Help!!! I teach third grade a I have a boy this year who does not speak ANY English. To describe the situation a bit... I teach in a very small, rural district with not a lot of money. With that being said. He will get help for about 45min-1hour a day, but it's just the Ellis computer program. An aide takes him to work on it, not even a licensed teacher. There are no other adults in the building that speak Spanish, only other students. Luckily I have 2 billingual students who I can rely on to communicate with him. What do I do with him the rest of the day when he is in my room? How do I give him grades? I feel so usless with him!!
Where I teach, we have a very high hispanic population. Find out which one of your bilingual students will work best with him. Team them together at all times. The student can repeat directions for him and answer any questions he may have. Be sure to explain to them that they have to whisper and keep as quiet as possible so as not to disturb the class. You will be amazed at how quickly he will pick up English. Give him the opportunity to work on the computer with websites that will help him with basic skills from K and 1st grade, such as letter names, sounds, numbers, etc. This will help him learn faster. You can go on the internet and find some basic spanish terms and phrases that will help you communicate with him as well. The hardest part is test time. Find out from you admin how they want to handle that if there are no other adults that speak Spanish in your building. Testing will have to be modified. Good luck!:2up:
I agree with tarheelsak...we have an ELL teacher but only for a period of time. I pair up as well. I work with the student one on one as much as possible, letters, sounds, sight words. I find they often have great capacity for learning and already know so much, it's just finding a way to communicate it with each other. Good luck!
Labeling is another great way for them to learn English. There are several kits you can buy so you can label things, but of course you could simply use index cards to label things. If he can read in Spanish, you could have billingual labels so he can see the connections easier. Use big books and read alouds as much as you can. This is a great ESL strategy. Anything visual really. Find out as much as you can about the family's background. It may be that he can understand more English, but is just not ready to express himself verbally yet.
I don't know what grade you teach. With a little-to-no-English speaker, I try to get my hands on Kindergarten/grade 1 materials for reading--from my school or go buy any cheap dollar store stuff with WORDS--at that level they usually show pictures, too. I rely on that for them to do during class. Also, math computation also works well if we are doing something they can't completely join in on for the moment. I have had great success with this regardless of the native language.
When I was a LTS, I had a little boy in 2nd grade who came in speaking absolutely no English. We had peer helpers for him, picture dictionaries, and lots of visual aides and of course he went to ESL. He was speaking in sentences by Christmas and was able to write 1 sentence. He was so eager and willing to learn.
Books on tape, partner and group work. In my experience, I have learned that just having them hear the language is excellent and produces great results. If he points to the bathroom (like he needs to use it) Just reply, you may go to the bathroom as you nod and point. I'm not sure about your area, but we do NOT grade nonspeakers for at least one year.
www.starfall.com is a great website that I used with students that did not speak any English this year.
I have to share this with you all. One of our first grade teachers got a new student who didn't speak English. She wanted the girl to know her teacher's name, so she kept pointing to herself and saying her name, like "My name is Mrs. Smith". The girl kept nodding and smiling, and then she caught on and started saying the teacher's name. The teacher was so excited she took her over to another teacher's room to show off what the girl could do. After getting high praise for saying it, the other teacher asked the girl what her own name was by pointing to her and saying "What is your name?" The girl very proudly said, "Mrs. Smith".:lol:
Another funny story: I taught ESL (English second language) in Korea for a year. One of my favourite classes was with four 12 year old girls. They hadn't been taking English for very long, but were so keen and eager to tell me things. One afternoon the most outgoing of the girls, Annie, was telling me about her weekend, which involved spending a lot of time in a book store. She kept saying, "Then I die a notebook, and I die a novel". I interrupted her after a little while, and said, "Annie, I think you mean buy. You buy a book. B-b-b-b-buy, not die". She responded good-naturedly, "Okay teacher", and went on with her story, "So I went to b-b-b-buy a notebook, and then I wanted to b-b-b-buy stickers". She said it at least three or four times before the other girls and I couldn't help laughing. She was really sweet though, and thought it was funny too once we explained that she didn't need to make the 'buh' sound so many times.
I'm not sure if this would help in any way, but when I was out getting school supplies this year I saw that there are Spanish/English Post-It notes with words and pictures of everyday objects. Maybe you could use these somehow.
Pictures, pictures, pictures! Labeling things works good too. For tests, the best thing to do is test them on their own level. Obviously they aren't going to be able to completely answer questions about things if they weren't taught in Spanish, and they don't have a translation of the question in Spanish. Yes, it's great that you have Spanish speaking students in your class. That will help you, but you never know exactly how they are translating it. Remember, your Spanish/English speaking students are learing it too, so they'd have to really understand something in order to give a good and correct translation.
That made me laugh, Knitchic! Stories like that remind me how much I like being around kids. I am seriously going to look for those sticky notes. Do you have any idea where you saw them, sundrop?
