#2 LORENZO, Jelica Asistio

Bachelor of Elementary Education

TS 100 E- Teaching Strategies in English
How can we promote the use of English?
1. Increase ELL students' English language production and peer interaction.
Specific and measurable goal: ELL students will verbally demonstrate their English speaking
abilities in classroom work at least three times a week.
There are two key items ELLs need in order to improve their English time and practice. There
is nothing teachers can do to rush English acquisition, but there are many ways to provide
opportunities to practice English in the classroom. If activities are structured to support studentto-student or group interaction, ELLs are required to use English to explain concepts and
contribute to the work. This gives teachers an opportunity to gauge what the student has
learned, and it demonstrates student progress in English language development.
2. Explicitly teach English language vocabulary and structures.
Specific and measurable resolution: I will identify, teach, and post key academic vocabulary
and structures for one content lesson each day.
The need to understand English language structures and language acquisition theory is
increasingly important as the number of ELLs increases in classrooms. However, very few
teachers have had the formal training required to be prepared to identify and teach the English
vocabulary and structures found in specific content areas. When I first started teaching ESL, my
students knew way more about grammar than I did. I joked with them, "I don't know English; I
just speak it."
Content teachers can begin by reviewing a content area lesson and identifying not just the
vocabulary that every student needs to know, but other vocabulary words and grammar
structures that ELL students may not be familiar with. See the Hotlinks section for resources on
how to provide explicit instruction on English vocabulary and structures.
3. Build on ELLs' Background Knowledge to Increase Comprehension
Specific and measurable goal: I will elicit background knowledge from ELLs in one content
area through a variety of activities, including questioning and graphic organizers.
Learning something new is like stacking building blocks. The more you have, the higher you can
go. It is not always apparent what building blocks ELLs come with due to language barriers, and
sometimes ELL students don't connect their previous experience with the lesson currently being
taught. That is where the teacher's skill at drawing on background knowledge becomes so
important.
4. Increase ELL Parent Involvement
Specific and measurable goal: Teacher will contact one ELL parent each week to share
information on his/her student or to inform the parent of a school event.
No matter what language you or your students' parents speak, parental support is a big key to
academic success. ELL families are often at a disadvantage when it comes to supporting their
child because of language and cultural barriers. It can be easy to interpret ELL parent "no
shows" as a lack of interest in education; however, very often ELL parents want their children to
succeed as much as any other parent but are unable to participate to the same extent that other
parents participate due to these barriers or their work schedules.
5. Increase Writing Opportunities
Specific and measurable goal: Students will engage in a weekly writing activity that will focus
on developing a certain skill such as creative vocabulary use, the correct format of an essay or
the peer editing process.
The ability to write effectively and accurately to convey a message is a very important skill for a
college student and in most careers. However, it often seems as if the curriculum is largely
focused on developing reading and math skills. Of course, these are very important too, but

students need to have many positive opportunities to develop writing skills in a variety of
formats in order to strengthen their communication skills. For ELLs this is particularly important.
Depending on their writing skill level in their first language and their English language abilities,
writing may be frustrating. Students need to engage in a variety of writing to develop an
understanding of different types of writing and to identify their strengths and weaknesses as a
writer.
2 types of English
Communicating English is the language of everyday communication in oral and written forms.
Examples include:
when your students are talking to their friends on the playground or in the school bus
when you and your students are having an informal face-to-face conversation
when your students go to the grocery store and read the shopping list
ELLs' social English may start developing within a few months. However, it will likely take a
couple of years before ELLs fully develop social English skills in listening, speaking, reading,
and writing.
Academic English and social English are not two separate languages. Academic English is
more demanding and complex than social English. An ELL student with social English
proficiency may not necessarily have the academic English proficiency. It is important for you,
the teacher, to make this distinction. Academic English is the language necessary for success in
school. It is related to a standards-based curriculum, including the content areas of math,
science, social studies, and English language arts.
To facilitate academic language development at the kindergarten level, you can focus on oral
language development around themes like plants, Mexico, and dinosaurs. You can include art,
manipulatives, and dramatic play. In first grade, you can add reading and writing with a focus on
thematic units and literacy development through phonics and storybooks. In the second and
third grades, you can focus on higher order literacy skills around the thematic curriculum, as
well as using novels, anthologies, trade books, and basal readers. You can begin by explicitly
teaching academic vocabulary in the content areas. For example:
In math you can teach your students all the terms for subtraction, like "subtract," "take
away," and "decreased by."
In science, you can teach the terms to connect the parts of an experiment, like
"therefore," "as a result," and "for instance."
For social studies, you can teach the words and also the background knowledge that
ELLs will need. For example, when you mention Thanksgiving, an English-speaking
student may think of the first European settlers on the east coast during the 17th and
18th centuries. But for an ELL, the word "Thanksgiving" may not mean much by itself.
In English language arts, you can teach ELLs by using basic graphic organizers for word
development to visually represent knowledge. ELLs can write a word and then explore
its connections and relationships.
What is an effective teacher?
Preparedness is Fundamental: Being prepared is more than just bringing handouts to
class. Its about being mentally and emotionally fit to teach and supervise children.
Remember, each day is a new day so come to class with an open mind, a schedule of
the days events and to-dos, and a back-up plan in place. Prepared teachers help
propagate students to be more prepared as well and when you have focus, theyll take
notice.
Foster Individualized Instruction: This can be tough with a classroom of 25 students, if
not more, but its not impossible. Each student learns differently, so its important for

teachers to keep a variety of teaching strategies in their tool belts in order to reach all
students. Below are a few helpful sites to help teachers enhance their pedagogical skills:
o Differentiating Instruction: Meeting Students Where They Are
o 8 Lessons Learned on Differentiating Instruction
o How to Differentiate Instruction
o Differentiated Instruction
o Six Strategies for Differentiated Instruction in Project-Based Learning
Encourage Creativity: Its so important to stimulate students creativity and imagination.
Keeping them off guard as much as possible helps make them more adept and agile
learners. You can foster a generation of innovators just be encouraging students to
experiment with improvisational skills, role play, and other active learning techniques.
These activities not only build confidence but speech and language skills as well.
Demonstrate Kindness: Again, might sound like a no-brainer, but its easy to forget the
importance of demonstrating kindness and caring when students are unruly or
inattentive to instructions. But when students act up, that doesnt mean you throw in the
towel. Its okay to share your feelings of disapprovalcommunication is key! However,
remember that your students are human, too, and they will have days that they are
distracted. Since theyre the embodiment of the limited experiences theyve already had,
all you can do as a teacher is provide memorable educational experiences that will have
a significant impact on their development.
Being a teacher is one of the most valuable occupations out there. The 21st century has seen
some pretty significant changes to teaching methods from educators in the field. Youre
responsible for providing the best possible outcomes for your students, and thats a tall order.
But with the right tools and strategies, and of course the right attitude, your students will not only
meet specific learning objectives but have fun while doing it.
What are the general areas of teacher competence?
1. Teachers should be skilled in choosing assessment methods appropriate for
instructional decisions.
Skills in choosing appropriate, useful, administratively convenient, technically adequate, and fair
assessment methods are prerequisite to good use of information to support instructional
decisions. Teachers need to be well-acquainted with the kinds of information provided by a
broad range of assessment alternatives and their strengths and weaknesses. In particular, they
should be familiar with criteria for evaluating and selecting assessment methods in light of
instructional plans.
2. Teachers should be skilled in developing assessment methods appropriate for
instructional decisions.
While teachers often use published or other external assessment tools, the bulk of the
assessment information they use for decision-making comes from approaches they create and
implement. Indeed, the assessment demands of the classroom go well beyond readily available
instruments.
3. The teacher should be skilled in administering, scoring and interpreting the results of
both externally-produced and teacher-produced assessment methods.
It is not enough that teachers are able to select and develop good assessment methods; they
must also be able to apply them properly. Teachers should be skilled in administering, scoring,
and interpreting results from diverse assessment methods.

4. Teachers should be skilled in using assessment results when making decisions about
individual students, planning teaching, developing curriculum, and school improvement.
Assessment results are used to make educational decisions at several levels: in the classroom
about students, in the community about a school and a school district, and in society, generally,
about the purposes and outcomes of the educational enterprise. Teachers play a vital role when
participating in decision-making at each of these levels and must be able to use assessment
results effectively.
5. Teachers should be skilled in developing valid pupil grading procedures which use
pupil assessments.
Grading students is an important part of professional practice for teachers. Grading is defined
as indicating both a student's level of performance and a teacher's valuing of that performance.
The principles for using assessments to obtain valid grades are known and teachers should
employ them.
6. Teachers should be skilled in communicating assessment results to students, parents,
other lay audiences, and other educators.
Teachers must routinely report assessment results to students and to parents or guardians. In
addition, they are frequently asked to report or to discuss assessment results with other
educators and with diverse lay audiences. If the results are not communicated effectively, they
may be misused or not used. To communicate effectively with others on matters of student
assessment, teachers must be able to use assessment terminology appropriately and must be
able to articulate the meaning, limitations, and implications of assessment results. Furthermore,
teachers will sometimes be in a position that will require them to defend their own assessment
procedures and their interpretations of them. At other times, teachers may need to help the
public to interpret assessment results appropriately
7. Teachers should be skilled in recognizing unethical, illegal, and otherwise
inappropriate assessment methods and uses of assessment information.
Fairness, the rights of all concerned, and professional ethical behavior must undergird all
student assessment activities, from the initial planning for and gathering of information to the
interpretation, use, and communication of the results. Teachers must be well-versed in their own
ethical and legal responsibilities in assessment. In addition, they should also attempt to have the
inappropriate assessment practices of others discontinued whenever they are encountered.
Teachers should also participate with the wider educational community in defining the limits of
appropriate professional behavior in assessment.