May We Never Lose the Wonder

Wonder and happiness. What two desired yet abstract thoughts. When I think of those two words the first thing that comes to mind is a little child going for a walk but stopping every few steps to look down at the ground to find an ant carrying a twig, or grabbing a leaf that fell of the tree or snatching a frog they see hopping. A little child is filled with wonder and happiness. How many times have we heard a toddler as “but why?” There is a wonder at the unknown yet they are delighted in their ponderings.

What does this have to do with teaching English as a second language? The article “New approaches to learner autonomy in language learning” talks about new approaches to learning. Two approaches they mention are the wonder approach and the happy learning approach.

The article talked about how when students are in wonder at what they are learning, that is, intrigued and fascinated by the subject, their motivation to learn increases dramatically. A struggle for ESL learners can be the fact that they lack a metacognitive mindset entering the classroom, being unprepared and unmotivated at the beginning of class. It is important as teachers to engage our student’s minds in what they are learning. The article “Motivating Students” says this about encouraging wonder in students, “include fascination with the subject, a sense of its relevance to life and the world.” It is impossible to force wonder and fascination onto a student, yet we can create an environment that appeals to their wonder. There are many ways in which teachers can do this.

One way in particular that can cause wonder in students is by having wonder as a teacher. Being clearly fascinated by what you are teaching about, draws student’s attention. Most people can probably think of a teacher they have had who was not fascinated by the subject they taught and as a result, you did not care about the class/subject. On the other hand, you have probably (and hopefully) had a teacher who was extremely fascinated and excited about the subject they taught. I have heard many testimonies of students falling in love with a subject merely because of their teacher.

The happy learning approach calls to light the idea that when students recognize the usefulness and helpfulness of what they are learning in the classroom to their everyday lives they are motivated, eager to learn and happy to learn. This feeling can be destroyed by the environment set up by the teacher, or it can quickly improve and enhance. By providing authentic and real-life learning in their classroom teachers can utilize this learning approach to springboard their students to higher learning.

A way that teachers can facilitate a happy learning environment is to teach subjects that the students can identify with. For example, if students in the classroom are newcomers to Canada, teaching them how to get a driver’s license can be extremely gratifying. However, the same lesson plan is pointless if you are teaching a group of students in Japan who never plan on coming to Canada. The article “4 Creative Ways to Use Authentic Materials for Teaching English” says this, “when teachers use authentic materials, they are in fact helping ESL students to make a comfortable transition into the L2 culture.” As teachers, it important to connect with your students so you know what they want to know and where their interests lie.

Bibliography

Chou, E. (2018, August 05). 4 Creative Ways to Use Authentic Materials for Teaching English. Retrieved from https://www.fluentu.com/blog/educator-english/authentic-materials-for-teaching-english/

Mcdaniel, R. (2018, May 07). Motivating Students. Retrieved from https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/motivating-students/

Yagcioglu, O. (2015, August 19). New Approaches on Learner Autonomy in Language Learning. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042815045401

Reading: Oral or Silent

Oral or silent reading, should this even be a question? When reading in a class, there can be a choice by the teacher (unless offered to the students) whether to read out loud (orally) or in their head (silently). These are types of reading performances that the teacher chooses from. There are advantages and disadvantages to both oral and silent reading. Notably, however, most ESL classrooms use silent reading. How come? What are the disadvantages of oral reading? Are there no advantages to reading out loud?

One advantage of oral reading is that it allows teachers to hear how well their students read. Oral reading can be run as an informal (or formal) assessment for students. “Oral reading is an instructional strategy that can help students improve a variety of reading skills” ("What Is Guided Oral Reading?", 2017), and therefore provides opportunity for these skills to be observed and assessed. The teacher listens to how they are processing what they read. A teacher can decipher what the student is good at and where they are struggling.

Another advantage of oral reading is that it provides teachers with the opportunity to give a pronunciation check to their students. Just because a student might read in their head does not mean they are not pronouncing a word. When it comes time for them to read a text, their comprehension of pronunciation can be clearly seen and observed by the teacher.

The last advantage I want to mention is that oral reading can help highlight a particular passage in a text. Especially if the passage is short, by reading it out loud, students have the words repeated and fresh in their mind. Discussion around a specific text can flow easier and with greater focus.

Some disadvantages to reading orally are that it is not a very realistic activity. The majority of a student’s reading life will be silent reading. Rarely is a person called upon to read a text orally. Because of the lack of reality in oral reading, it is often avoided by teachers.

When oral reading students easily lose their attention and can become distracted by just about anything. I think we have all experienced this at one point or another. I find this true in a situation as simple as when a teacher begins reading off their notes word for word I lose interest. It seems fake to me and I think I can just return later and read whatever they just quoted (which I usually never do).

Oral reading is recitation more than any sort of interaction and participation. It is a rather unhelpful activity for a group of students to hear a fellow student struggle through a text that they can all read in front of them.

There are many advantages and disadvantages to reading orally. Each teacher must decide on their own accord whether to incorporate it into their lessons. Personally, I would encourage the majority of reading to be done silently. However, highlighting text or having students focus on a specific passage by orally reading it, is helpful and should be used at times. It takes a wise teacher to know when to integrate oral reading, when is too much oral reading and when to just stick with silent reading. The key to remember when thinking about oral reading is that “engaging oral reading is about both reading powerfully and listening attentively” ("Six Tips for Successful Oral Reading", 2000).

Bibliography

Brown, H. D., & Lee, H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (Fourth ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.

Sebesta, S. (2000, November 04). Six Tips for Successful Oral Reading. Retrieved from https://www.teachervision.com/six-tips-successful-oral-reading

What Is Guided Oral Reading? (2017, August 23). Retrieved from http://www.readingrockets.org/article/what-guided-oral-reading

Group Work

Group work in an ESL classroom is an effective way to teach English. There are many advantages to using group work in a classroom and definitely many ways to include it in a lesson. Group work, in my opinion, would be defined as 3 or more students working together on a common activity. For the sake of this blog, I am going to incorporate pair work, 2 students working together on a common activity, in the term group work. Although group and pair work can be different there are many similarities.

One of the advantages of using group work in an ESL classroom is that it encourages the students to take responsibility with what they are learning. The teacher, although present and available, allows students to figure things out for themselves. Someone will take leadership and there will have to be communication between the students.

Another advantage to group work is how it creates interactive language. Communication is not limited to language by any means, however, when group work is required by a teacher, there is little chance that hand gestures will suffice. Interaction, in this way, generates true and real language that has a function for the students.

As mentioned earlier, there are many techniques to incorporate group work into the classroom. Drama and skits are some of my favourite group activities. By using drama and skits students can use their imagination to create scenarios, integrating authentic language into the scenario. Sociolinguistic knowledge must also be considered as they produce and perform.

 Games are another technique of using group work in the classroom. Games cause an interaction, creating authentic language as well as, mostly the game is centered around a particular subject being addressed in class. Other techniques to use in the classroom in order to incorporate group work can be brainstorming, projects, problem-solving, opinion exchanges, information groups, interview, peer review, dialogues and many, many more.

Something to be careful of, before you begin to incorporate group work into your classroom is to make sure your students have group work or classroom language. What I mean by this, is that your students must have or know the language they will need to participate in group work. If students do not know the basics of a spoken language, they are probably not ready to be left alone to figure out how to communicate with one another in a project.

Remember that you are the teacher. Just because your students participate in a group activity does not mean you are on coffee break. Visit each group, listen to what they are saying and if they need direction, pose them questions to cause them to think. Sitting back in your chair is not an option at this point. Stay involved with your students.

To conclude, group work is effective in an ESL classroom. Be aware of your classroom dynamics and the language that your students have accumulated already. When you think they are ready, challenge them to learn from each other, to communicate, and interact. Be available to them but give them a chance to figure it out on their own too. Both you and your students will benefit from it.

Bibliography

Brown, H. D., & Lee, H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (Fourth ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.

For more information look these up:

Implementing Group Work in the Classroom. (2018, February 28). Retrieved from https://uwaterloo.ca/centre-for-teaching-excellence/teaching-resources/teaching-tips/alternatives-lecturing/group-work/implementing-group-work-classroom

Verner, S. (2013, November 23). Top 10 Benefits of Group Work for ESL Classrooms. Retrieved from https://busyteacher.org/17846-group-work-esl-classroom-top-10-benefits.html

Working in pairs and groups. (2010, September). Retrieved from https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/working-pairs-groups

   

Questions - Ch. 13

Do you know a person who likes to ask questions? Someone who seems to pause and wonder at almost anything that you say or do? I know someone like that. They ask question after question and by the time you’re done you feel like you learned something about yourself, not just them. Answering questions in this way brings greater understanding and clarity in given situations.

Have you ever had a different opinion than someone and use questions to guide them to your own opinion? I have. By just asking questions, I seem innocent and curious when really, I lead them right to the conclusion that I want them to. In a way, I teach by asking questions.

Questions are powerful and are keys to learning in any situation. Brown in Lee in their textbook “Teaching by Principles” explain how teachers should adopt a question strategy. Questions benefit students in multiple ways. For one, it creates interaction. Interaction draws out a practical side of language that encourages students to use what they know in order to communicate. By asking questions, students engage with one another and/or the teacher. They can also respond in authentic ways when a teacher presents them with a question (see http://thetesladventure.blogspot.com/2018/10/the-heart-of-communication.html for more about what I have to say about interaction).

Another benefit of students using questions in an ESL classroom is the very basic reason why questions are helpful, you receive answers. When a student is able to communicate questions, teachers are able to bring clarity to that which is misunderstood or not clear.

Teachers also use questions in order to teach their students. Brown and Lee refer to two type of questions teachers use, display questions and referential questions. Display questions refer to questions that the teacher already knows the answer to. Referential questions refer to questions that the teacher does not yet know the answer to.

Display questions can be helpful, especially in beginning levels of learning English. It can be useful for teaching basic vocabulary and gives students an opportunity to be taught appropriate sentence structure by the teacher. A teacher could hold up a shoe and ask “what is this?” The class should all respond the same, “shoe!” After collecting homework, a teacher could ask students “did you do your homework?” Students answers may vary but the teacher would know the correct response, answers could be “yes” or “no” or “yes, I did my homework” or “no, I forgot.” Display questions although useful at times can often become tedious and patronizing for a class. They should be used within reason.

Referential questions are a lot more fun to use as there is a lot more authenticity involved. Questions such as the 5 W’s become more common as well as asking how something works, asking what the summary or conclusion of a text is, and many more. These types of questions are often more open-ended and could have varying responses depending on the person. Referential questions are the most common questions and ones that help students learn, clarify, explore, expand and create.

Questions are a very important part of learning and should be encouraged at every point in our lives, especially in the classroom. By asking and responding to questions, we can expand our knowledge, glean wisdom from those around us, and contribute our own thoughts to willing ears.

Bibliography

Brown, H. D., & Lee, H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (Fourth ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.

For more resources look these up:

Beare, K. (2018, March 3). Learn How to Ask Questions in English Class to Help You Learn. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/asking-questions-in-class-4093551
Display questions. (2008, April). Retrieved from https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/display-questions

Learning Personas

Take a look at these 3 different learning personalities that could show up in your classroom:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fmLEvTJaX56IeOJponOzaffk4X3HSa41FDEYAhqrJLk/edit?usp=sharing

The Heart of Communication - Unit 7

Interaction, it is the heart of communication and relationship. Interaction gives space for exchanges about thoughts, feelings, and ideas. Creating an ESL classroom that involves interaction hastens the growth and learning of a language. By interacting we are communicating and language is a part of that communication.

When we encourage our students to interact whether formally or informally with each other we are encouraging the practice of their new language. Reading a vocabulary list may have its benefits but when we take that same vocabulary list and use it in spoken sentences the vocabulary becomes more than just words, there becomes meaning. This encourages initiation on the part of students as well as quick responses. It seems easier for students to parrot back a question to catch the flow but it can be a lot harder for the student to respond with an answer to that question on their own accord.

The interaction may need some encouragement from their teacher. As a student myself, I can relate to the desire of slipping into class, hopefully, no one noticing me, avoiding eye contact with the teacher when they ask a question, and then slipping out of class again at the end. No matter how comfortable this procedure is, it is not a helpful learning environment, especially for language learning.

In one massive university class, I had a professor who “forced” everyone to talk with the people next to them, work together and discuss questions with them. A month or so in, she again “forced” (I say “forced” because it was told to us like there was no other option but she did not check too closely if we did) us to move spots in the class and meet new people. By the end of the course, I had numerous friends who I would have never met had I continued in my introverted ways.

As you can see, when students are strongly encouraged to meet and talk with each other, they often find themselves actually liking the people they are with, challenging each other in class, helping each other out when they are unsure and in general learning exponentially more from their collaboration.

Interaction goes beyond just talking with each other. It also involves problem-solving, working on projects, creating presentations together and much more. Working together causes interaction. These are often times when the authentic conversations can occur. One student has an idea of what to do, the next student can either agree or disagree and give their opinions. In these types of instances, without the prompting of the teacher, students use language to achieve their end goal.

The rewards of interacting with individuals are more than a classroom triumph, it is a triumph that extends into the “real world.” With the language ability to interact and communicate, students can go beyond the classroom into the world and communicate (no matter how stunted) to people around them. The world is full of interaction, whether with a child’s teacher, with the cashier at the grocery store, with the banker or just about everywhere else. By introducing interaction in the classroom, you are equipping students to face the world beyond the classroom and function in an English society.  

Bibliography 

Brown, H. D., & Lee, H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (Fourth ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.

For more resources look up these:

Carreiro, H. (2017, April 04). Classroom Interaction in Teaching English as a Second Language. Retrieved from https://classroom.synonym.com/classroom-interaction-teaching-english-second-language-2748.html

Interaction patterns. (2008, May). Retrieved from https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/interaction-patterns

Patterns of Communication. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.teach-this.com/ideas/patterns-of-communication

Classroom Management: What Would You Do? - Unit 7

Scenario: A learner in your class has sporadic attendance which prevents them from making any progress in their learning…How would you address this situation

What would I do in this scenario? What would you do? These are my thoughts in regards to what my response would be if I was the teacher in this situation.

Firstly, I am assuming this is an adult class. Second of all, I would hope that at the beginning of the course I, along with my students, would have come up with classroom “rules” outlining the importance of attending class and giving clear communication if attendance is unattainable. Assuming these things, I would proceed with having a conversation with the student. I would ask the student to stay after class (in a discrete way). I would ask the student what was going on and the reason for their poor attendance. 

If their response would be something along the lines of honestly unable to attend class because for example a sick child, a job, their own health problems etc. I would either suggest the student find a different job, find childcare etc. or drop the class for this season. Language learning takes time and great effort, if they are unwilling to participate in that way it would be better for them to drop. Perhaps I would suggest a course that was more flexible with its timing, maybe finding an online course or tutoring outlet or suggest a book that could help the student move along in their language study without having to commit to a certain amount of time in a week. 

If the response would be more along the lines of that they slept in, they forgot, a friend wanted to hang out with them etc. I would first ask the student about their desire to learn English and how serious they are. If they do not have a huge drive to learn English, perhaps they should not be in the class or they should wait for another time when they are willing to focus more on language learning. I would also be willing to set up or send out reminders for them of the class or work out time management and scheduling.

Depending on the response of the student, I would conclude the conversation by together creating an action plan to aid the student. We could work out steps to finding a child care or applying for another job. We could set up a plan that consists of reminders of attending class on time. Again, depending on the attitude of the student, I would suggest to the student a period of probation and maybe to schedule another meeting in a few weeks to evaluate how things are going. 

These are a few ideas and a lot of my response would depend on the situation but the main thing would be to communicate, communicate, communicate! In any relationship, communication is so important. I would want to clearly communicate to the student how I value them as a person, how I value my classroom, and I value their success. Communicating these things softens some of the confrontation that has to occur and encourages the student to respond kindly and responsibly.

For more resources look up these:

B, J. (2013, March 31). The Golden Rules: 10 Tips for Expert ESL Classroom Management. Retrieved from https://busyteacher.org/15100-expert-esl-classroom-management-10-golden-tips.html

Long, S. (2015, May 19). ESL Classroom Management Strategies. Retrieved from https://www.reachtoteachrecruiting.com/blog/ESL-classroom-management

Patton, S. (2018, May 04). Classroom Management Strategies for ESL Teachers. Retrieved from https://www.gooverseas.com/blog/classroom-management-strategies-for-esl-teachers

Adapting a Text

This reading text and activity is quite simple and probably equated to a CLB 3 or 4 level or close to a LINC 4 level. At this point, I do not teach in a classroom but I believe this text would be used well for mid-high beginners. LINC level 4 students should be able to understand the gist of a letter and find the main ideas in it. This level of student can make some predictions and they can conquer a 2-3 paragraphed text. Perhaps to make this text slightly more LINC level 4 appropriate, I would cut down on maybe one or two of the paragraphs in the email. The sentences are for the most part short and the vocabulary is basic without hidden meanings or idioms which makes it straightforward to interpret.

Because the theorized group of students are mature and are apart of an international EAP setting, the topic of the email could be adapted to be more realistic to them. However, the idea of emailing a friend or relative in another country could be quite authentic to them as well. Perhaps using a letter text in regards to employment, such as correspondence with a co-worker or boss, could be more appropriate.

If the class was of a higher level in learning English, I would add further correspondence to the emails. I would also add in larger, more complex vocabulary and sentence structure. Following these changes, I would enhance the activities following by involving questions on vocabulary and perhaps reconstructing or constructing some sentences in a short answer section rather than just matching, fill in the blank and true or false.

If this text was too difficult for my learners and the text was a mandatory reading, I would make sure to introduce the topic of letters/emails/text messages in a greater way. I would start smaller, discuss the parts of personal letters and common questions and vocabulary used in correspondence. Perhaps opening with shorter texts would be wise before introducing this longer reading text.

If the school I was working at used an LMS I would share this reading by providing a link to it or hopefully would print and hand it out to them in order to delve into it more thoroughly. The Copyright Act in Canada for educational use make using internet resources quite easy. When using another person’s material from the internet in your class firstly you must give recognition to the person. Include the reference to the material so it is clearly portrayed that you did not come up with this information by yourself. Secondly, if the material is not published by the owner of the material and/or is requiring subscription or payment for its use you must abide by the rules in order to use it. Do not break through passwords and other technologies to gain the resource for free.

Letter reading and writing can springboard you to all sorts of topics and language learning. Reading and writing letters (whether online or on paper) is still a very common practice in culture today and is one that language learners should become quite familiar with, especially if they are living in an English-speaking culture.

Bibliography

Reading skills practice: Foreign exchange emails - exercises [PDF]. (n.d.). British Council.

FAQ's on Copyright Law [PDF]. (n.d.). CMEC Copyright Consortium.

Lesson Planning - Unit 6

This week as I studied the topic of lesson planning I truly was amazed at the work that it takes to create an effective plan. Reading about and seeing the frustration of teachers putting together a fluent and effective lesson plan really opened my eyes to the work it takes. Creating a lesson plan is far beyond reading from a textbook, or presenting a power point. Many more steps are involved than just showing up to class.


One important piece of lesson planning is having and working towards goals, both terminal (longer term) and enabling (shorter term) objectives. These objectives should be clearly described in order to give the best direction. At the same time, these objectives must also be able to adapt and change according to the classroom. It is good to have a teacher desire great accomplishment for their students but if the students are struggling, it is better to backtrack on the goals in order to bring about excellence.

Another significant piece of lesson planning is creating a lesson that is real and authentic to the students. Texts, recordings, activities, role-plays etc. should all have a sense of reality to them. Having students learn proper grammar with sentences that are unrealistic (ex. The pineapple flew to the moon), are not helpful. Motivation increases as the topics students are learning about, through their learning English, are dealing with the challenges and interests of their own lives. Learning how to understand a hydro bill is a reality for a father compared to him learning to understand children’s songs. Be aware of your students, their needs, interests, and challenges and teach them accordingly.

Creating a lesson plan that is not too easy for learners but not overwhelmingly difficult is another challenge posed to teachers. I recall sitting in my grade eight class, working hard on the assignment handed out by the teacher, when I felt someone poking at my back. I turned around only to be distracted for the next ten minutes. I was distracted by one of the smartest kids in my class, who was always done early because the class was too easy for them. This is the danger of too easy of a class. Your student might not begin to distract others, but they surely will be bored and the class will be a waste of time to them. At the same time, having an extremely complicated lesson that only one or two of your students is catching onto is too difficult. Other students will give up and tune out the lesson in frustration. It is important to have a lesson and ultimately a course that affirms students in their capabilities but challenges them to go further in their learning. This environment creates a safe and learning culture in the classroom. Students in classrooms with this kind of tension are catapulted further in their studies.

These are three huge reasons why lesson planning can be so complicated. There are many more pieces of lesson planning to consider beyond this. Lesson planning may be difficult but with time and experience, both teacher and student will benefit.

For more resources look up these:

64 Free ESL Lesson Plans and Templates You Can Use Today. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://eslauthority.com/resources/free-esl-lesson-plans/

Case, A. (2016, June 24). Retrieved from http://www.esl-lounge.com/blog/106/time-management-for-teachers

Lesson Planning. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.teach-this.com/ideas/lesson-planning

Lesson Plan 2

Date: October 16, 2018

Class levels:  CLB 6

Class Time: 2 hours

Communicative Language Task Goal

The ability to discern, describe and find the details of an advertisement

By the end of the lesson today, learners will have:

Learned descriptive language used in advertisement, be able to compare prices, be able to discern what is being presented

Lesson Procedure

Lesson activities and procedure	Language focus	Language Skills	Purpose of the activity	Interaction	Time
Describe what learners are doing	Identify what linguistic and communicative ability elements are being addressed (e.g., vocabulary, sociolinguistic knowledge)	What skills are being practiced (e.g., Speaking)	Why they are doing this (e.g., to be able to…)	Are learners working individually, in groups, as a class	How much time it takes
Talk about advertisements. What is used in an advertisement? What makes you want to buy something? Explain Canadian culture.	Grammar, functional knowledge	Vocabulary, Speaking	Assess what the students already know about advertisements. Introduce new vocabulary and ideas.	Class activity	20 min
Show a basic paper/online advertisement, discuss if this is a good deal. Why? What are the qualities? Price? Use adjectives to describe.	Grammar and textual and functional knowledge	Comprehension of vocabulary, speaking	Using new vocabulary, learning comprehension of a static advertisement.	Class activity or group work	20 min
Show 2 video advertisements. Provide chart handouts for students take notes of both commercials	Grammatical knowledge, vocabulary, textual knowledge, functional knowledge, strategic competence	Listening, comprehension of vocabulary, writing	Understanding of the vocabulary, how to make a chart	Group activity/Individual work	20 min
Discuss the charts made by students. Create a conglomerated chart. Discuss the pros and cons of each offer.	Grammar, vocabulary, textual knowledge, functional knowledge	Speaking, listening, vocabulary	Communicate adjective vocabulary, comprehension of what is being offered.	Class activity	25 min
Have students pair up and come up with a poster advertisement of a vacation spot. Have them include the benefits of their offer and a price.	Grammar, vocabulary, functional knowledge, textual knowledge	Speaking, listening, vocabulary, writing	To use vocabulary and descriptions	Pair activity	30 min

Exit Assessment:

Display an advertisements. Students should be able to explain the details of the advertisement. Would they buy what is being offered?

Can You Understand?

What is it like to read something you do not understand? When you cannot understand 20% of the words on a page can you follow what is happening? I found this article extremely eye-opening, I would encourage you to go and read what the author has put together.

https://allthingslinguistic.com/post/155043761501/what-80-comprehension-feels-like

I have never fully learned a second language, only a few German and French classes when I was little. Because of this, I cannot pretend to know what it feels like to learn a new language in its entirety. Reading these examples of what it is like to read a text without understanding the many of the words surprised me how difficult it was to follow the flow of the text. Although sometimes when I read my textbook I feel like I understand only 80% of the words, I can often figure out the meaning of words based on my other knowledge of English. When first learning English (or any other second language for that matter) the task of learning vocabulary is endless, truly endless.

Reading strategies begin to become very important when learning a second language and you are trying to comprehend a text in that other language. Even if you can sound out a word and speak it ten times over, the meaning of that word is not actually learned until you hear a definition or see the meaning within a context. In the article “Reading Comprehension Strategies for English Language Learners,” it talks about teaching vocabulary explicitly. Clear definitions need to be provided when learning new vocabulary, pictures and using the word in different scenarios help with this.

Sometimes, instead of looking up every single unfamiliar word it is more beneficial to look up the most common unfamiliar word. When we gain an understanding of most words we can infer and predict the meaning of some of the smaller or less significant unfamiliar words. Learning how to follow a text according to the rhythm of the words that the student does know is also key to understanding and inferring the unfamiliar words. Punctuation, sentence lengths, etc. clue a reader into what is going on purely based on the format.

Scanning is one strategy that the article “6 Super Strategies for Improving ESL Reading Comprehension for Beginners” talks about. This allows students to review the text before diving completely in. This way they can gain the gist of the text and can combine the details to the general knowledge later.

Speaking out loud what is being read can also help students to comprehend what is being portrayed in the text. Students who ask questions also gain understanding. Asking questions of the text to peers or teacher cause students to think critically about what is going on and increase their knowledge. The article “Reading Comprehension Skills for English Language Learners” lists a number of comprehension skills such as summarizing, problem-solving, distinguishing between facts and opinions and finding the main ideas in a text.

I recall once trying to read the book “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen. I gave up probably one chapter into reading. The book was wordy, the language difficult and I just could not keep up. Later, I watched the movie with my sister and loved it. I went back to the book and this time because I knew the general gist of what was supposed to be happening I could get past the wordy, difficult language. I could comprehend the language the family used because I had seen them and heard them use it in the movie. At times, when learning to comprehend text, technology and video can aid in getting a point across.

There are many different ways to learn and teach how to read. Something that is important for teachers to remember is that reading can be very overwhelming. Even when you can comprehend 80% of the words of a text there is still so much that the reader misses out on. As teachers, we must be gentle, patient and helpful as we lead our students toward success.

Bibliography

A.(2018, July 20). Reading Comprehension Skills for English Language Learners. Retrieved from http://www.colorincolorado.org/article/reading-comprehension-skills-english-language-learners

Breiseth, L. (n.d.). Reading Comprehension Strategies for English Language Learners. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/ascd-express/vol5/511-breiseth.aspx

Reading Comprehension Skills for English Language Learners. (2018, July 20). Retrieved from http://www.colorincolorado.org/article/reading-comprehension-skills-english-language-learners

S. (2018, August 05). 6 Super Strategies for Improving ESL Reading Comprehension for Beginners. Retrieved from https://www.fluentu.com/blog/educator-english/esl-reading-comprehension-for-beginners/