Last Visit of the Semester

Today I came in and all the students were silently reading, which came as a shock, because I had never seen this class, or pretty much any class this silent. After I came in, and sufficiently distracted everyone from their reading, as a new but familiar stimulus in the room, they moved on to their next activity.

The teacher put an image up on the Smart Board (which I love, and wish I had in my room) and made the students think about it. They were instructed to brainstorm some ideas about a story that the picture would accompany. They were reminded of the stories they had just read, which were all Historical Fictions from the time of the American Revolution.

They all had some pretty cleaver ideas about Americans spying on British soldiers. They would start to make up stories or telling the class about the intentions of each of the characters in the picture. This was what the teacher was prompting, as after she came up with a sample story, she told the students to write the first two paragraphs of a new story that the picture could accompany, leaving it off with a cliffhanger. I think that this activity will really help activate some of the reading for the students, especially the ELLs.

Mina was called out by a teacher to do some baseline testing for a standardized test, I am not sure which one, but after this, I focused my attention on Ronoldo. He asked me about words, defining a word and searching for the word to describe it. I helped him out a little bit, but told him to do his best with the phonetically spelling. I have his story and will probably post it a little later because I really enjoyed it, as he considered the whole text, and the cliffhanger is very good, especially for a 5th grader.

When Mina came back, both her and Ronoldo went to the resource room. Suzahn was in the principle's office for saying the word "kill" I'm not sure in what context it was, but from what i caught, this has become a regular occurrence lately. I think that this is sad, but probably what may happen to a lot of students who are frustrated in their classes, or she may be using this as a way to get out of the classroom and the frustrations of some of the work, into a more intimate environment.

In the room, we started talking about the Titanic. It was weird because all 3 of the students had seen the movie, but I have never, and was not allowed to watch it when it came out when I was their age (weird!). They completed a KWL chart, and in the things they already knew section, would discuss aspects of the movie. Ronoldo started talking about the nude scene, and both I and the instructor said "wait wait wait" and stopped him. They each took turns reading pages from a little pamphlet on the boat. It is weird, I think that they each want to show off to each other how much they've improved, because they all seem to be clamoring to read. I think that it is interesting and really beneficial that they've learned about immigration in several forms this year, or travelling to America for a "better future," as they have read about Pilgrims and the immigrants on the Titanic.

This was probably my favorite time visiting the class, as I got to fully interact with Ronoldo and Mina. I have enjoyed every minute of coming to know the students, so, like every last placement, today was also the hardest one to leave. These are good students who genuinely want to learn, even though they have so much going against them; a language barrier and cultural, and from what I've gleaned about their home life, socio-economic barriers. It is amazing that they work so hard, but some students with everything going for them tend to not put forth the same amount of effort. Maybe it is that they do not know what they have...I sure didn't. I would like to work with these students more as just a volunteer, as I have been invited back next semester by the teacher, and continue to keep the blog and the newly hosted website up. (there are still some kinks with the website when viewed in different browsers, and it is a little less complete than I would want, but all in all I think it is a good start)

November 11, 2009

I went to my placement, excited to work with the students...I got up to the school and realized it was Veteran's Day and that no one was there

Finally updating (again) part 2

October 28th

Mina was not here today, and Ronoldo did not go to the reading room, so the day was spent in the regular classroom. They had spent the majority of the past week working on an essay on a famous explorer that each was expected to write. I took him and a couple other students who needed extra time typing up their papers to the computer lab.
The assignment was very clear cut, and did an excellent job of explaining what the teacher expected from each paper. It had a list of every aspect, and a brief explanation of these sections. There were also some questions that were used to prompt the students’ responses to these.
Ronoldo’s paper was on Christopher Columbus, and in the fourty-five minutes we were in the lab, he barely finished his title page. Typing out the explorer’s and his names was excruciating, because he typed with one finger, and did not know where the keys were. It kind of made me want to take the keyboard from him and have him dictate his information to me while I typed.
He kept having issues with formatting, which I told him he could deal with at the very end. He did not seem to believe me, and spent a lot of time trying to get the right font and font size for his title page. To be fair, I was the same way at his age, and would drive my dad crazy while I formatted and reformatted each part of the paper.
I think that there may be an issue with ELLs learning how to type AND learn the English language. Writing it down is one thing, but typing is hard enough to learn as it is, especially to a fifth grader. I do not doubt that he was intimidated at all by the scale of this project, and the fact that he was required to type out the whole thing. I know I would have been, and am sometimes put off by this even now.

Finally updating (again)

So, the past month has been a little hectic, and I've had my notes for these visits on my computer but haven't remembered to post them (I'm such a good blogger). This past week I was unable to got to the elementary school due to feeling sick and not wanting to spread anything to students, or risk catching anything else for that matter.

October 21st

I met the students in the reading room, where they were working on a worksheet to try to identify the subject and predicate of a number of sentences. The paper was set up so that it declared a statement, and then asked the students a question about what preformed the action in each. I know this is kind of confusing, but the best way to explain it would probably be that it was very formulaic, and consisted of statements like this: “Billy plays basketball every Thursday.” And then asked questions like “Who plays basketball every Thursday?” The answer obviously being Billy.

Mina had problems with this, most likely because she was overthinking the questions, which were very simplistic. Despite being very easy to those with better grasps on the English language, these questions were probably very helpful to those just beginning to learn. A few days after going to this placement, I got a similar worksheet from my Spanish teacher to help us identify direct and indirect objects. Maybe all this is helpful to ELLers.

After finishing going over their answers on this worksheet, they started one that helped them to identify the predicate. They were required to circle the predicate of various sentences. Originally they started to circle everything but the verb, but eventually figured out that the predicate is essentially the verb to the end of the sentence.

The next worksheet was one in which they had to decide whether a predicate or subject was required in a sentence with a blank, and then had to choose from a word bank (or phrase bank in the case of the predicates) The students seemed to have the most fun with this because they had more opportunities to be creative with their sentences, and it did not really matter which word or phrase they chose, as long as it was the correct missing aspect of the sentences.

Back in the general classroom, the Ronaldo and Mina were placed in a group with the two lower reading students, and the class went around to different stations. Their first station was with the teacher, where they began taking turns reading pages from the book, Dear Mr. Henshaw. I remember reading this book and enjoying it when I was about their age. It is a simple read, but a very good book. It is interesting because it is different than most, being that it is written as a series of letters that a child sends to his favorite author, Mr. Henshaw. Through these letters we learn more and more about the child and his life. After a round of reading, the teacher would ask a series of questions about what was happening in the book.

The next station the students went to was a partner reading area. They took turns reading paragraphs in the short story La Bamba, another story I had to read at their age. The kids almost fought to read and if one would start reading more than they were supposed to, the partner would interject immediately. Not soon after getting into this section, all the students were pulled out for some sort of guidance activity I believe.

Sometimes communication between teachers is hard to establish in the schools. In the school I am placed in, there was some confusion as to when the ESLers would be pulled out of their general education classes and taken to the reading resource room. This was made a little more confusing by the issues I had stated in my last post. This took up some of the students' learning time, I guess this is a real glimpse into how far something so small as a miscommunication can go in disrupting the activities in the schools.

In the reading room, they took part in some small group exercises that focused on developing their reading. They learned about Christopher Columbus Day, a holiday which is apparently a holiday pretty much unique to the USA. I learned in my Spanish class that Dia de la Raza is celebrated in Spanish speaking countries on this day. Instead of celebrating Columbus embarking across the Atlantic Ocean, they celebrate the mixing of the Spanish and the indigenous peoples and their cultures. I think I prefer this holiday instead because it is more universal, and less controversial than the celebration of a man who thought that he landed in Asia, and telling students that people thought that the world was flat at the time, but I won't rant about that.

Three fifth grade students were in the reading room when I got there, Ronaldo, Mina and Suzahn. Ronaldo and Mina were in the general education class that I observed last week, and Suzhan is Mina's twin. The children were asked to read from a packet about Columbus, and each alternated reading paragraphs out loud. The resource teacher would sometimes ask comprehension questions, in order to see if they understood new or unfamiliar vocabulary words and terms. The she would circle words that the students had trouble reading, or mispronounced. At the end of the reading, which was about two pages, they were asked to answer some multiple choice questions. These questions were a little tricky at times, and required some further analysis of the the reading rather than being able to be found directly within the text.

Talking to the resource teacher, she was happy to have these students. She said that while they seemed to be loud and impulsive, this meant that they were full of energy and life. She was happy that they were participating in the lesson, and happy do do so.

After about half an hour, the students returned to their regular class. It took a little time to get settled in, Ronoldo did not have any paper, and he did not really have much of a desire to get started. The teacher helped him get started by asking him some of his interests, and incorperating them into the assignment. Eventually they started their work, which was to write the rough draft of an announcement. After this, the general education teacher got the two ELLers and the lowest reader in the class together, and they read a book that was apparently designed with ESL student in mind.

The small book was about different subjects and their applications to their lives outside of school. This does two things, it describes behaviors and operations necessary for life, while reinforcing their acquisition of the English language.

One issue that the teacher talked to me about was the fact that Mina was always seeming to be pulled out of class for something, and was not getting the information that she needed in the general classroom. Instead, She has been wasting time transitioning between the classes. The teacher does not seem to be pleased that all this is happening, and I don't think I would be either. I think that, while a student like Mina should be able to participate in extra curricular activities during the school day like chorus and band, there is a point where this freedom to choose interferes with the student's ability to learn.

Finally!

Sorry for the lack of posts....

The past two or three weeks were hectic (I barely had time to complete and turn in my MAT application) and I did get ANY word on my placement until last week-and apparently, it was misinformation...

I was going to be in a classroom where I would be working with 7 English Language Learners (ELLs). This would be a great opportunity to get some really in depth information about teaching them, but I was put in a class that up until last week (after I was scheduled) only had 1 ELL; there are 2 now.

I went into the school on Wednesday, around 1230 and asked where I was supposed to go, and the vice principal came by and talked to me, saying that she was told that I was not supposed to show up until middle to late October, and that I would only be coming in for 3-4 weeks to purely observe the students. I informed her that this was not what I was planning on being signed up for, and gave her my plans for this Independent Study, which she seemed excited about.

Coming in early was not an issue to the teacher, She introduced me to the classroom and told me that their schedule was weird because they had a 2 hour early dismissal. They had just finished watching James and the Giant Peach after a unit of reading the book with the rest of the 5th grade class. They had been asked to fill out a worksheet with columns for each sense and observe the fruit in these terms. They were then asked to start writing a story about a peach using the descriptions that they had written down.

The ELL students, a girl and a boy, did not seem to have a problem with doing any of the assignments. The girl finished faster than everyone and then just sort of looked around, while the boy (the student who had just transferred in from another MD county) was distracted on a couple of occasions, and talked with the students surrounding him. He seemed to be in a very good mood, and had multiple positive interactions with his classmates.

I would have thought that perhaps just coming from a new school system, he would not be able to make friends as easily. I know I would not have, even as a native English speaker.

I was only at the placement for an hour and a half, and most of that was waiting around for the right administration. I will update in a couple of days, and hopefully everything will work out a lot better and I will have enough information to write a decent blog post.

Please consider the following,

Imagine that you are back in elementary school. How was it? Did you have a good time? Were you successful? Did you make friends?

Now, imagine that you are reliving all of these experiences, but in a foreign country where you don't speak the language. How would things be different? Do you think you'd have a good time, or be successful or make friends nearly as easily? Do you think that the teachers would know how best to teach you?

After taking English as a Second Language Across the Curriculum (ESLAC), I began to wonder how my life would be different if I was thrust into another country and forced to learn their language or fail. There is support (albeit, not enough) in order to make the public aware of and assist students, like ones with exceptionalities, or in lower socio-economic statuses. But from my experience, the issue of English Language Learners (ELLs) in public schools seems to be largely ignored, met with with inexperienced teachers, or may ignite debate about US immigration law.

I want to do my part in changing this. Along with this blog, which I will use to keep track of my experiences, and revelations in an elementary school field placement, which I should be starting soon, I plan on developing and maintaining a website (which is based off my final project in ESLAC). I am hoping that this site can be used as a starting point for overall public awareness for ELLs, by combining utilities from the internet, my research and my experiences.

Thank you for reading,

Benjamin Casto