ELLs with Limited Prior Schooling: Six Instructional Guidelines

CoTESOL Convention

Denver 2011

Andrea DeCapua

The College of New Rochelle

Helaine W. Marshall

Long Island University

Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education

How do we refer to them?

• LFS • SIFE • SLIFE

Needs of SLIFE

• Develop basic literacy skills • Master content & concepts in curriculum

• Adapt to cultural differences in learning and

teaching

• Develop academic ways of thinking

Mutually Adaptive Learning Paradigm - MALP

SLIFE

North American Classrooms

Interconnectedness Independence

Shared Responsibility

Individual Accountability

Pragmatic

Tasks Academic

Tasks

ACCEPT SLIFE

CONDITIONS

COMBINE

SLIFE & U.S.

PROCESSES

FOCUS on U.S.

ACTIVITIES with

familiar

language

& content

Immediate

Relevance

Oral

Transmission

Future Relevance

Written Word

with

(DeCapua & Marshall, 2011; Marshall 1994, 1998)

A. Accept Conditions for Learning

A1. I am making this lesson/project immediately relevant to my students.

A2. I am helping students develop and maintain interconnectedness.

B. Combine Processes for Learning

B1. I am incorporating both shared responsibility and individual accountability.

B2. I am scaffolding the written word through oral interaction.

C. Focus on New Activities for Learning

C1. I am focusing on tasks requiring academic ways of thinking.

C2. I am making these tasks accessible to my students with familiar language and

content.

© University of Michigan Press, 2011. DeCapua & Marshall. Breaking New Ground: Teaching Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education in Secondary Schools

MALP Teacher Planning Checklist

DeCapua, A. & Marshall, H. W. (2011). Breaking New Ground: Teaching Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education in U.S. Secondary Schools. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan Press.

• Choose a bag.

• Look inside.

• What is it?

• Think about your answer.

Questions to ask about the Mystery Bag

• Do you know what it is?

• Do you know what it is called in your language?

• Do you like it?

• Give 4 words to describe it.

Sharing Answers

› Tabulate answers

› Write answers as students say them

› Copy down all descriptive words

And now………

Apple Collection

Benefits of Collections

• Building definitions

• Learning ways to categorize objects

• Developing vocabulary – academic terms

– descriptive adjectives

• Collaborating on a class project

Categorization

A/An _______________________

is

a/an _______________________

Important: small before big!

Characteristics

• with ___________________

or

• that has ________________

Specific Descriptions

• green

• good

• delicious

• round

• sweet

• plastic

• wood

• heavy

• glass

• silver

• small

• soap

• key chain

• teapot

• bank

• basket

• magnet

• paperweight

Classify and Place in Order

1. Opinion

2. Size

3. Shape

4. Condition

5. Age

6. Color

7- Origin

(Where from)

8- Material

(Made of)

9- Function

(Used for)

big red teapot heavy glass paperweight

Talking & Writing about Collections

Talk/write about the items in the collections using sentence frames:

My apple is a/an ____key chain________.

It is ___________, ___________ and ________.

It is a/an ________, ________, _________ key chain.

A. Accept Conditions for Learning

A1. I am making this lesson/project immediately relevant to my students.

A2. I am helping students develop and maintain interconnectedness.

B. Combine Processes for Learning

B1. I am incorporating both shared responsibility and individual accountability.

B2. I am scaffolding the written word through oral interaction.

C. Focus on New Activities for Learning

C1. I am focusing on tasks requiring academic ways of thinking.

C2. I am making these tasks accessible to my students with familiar language and

content.

© University of Michigan Press, 2011. DeCapua & Marshall. Breaking New Ground: Teaching Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education in Secondary Schools

MALP Teacher Planning Checklist

A. Accept Conditions

for Learning

• The category each object

represents is something familiar

• The activity makes abstract—classification— concrete, by using real-world objects

• Students and teacher learn more about each others’ interests

• Students create collections together as a class

B. Combine Processes

for Learning

• Class collectively creates

sentences

• Pairs come up with additional sentences

• Each person adds information related to own object

• Students share answers to questions orally as teacher writes on board

• Students read from board orally and later copy into their notebooks

C. Focus on New Activities

for Learning

• Classifying

• Representational vs. functional identification

• Language scaffolded by use of L1 among students

• Content scaffolded by relevant personal information

• Content scaffolded by sentence frames

Mutually Adaptive Learning Paradigm - MALP

SLIFE

North American Classrooms

Interconnectedness Independence

Shared Responsibility

Individual Accountability

Pragmatic

Tasks Academic

Tasks

ACCEPT SLIFE

CONDITIONS

COMBINE

SLIFE & U.S.

PROCESSES

FOCUS on U.S.

ACTIVITIES with

familiar

language

& content

Immediate

Relevance

Oral

Transmission

Future Relevance

Written Word

with

(DeCapua & Marshall, 2011; Marshall 1994, 1998)

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