Meaningful Homework

Meaningful homework is review and practice of skills that have already been learned in the classroom. Meaningful homework gives students the opportunity to apply learned skills in new situations at home and can also encourage self-discipline and responsibility for students (USDE, 2005). Homework is meaningful if students receive constructive feedback and if the homework targets a specific learning purpose for the student (USDE, 2005).

The intended homework objectives for students, particularly English Language Learners, should be to “practice or elaborate on what has been learned and to prepare for new information” (Hill, 2006).  Teachers need to clearly communicate expectations for homework so that students are aware of exactly what is expected of them. These expectations may be different from one student to another as teachers differentiate homework to make the content accessible for the student’s sate of language acquisition.

Meaningful, varied and specific feedback should be provided on homework assignments to make ELL students aware of what they are doing well and improvements they can make.  Feedback can come from the teacher, from fellow ELL students or from native English speaking students.

To overcome language barriers in home-school communication, teachers can encourage parents to engage with their children in their native languages. Parents can orally tell stories in their native language to develop language skills, “read” wordless picture books and make frequent trips to the library to help children develop a love of books (Colorn, 2007). Parents can also say rhymes and sing songs or simply engage in meaningful conversations with their students, requiring students to respond with more than one word answers (Colorn, 2007).   Educators can inform parents of the specific ways they can support their child’s learning at home by offering information sessions at school geared towards homework support. Teachers can also keep lines of communication open with parents, offering support and answering questions for parents.

Technology can support homework and independent work for ELL students because of the immediate, individualized and specific feedback that many programs, apps and websites offer for children. The interactive nature and guidance of the program can give students the enjoyable and motivating feelings of playing a game while also helping them to acquire their new language.  For instance, ABC Mouse is free for public educators and students can access their accounts from home.

 

Resources:

Colorín Colorado (2007). Empowering Hispanic Parents and Families at Home. Retrieved on 2/17/2015 from http://www.colorincolorado.org/educators/reachingout/empowering/.

Hill, Jane and Kathleen Flynn (2006). Classroom Instruction that works with English Language Learners. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

U.S. Department of Education (2005). Homework: The Basics. Retrieved on 2/17/2015 from http://www.colorincolorado.org/article/20469/.

 

Fiction and Nonfiction Texts

Kindergarten ELL readers must be explicitly taught how to differentiate between fiction and nonfiction texts to increase comprehension. However, age appropriate nonfiction texts for young readers do not always have the text features that more advanced nonfiction books may use, like an index, graphs, tables or charts. There are other features that can help students determine if a book is fact or fiction, such as the type of graphics or visuals, the author’s purpose (Did the author write this book to teach us facts about something?) and if the book has characters and a plot.

Below, I have illustrated the similarities and differences between a fiction book, Falling for Rapunzel (which by the way is a MUST read for Valentine’s day, the kids love this book!), and a nonfiction book Now I know: Animals at Night. I chose a “Box and T” graphic organizer to present this information because this is a graphic organizer that I use with kindergarten students quite frequently.  The box is for identifying similarities and the T illustrates differences. This is a useful way to get young kids visualizing similarities and differences and can be a stepping stone leading to the venn diagram.

	Differences:
Falling for Rapunzel By: Leah Wilcox		Now I know: Animals at Night By: Melvin and Gilda Berger
Fiction		Non-Fiction
-bright, vivid illustrations   -setting   -plot   -humor   -theme or a moral   -characters   -relationships between characters   -problem, solution		-fact boxes: “Did you know?”   -Images with captions   -Bubbles with zoomed-in pictures for kids to take a closer look   -glossary   -bold, italicized and underlined words   -interesting pictures of real animals

 

 

Similarities

-title page   -students can make connections to both genres   -print is organized left to right (concepts of print for younger students)

Visuals can help the students to determine whether they are reading fiction or nonfiction. If the student sees real pictures or graphs, tables or charts to help explain information, then those can be clues that the book is nonfiction. If the student sees things that are make believe, like a dinosaur wearing clothes, then they will know that they are reading fiction.

While reading nonfiction, utilizing the glossary for unfamiliar words in addition to reading the words in context can help ELL students to help to better understand vocabulary.  The glossary could even be used to pre-teach vocabulary prior to reading the text and then referred back to throughout the book. 

Humor and the moral of the story may be more difficult for younger students to grasp and the teacher may need to ask guiding questions to help them uncover humorous situations in the book and the moral of the story.

I have found that providing students with questions that they can ask themselves while reading independently to determine whether the book is fiction or nonfiction is helpful. I model thinking aloud the questions and their answers. It is important that the student uses more than one text feature to determine its genre, because sometimes books possess features from both. Here are a few example questions and thinking aloud that I might model for students…

“Does this book teach me facts? Nonfiction books teach me facts about a topic.”

“Does this book have characters? If the book has characters that have a problem, it might be fiction.”

“Why did the author write this? If they wrote the book to teach me about something it might be nonfiction.”

“What kind of pictures do I see? These are pictures from a camera of things in the real world. This might be a nonfiction book. Or do these look like make believe drawings or paintings? Then it might be a fiction book.”

Sheltering Lessons for English Language Learners

Sheltering a lesson plan can give English Language Learners the support that they need to access the same content as their English fluent peers.  It is important to keep in mind that while ELLs are learning a new language, they are also responsible for keeping up with content area learning as well. What may seem like a task that is way out of a student’s reach, can become a meaningful and beneficial learning experience with the addition of carefully planned sheltered instruction. Below are a few SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol) strategies that teachers can use to increase comprehension for ELL students.

Prior to reading:

-explicitly explain both the content and language objectives: “our goal for today is _____.”

-preview vocabulary: write it on the board, read it aloud, give context, show pictures

-utilize a graphic organizer to encourage students to access prior knowledge

-ask guiding questions and give students time to discuss their answers in groups

-explicit instruction on reading strategies to increase comprehension

 

During reading:

-ask clarifying questions

-read aloud (either teacher or students) so that students can hear and see the words simultaneously

-slow and clear pronunciation

-remind students to utilize strategies

-model strategies within the text, “I do, we do, you do”

-repetition of vocabulary

-give students time to make connections and to process what they have just heard, seen or learned

 

After reading:

-review vocabulary

-provide students with opportunities to clarify misconceptions or ask questions

-give students time for discussion in groups

 

During sheltered instruction, the students should be engaged in reading, writing, listening and speaking, where they are both comprehending and producing language. Students should work in groups of peers where they can discuss ideas and share experiences.

Teachers must know their students and be familiar content area expectations in order to provide the appropriate amount and type of scaffolding to make content accessible and meaningful for the learner.

 

 

Resources:

Sheltered Literacy Lesson Video. Regis University. Retrieved on 2/2/2015.