Sunday, February 16, 2014

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.

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