry # 5 Literature Review

I was excited to pull out two of my favorite books I like to read to my students each year. I chose Bintou's Braids by Sylvaine Diouf and The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush by Tomie dePaola. Both of these books have greater meaning to the reader if the vocabulary is clear and the audience understands the different settings in each book. There is rich culture throughout both books and meaning would be lost without understanding and scaffolding to readers who are not familiar with Senegalese culture and American Indian culture.

Bintou's Braids is a children's book set in Sengal in a tribal community. This is a beautiful story about a little girl who really wants braids like the older girls in her village only she can not quite yet. In her village you have to be older before girls can wear braids. The tradition was set in place so that little girls did not focus on their outside beauty but remained focused on their inner beauty until the time was right. Bintou does something very brave and saves some lives. When the village tells her what a great job she has done and asks her what she wants to celebrate, she says she wants braids. The elder women say they will make her hair beautiful. The next day she is woken with her same tufts but with beautiful barrettes and ribbons.

The vocabulary that may need scaffolding are words such as (tufts, cornrows, baptism, village, fish balls, fritters, papayas, mango).

The setting may need some scaffolding such as what is it like to live in a village, it is near the water, what are palm trees?

Some if the cultural aspects that could be scaffolded are what is a baptism, why did the parents not name the baby when it was born, why do little girls have to wait to get their hair braided, and why do the girls put gold coins in their hair.

The story "The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush" is about a boy who wants to keep up with the other boys in the village but struggles greatly. He is not as fast as they are or as skilled as they are. When the boy gets a little older he goes to the mountains to think about being a great man someday. He has a vision there and is told he will be a great painter and that is how people will know him in the tribe. After the vision the young man begins to create paintings and through several more visions he begins to paint silhouettes of nature. Because of his beautiful paintings his tribe has beautiful flowers growing amazing sun sets and he is then known as He-Who-Brought-the-The-Sunset-to-the-Earth.

The vocabulary that may need scaffolding are words such as (tee pees, plains, buckskin, tribe).
The setting may need some background knowledge such as what is it like living in a tribe.
There may need to be some scaffolding on context of meaning within the story such as why would someone go to a mountain and see a vision, why would someone collect animal skin, why do they give the boy nick names such as "gopher and He-Who-Brought-the-Sunset-to-the-Earth?

I would like to re-read these two books to my students making sure that vocabulary, setting and context is clear to everyone so they can enjoy these stories as much as I did!

Before I read the two books I would first introduce the vocabulary words mentioned above through pictures, video, and conversation. I would also have the students discuss some of their personal tradition in their families and then talk about the traditions of Senegalese and American Indians. I would have the students talk about what is similar and different in the cultures compared to their own cultures at home. Throughout the readings I would pause the story and make sure students understand the context of the vocabulary.

Dayna~

Entry # 4 Decoding Skills

This week I was challenged to read a text I was unfamiliar with and do whatever I could to determine meaning. The book I chose was called "Que Puedes Esperar Cuando Estas Esperando" I thought I would attempt to multitask by completing an assignment while reading some fun facts related to my life at the moment. The book in english is called "What to Expect When Your Expecting." I had read this book in english about 16 years ago and wanted to pick it up again for this pregnancy but have been too busy to give it a second thought. 

I honestly thought this reading would be a little easier than it actually was. I found that even if I could figure out a couple words here and there it was hard to use the vocabulary in context to the actual information written in the book. If I had to rely on my spanish reading skills and comprehension of what I read on my own I would not have very reliable information on pregnancy. In fact I would have gained a lot more anxiety knowing there was a whole book of helpful information that I wanted but could not access through my own literacy skills. When I think about my students I wonder if they sometimes have that same sense of anxiety when I hand them something they can not read without any scaffolding. I have to honest with myself, that no matter how conscientious I intend to be, there must have been moments that my lack of understanding of what my ESL students need in order to be successful has at some point caused anxiety or frustration in some way. I am so thankful for the opportunity to gain a better understanding of how to best meet all of my students needs. 

The strategies that I ended up using to decipher the information are as follows:

* I first knew enough about pregnancy that I could use my background knowledge as a resource.

* I used the limited pictures that were in the book.

* I referenced a spanish/english dictionary and an online translator tool.

* I finally asked my daughter and a co-worker for help translating the reading.