The Importance Of Learning Groups In ESL Students

Within the past ten years, the number of English Language Learners (ELLs) has doubled. An increase of more than 2 million ELL students in the U.S schools, left professionals within the field of education with no choice but to face the challenge of understanding cultural differences. In addition to this, educators must understand how these differences affect students’ language development, learning style, academic achievement and most importantly, his or her performance on standardized tests. These differences must be understood, valued and respected by all service providers, especially those who are involved in the decision making process concerning the placement of students in special educational programs. (Roseberry-McKibbin, 2014).

|With group learning, peer assessment can also be utilised which can be a valuable tool. Some learners will respond better to feedback |

All these strategies gives all students an equal opportunity to practice English, participation and involvement. ELLs students when it’s time to read or participate in class they may be reluctant to speak because of their lack of proficiency in English or feel uncomfortable in an environment where they have to share their ideas. ESL teachers must provide a positive and supportive environment that offers significant influence on student comfort level, success and participation that requiring ELLs to use the language in front of class without force them

For teachers, I believe they are lacking in having efficient data, practices, and resources. These three categories play an essential role in educating, evaluating, and caring for ELL students. Communication is a huge factor when it comes to instruction in the classroom. In the past research has shown poor communication between teachers, students and families. Schools often lack in providing differentiated methods and tools to teach ELL students. Schools in the past have failed to offer the correct assessments that were needed in order to diagnose each student's needs and measure their individualized learning standards. Educators can easily become frustrated because there is such a wide range of English learners. This means academic levels are different and the educators have not received the proper training or instructions on how to correctly educate ELL students.

Lessing, Doris. "Group Minds." Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum. 7th ed. Eds. Laurence Behrens and Leonard J. Rosen. New York: Pearson Longman, 2000. 333-335.

Grouping ELL students with “peer-buddies” or students appointed to assist the ELL student can give the ELL student more opportunities for using conversational English, allow them to receive minor assistance without interrupting the teacher, and give

ELL continue to rise year after year. In EDUC 628, the class delved into the rise of ELL in America and how the best teaching methods to approach each learner with. Every ELL student is unique and has different learning process. Although the semester covered a wide variety of topics ranging from dialects to teaching methods, every module served its purpose in providing a framework for future ELL teachers. Learning about how to teach ELL was significant to me because when I first entered the school system in America, I was placed into ESL and I have gone through the process of many of these teaching methods. EDUC 628 main focus was preparing students whose goal in the future was to educate ELL. The articles and readings assigned in the class provided a funds of knowledge going into each new lesson. Coupled with the readings, hands on activities such as the mini lessons and designing lesson plans provided each student with experience that will reflect on their teaching abilities in the classroom. In my paper, I will be provided a step by step synthesis of what was learned and accomplished every week along with a brief summary of the readings. I will probe deeper into the modules and lessons that piqued my interest the most and that also challenge my mindset.

Reading in these groups teaches the children to take turns, listen, offer support to one another, share views, stretch their imagination and raise their self-esteem.

Since most of the school's population comes from a hispanic/latino background 36.5% are English Language Learners. The school offers intervention for those students or students struggling with english. In my classroom there are a total of four english language learners, one monolingual spanish speaking students and the rest are ELD. Usually when the teacher is explaining a lesson I sit and explain in depth and with more examples to the ELL’s. While we do reader's workshop I work with them on their sight words and have them read to a buddy. When the students practice reading I have them coach each other if they don't know a word. When i sit with them to

This practice allows teachers the opportunity to gauge how much practice ELL students actually receive with speaking English in “real life”. Teachers who have participated in Shadowing programs have noted an oral deficiency in ELLs’, but have also noted that ELLs sit silently through their classes, not interacting with other students or with their teachers. Soto, an associate professor of education at Whittier College in California indicates that English-language learners spend less than 2 percent of the school day improving their academic oral language, even though it’s a critical foundation of literacy (Soto, 2014). As indicated, based on the results of this pilot program, participating teachers will plan together, how to provide more opportunities for “academic talk”, to include ELL students, during classroom activities. School administrators will also tailor, teacher development training programs to instruct teachers on how to be more inclusive of all of their students during classroom discussions and to be sensitive as to whether ELL students would benefit most by practicing the language relating to particular content areas or whether the focus should be placed more on conversational English skills (Heitin, Liana 2011). Additionally, teachers will be instructed to ensure that needed practice occurs in settings which will best facilitate ELL learner’s individual needs (e.g., some ELLs may learn better in small group discussions and others may

The article Principles and Practices of Sociocultural Assessment: Foundations for Effective Strategies for Linguistically Diverse Classrooms, is written to inform the readers about different types of practices that teachers can take into action when working with ESL students. In this article, it mentions how different principals help to accommodate the ESL students. One of the principals that was mentioned was is that learning is social. In the article, it was mentioned that learning is social because it helps students to understand and use interaction with others to share meaning in a social setting (Smith, Teemant, & Pinnegar, 2004, P. 39). In the article, another principal that helps ESL students is that teaching is assisting. The meaning

The literacy-rich classroom environment must be designed with the students’ needs in mind, meaning it is student-centered with teacher guidance, integrates technology, and is flexible to allow for differentiation. The classroom should have a flexible design that can be “adaptable and easily changeable based on what the students are working on” (Sadlier School, 2017). This means that the seating arrangement is not based on individual desks, but rather tables or clusters of desks to encourage students to collaborate and communicate in small groups or pairs, promoting oral language mastery (Sadlier School, 2017). It should also promote hands-on, student-centric learning

Jayden is an ESOL student who has strong speaking, listening, and writing skills but is considered intermediate with his reading skills. He has problems decoding reading and even greater problems with getting a deeper understanding from reading, for instance, making inferences. He approaches language for its socially informative aspect. He prefers social interaction to solve problems and to make clarifications on something he does not understand. If he doesn’t understand a text or a word he will usually ask a friend first or the teacher, depending on who is more accessible at the time. He is also motivated by the social aspect of learning and therefore benefits from learning in cooperative learning environments rather than individual ones. He also leans toward looking for answers via oral communication first, rather than looking back at the text and reading for the information. Jayden lacks personal strategies for learning, especially in regards to reading and writing. His strategies have

To be an ESL student in the regular classroom is not easy for the students and the teachers. Researchers agree that most of the time, the high school and middle school teachers are less prepared to receive this type of students in their classroom (DelliCarpini). In regular classroom is difficult for the teachers to think they have different type of the students in the classroom. ESL students do not like to ask a lot of questions even they are not understanding what the teachers say.

The students who attended the EESL program had twelve classes of English with a total of thirty-six, that was, thirty percent of their schedule. The schedule was extended over a period of nine days. The students had an English class each day, either a single period or a double period. Each period lasted seventy-five minutes. The seating plan of the class was not organized in rows as commonly seen in schools but, four tables were pushed together to form a team table. The cooperative teacher’s (CT) pedagogical approach was supported by teaching project-based activities. The activities and the lessons were planned around one theme that changed every three or four weeks. For example, the students had worked on the teenage years, superheroes, and fears just to name a few. Hence, the CT produced an array of material for each subject. Furthermore, the students used an activity book called Moving Up! and worked in a grammar book called Step 3. The CT mainly spoke English in class. However, in certain occasions, she switched to French. Speaking French was observed during a time when she had to discuss a field trip activity that the students were going to participate in. She had to explain the remaining payments that the parents had to do and she wanted to make sure the information was clearly understood by the students. Another instance when the CT spoke French with the students was just before the bell rang for class and after the bell when the class was over. The students