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Title: Mothers Day Resources and Activities for English Language Learners
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Read an article about Mothers Day, practice conjunctions, and get more ideas in Larry Ferlazzo’s latest article on the Learning Network: http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/05/05/test-yourself-e-l-l-practice-may-5-2014
Source: New York Times
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Title: Article: Are School Turnaround Efforts Overlooking English-Learners?
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From http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/learning-the-language/2014/05/are_school_turnaround_efforts_.html
Are School Turnaround Efforts Overlooking English-Learners?
By Lesli A. Maxwell
May 1, 2014
The unique learning needs of English-language learners enrolled in low-performing schools that were targeted for dramatic improvements under a federal school turnaround program were largely overlooked, at least in the early phases of implementation, a new evaluation concludes.
In an ongoing review of the Obama administration's $4.6 billion School Improvement Grant program, the Institute of Education Sciences found that the needs of second-language learners received "only moderate or limited attention" in the early-to-midway stages of the schools' turnaround initiatives. None of the schools studied by researchers at IES—the research arm of the U.S. Department of Education—demonstrated that they were addressing ELLs' needs as a strategic part of their turnaround methods.
Read the full article at http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/learning-the-language/2014/05/are_school_turnaround_efforts_.html
Source: Education Week
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Title: 100,000 Strong in the Americas Website Promotes Educational Exchanges
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From http://languagemagazine.com/?p=50020
Recently, the U.S. Department of State unveiled a new 100,000 Strong in the Americas website available at http://www.100kstrongamericas.org. President Obama launched 100,000 Strong in the Americas to increase educational exchange opportunities in the Western Hemisphere. The initiative is implemented through partnerships between the U.S. government, including the White House and the Department of State; Partners of the Americas, NAFSA: Association of International Educators, foreign governments, universities and colleges, and the private sector.
The goal of 100,000 Strong in the Americas is to strengthen U.S. relations with the countries of the Americas through increased student mobility. It will help students from the U.S. and the Western Hemisphere select international exchange programs that will equip them with a broad base of skills and experiences, including exposure to other countries and cultures. The initiative reflects a growing focus on ensuring youth throughout the Western Hemisphere are prepared with the language and cross-cultural skills needed to succeed in the 21st century economy.
The updated website contains resources for students interested in studying abroad in the Americas, higher education institutions who want to increase their footprint in the Western Hemisphere, and private sector companies who want to contribute to the future prosperity of the Americas. It is hoped that 100,000 Strong in the Americas will enable a new generation to reach across borders to address common challenges and seek out new opportunities.
Visit the new website at http://www.100kstrongamericas.org
Source: Language Magazine
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Title: Tools for Creating Review Games
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Richard Byrnes shares his recommendations for online tools that teachers can use for creating review games in this recent blog post: http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2014/05/by-request-tools-for-creating-review.html#.U2v9RseaHlo
Source: Free Technology for Teachers
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Title: Idea: Adaptation of the Newlywed Game
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Here’s a nice activity for pairs of students, in which one student must guest the other student’s response to a teacher-chosen prompt: http://bryankandeltprs.com/2014/05/08/how-well-do-you-know-your-friend-adapting-the-newlywed-game-for-wl-class
Source: Bryan Kandel TPRS Blog
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Title: Blog Post: Four Ways To Tweak the Exit Ticket
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Do you ask your students to do something each day before they leave class? It’s a quick way to work some informal assessment into your daily routine, but teacher Sara-Elizabeth Cottrell has been looking for ways to make sure that the exit ticket is linked to long-term retention as well. Read about her favorite ideas at http://musicuentos.com/2014/05/exit-ticket
Source: Musicuentos
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Title: Blog Post: The Art of Authentic Resources
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Here is a recent blog post by teacher Amy Lenord about personalizing authentic resources, taking their use beyond the interpretive mode: http://www.amylenord.net/1/post/2014/05/the-art-of-authentic-resources.html
Source: The Language Coach
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Content Type: 5
Title: Join Our Team of Dedicated, Multilingual Educators by Mandy Gettler, CASLS Associate Director
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CASLS is known nationally for bridging traditionally separate disciplines to develop innovative solutions to language teaching and learning. Our staff regularly collaborates with one another, faculty members on our campus, and national experts in the field. We emphasize professional development and mentoring for each staff member, which creates a positive work environment and results in innovative programming.
"I love working with a supportive team," says East Asia Special Programs Coordinator Li-Hsien Yang about working at CASLS. Online Instructional Deborah Cooke agrees and adds, "I also enjoy the diversity of projects we on."
We are hoping you will consider joining our team and becoming part of our dedicated, multilingual staff. We are currently looking to expand our staff and hire a Curriculum Development Specialist. We will begin reviewing applications on July 1, 2014, but the position will remain open until filled. You may view the entire job posting on the University of Oregon Human Resources website.
The Curriculum Development Specialist designs, pilots, and revises curricular materials for learners studying a second and/or foreign language at the high school and university levels. CASLS' language learning programs often utilize emerging technologies and take advantage of online and hybrid contexts. The Curriculum Development Specialist may work with language experts who will provide input and guidance on language-specific issues. Curriculum should be aligned with national standards. Design work will include the creation of a scope and sequence, timeline of instructional activities, instructional manuals, learning materials, and in-class assessments and rubrics.
Required Qualifications:
- Master's degree in second language acquisition, applied linguistics, teacher education, second/foreign language methods, or related field
- 2 years teaching foreign language at the high school or college level
- Ability to work in multilingual and multicultural team environment
- Proficiency in a language other than English
Preferred Qualifications
- Doctoral degree in second language acquisition, applied linguistics, teacher education, second/foreign language methods, or related field
- 3 years or more teaching foreign language at the high school or college level
- Knowledge of proficiency benchmarks
- Familiarity with the use of digital tools for second/foreign language teaching and learning
- Experience in online course design and/or online instructional experience
- Proficiency in Chinese, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish or Swahili
EO/AA/ADA institution committed to cultural diversity. As a foreign language resource center, CASLS is committed to creating an inclusive, diverse work environment. The successful candidate will have the ability to work effective with faculty, staff, and students from a variety of diverse backgrounds.
Source: CASLS Spotlight
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Content Type: 3
Title: Teaching L2 reading (2): A model for teaching reading
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Robert L Davis is a Professor of Spanish and Director of Language Instruction in the Department of Romance Languages at the University of Oregon. He is also the Scholar in Residence in the Global Scholars Hall and a member of the CASLS Advisory Board.
The "traditional" approach to reading in the L2 classroom goes like this:
- The teacher assigns a text: "Read this for tomorrow", perhaps with some questions to answer.
- Students slog through the reading, often overusing a dictionary to look up every unknown word.
- The follow-up discussion starts with questions like "What did you think?" "Was it easy or difficult?" "Did you have any trouble with any words or passages?"
The discussion, if it ever gets off the ground, is teacher-fronted and laborious, akin to pulling teeth. The motivation for reading is usually "to expose students to this key text from the Spanish-speaking world" or "this text is good for direct object pronouns"—neither of which is an authentic, real-world reason to read.
Research in L2 reading suggests a completely different approach, which takes advantage of our natural cognitive frameworks. More attention is given to why we read (thus, text selection is paramount—see last week's article) and using the reading for a real-world purpose. Contrast the reading sequence above with the following model.
Pre-reading. The purposes of this part of a reading lesson are twofold:
- to activate students' previous knowledge of a topic, or if it's a new topic to them, create the necessary basic background knowledge.
- to fill in any linguistic gaps students may have that would impede comprehension: vocabulary, structures, idioms, or processing strategies (e.g. "What is the subject of this sentence?")
In the pre-reading phase, it is useful to have students preview actual sentences from a reading, to study them in detail up front, so that when they come upon them in the actual reading, they serve as an "island" of familiar material.
Guided reading activity. In the real world, we always read for a purpose. A guided reading activity gives students a reason to read a text. Typical guided activities include the following types of questions:
- Find the three sources of college financial aid mentioned in this article. (scanning)
- What is the reaction of the main character to the surprise announcement? (scanning)
- Does this writer support or oppose the proposed law? (skimming)
Other examples of reading "performance tasks" can be found at: http://pages.uoregon.edu/rldavis/readingtasks/
Assimilation and/or personalization. Once students have answered the guided reading questions, you may want to add some additional comprehension questions—low-level or factual questions that indicate a basic understanding of the text. But the real goal of the reading lesson should be to use the reading for a real-world purpose: to assimilate and personalize the ideas it contains into the learners' existing knowledge. Depending on the content and nature of the reading, this final phase of the lesson could ask students to:
- use the reading as a point of departure for further research on a topic
- respond to or refute the ideas in the text
- use the information in the text to solve a real-world problem
- rewrite the text using their own, personal information, making all the necessary changes
Follow the link below to see a sample lesson plan that illustrates the three parts of a good reading lesson:
Como usare WhatsApp (beginning Italian)
Source: CASLS Topic of the Week
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Content Type: 3
Title: A Strategic Approach to Reading
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By Julie Sykes, CASLS Director
A strategic approach to effective reading expands the ways in which learners are able to approach, digest, and reflect upon the texts with which they engage. Key to meaningful reading instruction, which explicitly targets learners' reading strategies, is purposeful application of strategic activity at various stages in the reading process.
In a survey of learner strategy use, Cohen, Oxford, and Chi (2002) encourage self-reflection on language use strategies especially effective for language learners. The reading section of this survey (pictured here) highlights strategies learners can use to improve their reading abilities, as well as strategies to use when they encounter unknown words or phrases.
Adopted from Cohen, Oxford, and Chi (2002), pg. 72.
The survey can be used with learners in the classroom to encourage reflection about the reading process and learners' own reading strategy use.
Furthermore, explicit classroom instruction facilitates the development of the use of these strategies. In an insightful discussion of reading strategies in the foreign language classroom, Mazzante and Spangler (nd), provide samples of strategy application activities across various stages of the reading process. We highlight a few examples here.
(1) Annotation can be used at all three stages in the reading process – pre-reading, during reading, and post-reading. As learners read, they are asked to highlight and make notes about the elements critical to the text. This could include, for example, audience, point of view, unknown structures or words, or cause and effect. Mazzante and Spanler suggest providing an annotation system to helps learners focus on the important element.
(2) Anticipation guide activities ask learners to make predictions about the topic or themes present in the reading they are about to read. This can include questions to answer, a grid to complete, or a drawing. Key to anticipating is returning to the predictions after reading to make comparisons based on new knowledge.
(3) Use of information. After reading, a key to remembering the material is using in a meaningful way. This can be done through paired sharing, guessing activities, reciprocal teaching, and product creation.
See A Research Toolkit of 12 Reading Strategies for the Foreign Language Classroom (http://www.psmla.net/sites/default/files/4RdgStrat%202012%20Forum.pdf) for detailed activities related to each.
Key to a strategies approach is the inclusion of activities in each stage of the process to move beyond comprehension of content towards thorough interaction with any text they read.
References
Cohen A., Oxford, R., Chi, J. C. (2002). Language Strategy Use Survey. Minneapolis, MN: Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition, University of Minnesota. [In Cohen & Weaver, 2006, pp. 68-74] [note: title links to survey]
Mazzante, J. and Spangler, D. (nd). A research toolkit of 12 reading strategies for the foreign language classroom. Pennsylvania State Modern Language Association Forum Publication. Available at: http://www.psmla.net/sites/default/files/4RdgStrat%202012%20Forum.pdf
Source: CASLS Topic of the Week
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