This blog came about because of a suggestion by my husband +Cj Flay.  I was telling him about working with my High School New Comers and my observations on their abilities and how they are handling taking an Science Class.  He said, "This is the stuff you should blog about."....so here it goes :)

I teach ESL (English as a Second Language) to Middle School and High School, who, thankfully all speak Spanish (I do too).  Most of what I do is helping kids who have been here a while and speak English pretty fluently, get the reading and writing down better.  This year, however, I have gotten an influx of New Comers (brand new to the country with little to no English).  Most of them are at the HS level which gives us less time and makes it so much harder for them to pass the required classes.  

My job is to teach the academic language to help the student understand the curriculum better and function in the classroom.  The classroom teacher's job is to make sure the student understand the curriculum.

Yesterday 4 of my very new, New Comers were working on a science assignment.  The language of the questions was very high educational language.  Many of the words and phrases that were throwing them were things like "was known for;" "concluded;" and "all of the above".

I was teaching question words and word order and the level 2 educational words found in the questions.  

I asked them to have their notes handy and they had old quizzes to help.  I did not read the questions in English to them.  I let them look at the questions and they started reading and simultaneously translating into Spanish.  They were doing a pretty good job.  The words that threw them were few and I helped out with those.  

It was very interesting to watch and listen to them work on these questions.  On their own they struggled.  In attempting to reading the questions out loud, in Spanish, they helped each other.  They are learning word order in English and the fact that many words are cognates - words that look the same and can sound the same, with the same meaning, in bot English and their native language - between English and Spanish.  Eventually they began trying to read in English and clarifying the meaning in Spanish.

Next they would look at the answers.  If they were one word answers they didn't have a problem.

Which planet has a greater mass than all the other planets combined?

1. Jupiter             2. Uranus

3. Neptune          4. Saturn

Of course the complete question had to be simplified to:

Which planet has the most mass?

and the answer was simple.  Especially with a visual of the solar system on the smartboard.

But if the answer was complex it would have to be explained: 

What causes the tides to change?

1. the revolution of the earth around the moon,         2. the revolution of the moon around the earth,

    and the rotation of the earth.                                     and the rotation of the moon

3. the gravitational attraction of the sun on the earth   4. the rotation of the earth around the sun

The words highlighted are the words they learn in the classroom.  The other words or words they are expected to already know. So, therefore. the words I need to teach.

Their notes were in English, copied off the board.  But they could go back and find the answers and have further understanding.  If they argued over an answer that wasn't clearly in their notes I would make them explain it however they could.  They were proving to me they could understand the curriculum. I got a kick out of that.  One kid kept saying 'the internet knows'  so I wouldn't let them look things up there.  You can't do that on a test.  We would discuss, look in notes and if still nothing I would pull up a visual aid or a website they could 'read' and determine the answer by looking for the key words from the question.

When we got to the question with 'all of the above' as an answer they were completely thrown.  They did not know the word 'above' so I gave it to them.  Then the concept had to be explained a few times until they got what it meant.  One told me he had seen it on a test last semester and just didn't answer that question.

We are supposed to be teaching critical thinking and language with our new Common Core Curriculum.  My students are getting a lot of that in just trying to understand notes and assignments.  They are still unable to 'explain' how they got to the answer,  in English.  We need to let them show us.

Modifications to the assignment:

Allow notes,

bilingual dictionary,

visuals,

peer help,

extra time.

Further modifications needed:

simplified language

shortened assignment (if time is an issue - it is taking us 3 days to get through 50 questions).