ELL Family/Teacher Collaboration Report

You are the director of a preschool program that serves children ages three to five. You are giving a presentation to teachers and parents to encourage partnerships in

In pursuing my ELL endorsement, I found it to be very beneficial to interview current ELL teachers. They shared their insight and expertise in this field. I interviewed the middle school ELL teacher at my school, an upper-elementary ELL teacher and early-elementary teacher in my district. I asked twelve questions that pertained to their experience teaching ELL. These responses are valuable to future ELL teachers and general education teachers who teach ELL in their classrooms.

In the book Early Childhood Education Today 11th Edition, we read that “Family-centered practice is one of the cornerstone features of early childhood special education. This follows the fundamental notion that children’s development is influenced by their environment: their family, teachers, school, town, media, governmental systems, and so on.” (MORRISON, 2009) The first thing we as teachers must do is acknowledge that the children’s families are the first and most important teachers of their children and recognize the long-term effect families have on the attitudes and accomplishments of their children . For the edification of today’s youth there are potential positive responses to be obtained through working with a child’s parents as

Verbal prompts, redirection to remain focused on a given task, minimize outdoor play, reduced iPad games and parent meeting. The results of interventions are diverse. Adriel would respond to previous intervention such as less outdoor play and parent meeting by behaving in class and follow directions for outdoor play for the first two days of the week and then the behavior occurs again. Verbal prompting often works for the first 2 minutes and then the behavior occurs again. The support and one-to-one attention given from the staff during transitions decreased the incidents of noncompliance, pushing and yelling. The staff will model, role play, practice and discuss all these intervention strategies to support Adriel. He will be given attention when he shows replacement behaviors.

Through my research in my school district there are no regularly scheduled community outreach programs. This district does have a coordinator (Joann) who works with many different school districts for community outreach projects. From what I understand is that she lets each school know when there is an activity going on for the ELL students and their families. I was also guided to the website “Partners In Learning” (New Frontier Group, n.d). This site has an enormous amount of resource for parents. This website is for non-speaking to “limited-English speaking parents. Website, articles, and journals that are offered in multiple languages are very beneficial

Knowing how to address a variety of situations in the early childhood setting and effectively partnering with parents to do so are important skills for all teachers and caregivers. For this assignment, you will choose one of the following scenarios:

A professional educator will actively view the child’s in association with their family and environment. They need to be viewed in context with their family as this will make the educator aware and respect the values and culture of each family and student. Principle 2 of the EYLF mentions ‘Learning outcomes are most likely to be achieved when Early Childhood Educators work in partnership with families’ (EYLF, 2009, p12). This is mostly effective when a successful educator uses strategies that actively involves the family, by introducing families to the classroom through plan programs that invites parent input.

I selected my Family Collaborative Project as an artifact that represents my competency to assess the ongoing learning of children (including those with disabilities) birth-to-three in a collaborative manner with paraprofessionals and families. I used two different screening tools based on a systematic approach of assessment: Developmental Screen Ages & Stages and the Assessment, Evaluation and Programming System (AEPS). The Family Collaborative Project encompassed my ability to collect screening data, assess and record children’s on-going development, use developmentally appropriate learning outcomes that align with Kentucky Early Childhood Standards. Further the results of the assessment provided me the opportunity to work as a team with families, paraprofessionals and teachers to design learning outcomes and plan future services and instruction.

Lastly, the districts community outreach programs for the amount of ELs in the district is outstanding, with one-on-one meetings and communication, the families are constantly kept in the loop and current with their student’s learning. Along with that, the school also provides summer camp for ELs and additional supports. There are no improvements that I would suggest to this portion of the program at this time.

From the first day a child is born, parents are there to nurture their child, to support them as they grow and develop. There is a lot to learn about raising a child under normal circumstances, but when a child has special needs parents must learn this whole new language of medical and special education terms (Overton, 2005). Parents enter this new world where navigating for the best interest of their child is riddled with challenges and obstacles that they need to somehow overcome. This is especially true when parents are dealing with the special education program in their child’s school.

The following five ways are, “1.Connect with ELL students’ families, 2. Ensure the effective communication of important school information, 3.Tailor your approach to the family’s cultural traditions, 4. Get parents involved in school activities, and 5. Formulate a plan to encourage parental engagement” ("Five Ways to Engage Parents of ELL Students", 2013) Now let’s break down each step so we can fully understand if these steps are efficient. Number 1: Connect with ELL students’ families- Build a partnership by learning about parent’s cultural traditions and mutual respect. Number 2-Ensure the effective communication of important school information- Make sure to present all school’s schedules and important school information in their native language. By doing this you are making sure the correct information is being passed along. Number 3: Tailor your approach to the family’s cultural traditions- Make sure the cultural norms are embraced. That way both viewpoints are valid and will contribute to the success in their child’s education. Number 4: Get parents involved in school activities- By getting the parents involved you are relaying a message of the importance their personal role in the child’s education. Number 5: Formulate a plan to encourage parental engagement- “Education is everyone’s business, not just that of educators. Encouraging the contributions of ELL families is one more way to help schools work for the betterment of the entire community” ("Five Ways to Engage Parents of ELL Students",

In this study, the researchers represented only the number of prompts given by the caregiver and the number of removals from a setting. A visual support was implemented to both participants to decrease unwanted behavior during the transitioning from one setting to another. The researchers identified the target behavior for each participant and tracked it during baseline, intervention, and maximum transition time. The introduction of the visual supports resulted in a significant decline in the inappropriate behaviors for the two participants. The researchers felt the use of the visual supports reduced the amount of time spent between activities as well as increased independence for each

In order to encourage parents to be involved in their child’s school and education schools could offer orientations that focus on multicultural education and how it is incorporated. Library books, articles, and videos about multicultural education should be made available to all parents and family members of the ELL students. There should also be some type of bulletin board made available to families that has notes about upcoming events, workshops, English language classes for adults,

(Hayes & Casey, 2002) This is because when children are interacting, the learning process is more enjoyable. The fact that the children were engaging in a shared experience made it easier for them to create longer narratives because they were having fun. In addition, Wright, Diener, and Kemp (2013) studied the link between storytelling dramas and the sense of community in the early childhood classroom. Specifically, they found that storytelling dramas creates a sense of community which encourages social interaction for children who had existing social issues (Wright, Diener, & Kemp, 2013). Preschooler’s with existing social issues have a hard time entering play and engaging with others because they are still learning how to do so. For this reason, creating a sense of community in the classroom through storytelling establishes a feeling of belonging for children who have less social skills. Children are more likely to engage in these shared activities if they feel comfortable and valued in the environment they are doing so (Wright et al., 2013). Similarly, storytelling encourages children to have respect for each other by being an active member of the storytelling process. During storytelling, children take turns and collaborate with each other (Kim, 1999). This reciprocal back and forth interaction creates a sense of unity and allows children to identify that their ideas are valued by

The child I decided to observe was my two-year-old little brother. This was a very brief observation of approximately half an hour. It took place in my own house, and when I started to supervise my brother, Frankie, he was just getting home from the daycare. As my mom and stepdad are working during the day, my little brother attends to the daycare. There, he spends about eight hours, daily, playing and interacting with other kids. It becomes very clear that not having that relative companion is kind of difficult for him. When he comes come, he wants all of us to start playing with him. In very rare occasions, Frankie comes home tired and all he wants is milk and sleep. As most children of his age, he requires a lot of attention and affection.