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Tag: ELL

Halloween Tips and Activities for MLs

Halloween Tips and Activities for MLs

Many children look forward to Halloween each year. English Language Learners (ELLs) that are newcomers may not have experienced Halloween in the past or celebrated it in a much different way. These students will benefit from a basic explanation of what the holiday is and the different ways that it is celebrated in their community.  This will help alleviate the confusion that may come up otherwise. Here are some Halloween activities and tips to use as you introduce the holiday…

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Integrating Speaking and Writing for ELLs

Integrating Speaking and Writing for ELLs

Speaking and writing are two components of language development. With elementary-aged students, the typical progression is that students progress more quickly in speaking than in writing.  This is most likely due to the fact that all students at that age are learning writing, while speaking is a natural way that children socialize. For older students, some may be more comfortable writing down ideas before speaking. Integrating speaking and writing provides English Language Learners with additional and opportunities for vocabulary development….

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STEM With English Language Learners

STEM With English Language Learners

STEM with ELLs STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) activities are highly engaging for students.  This is particularly true for English Language Learners. A key component is that the disciplines are integrated. Students typically have a real world problem to solve or project to create. Here are some overviews of using STEM in the elementary classroom: what-is-stem the-benefits-of-stem-activities STEM Overview from WIDA Reasons to use STEM with ELLs Builds Background Knowledge- Having students take part in or observe an experiment, engineering…

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Assessing ESOL Students & Changes to WIDA Scoring

Assessing ESOL Students & Changes to WIDA Scoring

Assessing ESOL students & Changes to WIDA scoring Throughout the school year I constantly assess my ESOL students. I use short formative assessments that I integrated into activities we were already doing. Using Rubrics for quick assessments To get a sense of their speaking level I will sometimes take out the WIDA speaking rubric and simply listen to students conversations and write down where they fall on the rubric. Writing is also easy to organically assess. I look at writing…

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Vocabulary Building File Folder Games

Vocabulary Building File Folder Games

I have some newcomers that I just started working with.  They love games so I came up with some file folder games to help them practice basic vocabulary.  The students are at two different levels: some are able to read the others has some basic letter sound knowledge.  All have low expressive vocabulary. We are practicing nouns and where to find them.  The game board are different rooms either in a house or school.  The cards are nouns or verbs.  There are…

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