Strategies

"What is important is that the task and the classroom grouping are the most effective for the particular teaching focus at that point." (Gibbons p.59)

At this point the book gives some strategies to use to work with ELLs when teaching in a content area.

Planning lessons, use of materials and classroom organization are important for ELLs.  According to Gibbons, students learn best in a mixture of whole group work, small group work, paired work, and individual work so that the students are collaborating to understand text.

The first strategy is to find out the background knowledge of all the students when introducing lessons.  It says to be open about the subject being studied and let the students use their first language to tell their "personal narratives".  While the students tell their narratives, the teacher should be doing a K-W-L chart and writing down vocabulary associated with the subject.

Next is to move toward the complex text slowly by a class discussion that includes visual aids, diagrams, graphs, vocabulary words and concrete objects.  By discussing the topic before getting to the complex text, students will have some prior knowledge and be able to tackle the text on their own.

ELLs need a lot of modeling and the teacher should be able to model the use of academic language. As teachers, we need to be aware of our language that we use in the classroom.  Students should be able to use academic language in the classrooms and use other languages with family and friends - Discourse as discussed with our readings.

The next step is the teach students about grammar using the text so they become familiar with the language. She says to follow the text being used until they understand the concept.