Challenges of ELL students

I mentioned previously that during Summer Institute, I am spending half of my day doing Practice Teaching (PT) with a summer school program.  This is intended to give Teaching Fellows a brief, but intensive, introduction to the classroom.  I work with a Cooperating Teacher (CT), a veteran teacher who acts as a mentor as well as an evaluator of my progress, much as education majors spend a semester or more doing their student teaching rotations.  I was expecting to be teaching students who are in summer school for credit recovery (i.e. they failed the course during the regular year).  Instead, I am working with a summer enrichment program for students who are going into 9th grade.  We have mix of students who like school, and don't mind being there, as well as students who's parents are making them go because it is free and keeps them out of trouble.  Overall, even the students who would rather not  be there are still actively participating in the lessons, and so far things are going well. 

One aspect of PT that was totally unexpected to me is that out of our two different classes, one class is entirely ESL (English Second Language, also called ELL, English Language Learners). 
My CT has had special training and experience working with ELL students, so he is able to share some specific teaching strategies with me.  Most of the students are Spanish speakers and they range from level 1 (very little English) to level 3 (sort of proficient English).  I speak a few words of Spanish from my high school classes (10+ years ago!), but not enough to be very useful.  This class is a continual challenge to me to try to figure out how to modify the lessons appropriately for them.  I tend to rely on the English-speakers to translate for me, and I do allow some students to give their written answers in Spanish.  Because this is summer enrichment, there are no grades, and I am also working with math concepts, so some things do not require a lot of writing but are calculation-based responses.  One concern I have is that I am not interacting with the level 1 students and I do not want them to be left out, or feel that I am ignoring them.

Overall, the ELL students are very enjoyable to work with.  They are energetic and positive, and even if they have no idea what I am saying, they smile at me and try their best.  I try to say at least one thing to them each day in Spanish, even if it is only a few words and I always get a laugh and they seem to enjoy my attempts.

The ELL students do have an additional teacher they work with each day for Language Arts who speaks Spanish and specializes in ELL instruction, so at least these kids have someone they can talk to if they really need something.  I have talked with the Language Arts teacher about ways to interact with the students, and she assures me it is OK to have other students translate for me, and that it is still very good for me to interact with the students in English, even if they don't understand.  Any exposure helps.

I have been told that when I get to my regular teaching post in the fall, I should not have any level 1 ELL students in my class without also having an ELL co-teacher in the classroom.  I may have cases of level 2 and 3 students who  I might have to teach without the support of a co-teacher, and even students with basic and proficient level skills in English still need special help. 

Some of the strategies for working with ELL students are to make sure you speak slowly and clearly, use pictures and visual aides whenever possible, sometimes having important vocab words in both languages, etc.  If you have ever tried learning a new language, or traveled in a country where you did not speak the language you can start to put yourself in their shoes and think of the things that helped you communicate with people despite language barriers.

Overall, I am glad I am getting this experience now, and it is inspiring me to want to learn more Spanish in particular since that is the most common language of the ELL students in my district.  I know that there are some schools in our district that have large Spanish speaking populations, and even for students who speak English, sometimes the parents do not.  There is a real need for teachers who specialize in ELL education, and this has given me a desire to pursue special ELL training in my future teaching career.