How to Make the Best Use of Convention Materials

TESOL International Conventions provide a plethora of learning, professional development, and networking opportunities. As the convention comes to a close, I am always so pleased with all of the photos, handouts, electronic presentations, and business cards that I acquire. These materials help me to put my new learning into practice within my classroom and affiliate leadership.

Though these materials are helpful and handy, it can be hard to organize these new materials in a productive and accessible way. This is where I must ask, “What happens to all of your TESOL Convention materials when you go home?” I’m sure that many of us are well intentioned when we put all of our documents and materials into a file titled “TESOL Convention 2019.” However, as we file away our materials, we often file away our hopes and goals for implementing our new learning and development.

This is where I would like to present the 5-step PROVE model to organize your convention materials so that you use them all year long.

Stephanie Marcotte, ESL Professor

1. Prioritize

Take all of the materials that you gathered from TESOL and prioritize them.
Pick a few key areas, themes, or takeaways from the convention. The most important things should always be on top.
Provide clear labeling for each of these themes or areas. I would suggest using color to help you code the most importance to the least important.
If you choose to use a “TESOL Convention 2019” folder, you will at least be able to identify the key themes from the convention months down the road.
If you are looking to step away from this traditional folder filing system, you now have key groupings to display in vertical folders, on boards, and even on your desktop.

2. Remember

Create a document in your schedule book, notebook, professional development folder, or computer where you list the main takeaways and themes from the convention. This does not have to be long.
You are essentially outlining the experience for yourself for later use. You might choose to keep this in an area you view often and/or use it as a table of contents to organize your general convention filing system.

3. Open

Open up the “TESOL Convention” folders!
Schedule times in your schedule book or calendar to review the materials from this convention and all previous conventions. Try to review these materials at least once per semester.
You might reorganize your materials, focus on specific areas, or share with others. You could also use your same outlining or coding system to pull all of your materials by theme.

4. Visible

Keep your notes and materials visible. It’s a good idea to file professional development materials based on when you hope to use them.
You might have a traditional “TESOL Convention 2019” folder for general notes; however, this isn’t always enough. Whatever is in this folder should be grouped, organized, and labeled.
The areas that you hope to prioritize should be in separate folders, vertical filing folders, or hung in a visible area in your work space.

5. Exchange

As our world continues to favor technology, it’s a good idea to think about organizing your materials online. This is a great place to file all of your handouts and documents from the convention.
You can create subfolders regarding different topics or themes explored. You can also share with other people who might have more information to share in those categories. This is more of a long-term archival note project.

The 5-step PROVE model is a great way to start organizing you materials for best use now, next year, and way into the future. It is simply not enough to gather materials. These materials need to be organized so that they can be used in meaningful ways.

Be proud of all you have learned and all that you hope to explore with the PROVE model for material organization.

Author Bio
Stephanie Marcotte is an AESL professor at Holyoke Community College in Holyoke, Massachusetts, USA. She is a doctoral student at the University of New England, where she studies transformational leadership within higher education. Stephanie is also the past-president for NNETESOL, a TESOL affiliate organization.

from TESOL Blog http://blog.tesol.org/how-to-make-the-best-use-of-convention-materials/

✅ ✅ ESL/ELD K-5 Curriculum Map a year long pacing guide!

ESL/ELD K-5 Curriculum Map

a year long pacing guide!

Planning for the year can be overwhelming. Many of you have been asking me for my ESL/ELD curriculum map so here it is!

This year-long ESL/ELD curriculum map, broken down by week, will help you plan your year for all 3 language levels.

✅ Beginner/early intermediate
✅ Intermediate
✅ Early Advanced/Advanced

Each month, under each language level there are language components that I teach during that month. You more than likely have your own resources, activities and curriculum to teach these components. ♥If I have a product that contains all or parts of the language I teach during that month I have listed it. All resource images are click-able links for your convenience. Just click on the image you want to see and it will take you to my TPT store.♥

Each month has a combination of ELD units and/or grammar components essential for English learners. Again choose some or all of what I have here. Feel free to mix it up to suit you!

Click Here to download from TPT!

Every classroom is different! Every teacher teaches differently, and I tried to create this year curriculum map with many different types of classrooms and teachers in mind. I know you may need to tweak this to the needs of your students, classroom, and administration. That’s OK! For example, March is testing month for me. If you need to switch months around to meet your testing time, that is just fine. Do what is best for your students in your classroom.

There is even a column for holidays, which you can use or not use, your choice. How awesome is that people? I mean the whole year is planned out for you.

Click here to download!

Happy Teaching!

from Fun To Teach ESL – Teaching English as a Second Language http://esleld.blogspot.com/2019/03/esleld-k-5-curriculum-map-year-long.html

Should ELs Be Allowed to Speak Their L1 in School?

In 2016, 20% of people living in the United States considered themselves bilingual, compared to 10% in 1980 according to the annual American Community Survey. Grosjean states in a 2018 article in Psychology Today that one of the reasons there is this rise in bilingualism is that we have had a steady increase in immigration, and when immigrants learn to speak English, they become bilingual.

This is why I am so surprised that some educators feel that students should speak only English in school. In fact, some states have an official English-only policy and refuse to test students in another language. According to Genesee’s article for Colorín Colorado, entitled “The Home Language: An English Language Learners Most Valuable Resource,” there is indisputable evidence that the home language of English learners (ELs) is of considerable benefit to their academic success.

Bilingual programs have become more common because English-only programs threatened ELs’ ability to learn academic English at the same time as they mastered challenging academic concepts. Now, according to Genesee, the role of the home language (L1) is diminishing with new educational policies. Both educators and legislators fly in the face of research and are not taking into consideration the important role that first languages play in learning English.

I recently Googled the question of ELs using their first language in school and the first entry to come up is an opinion piece published in 2018 by experienced English and ESL teacher and author Ken Beare. The article maintains that if we allow ELs to speak other languages in school, it distracts from their learning English. The author claims that ELs need to speak English to learn English. Beare admits that he occasionally uses a student’s L1 to give directions or explain a grammar concept. His biography does not say what age students he teaches. I suspect, however, that he teaches adults who come to him for ESL a few times a week.

I have spent my 28-year career teaching elementary age ELs, and I disagree that ELs should speak only English in school. When students speak their L1 to learn English, it is an asset, not a barrier. In fact, I totally agree with Jim Cummins, who recently said at the 2019 Multilingual Learning Conference in London, “To reject a child’s language is to reject the child.”

Here are a few reasons that ELs should be encouraged to use their L1 to learn English:

Research shows that programs for ELs that incorporate the students’ first language have success rates that outperform those of ELs in English-only programs (Thomas & Collier, 2012).
Research has shown that children who are bilingual demonstrate definite cognitive benefits in comparison to monolingual children (Bialystok, 2015). These benefits have been shown in executive control processes.
Students with strong reading skills in their L1 demonstrate strong reading skills in English. When learning a second language, students are able to transfer much of their knowledge of reading from one language to another (Genesee, n.d.).

Bilingualism is a resource that is beneficial to the United States. We don’t want to keep students from speaking their L1 in schools.

References

Bialystok, E. (2015). Bilingualism and the development of executive function: The role of attention. Child Development Perspectives, 9(2), 117–121.

Genesee, F. (n.d.). The home language: An English language learner’s most valuable resource. Retrieved from http://www.colorincolorado.org/article/home-language-english-language-learners-most-valuable-resource

Thomas, W. P., & Collier, V. P. (2012). Astounding effectiveness—The North Carolina story. In Dual language education for a transformed world (pp. 43–64). Albuquerque, NM: Fuente Press. Retrieved from https://1.cdn.edl.io/O3eDkGbvBSsdm00ojspfjbed9x6SH2AEyW4wFMF7rcT2n4GM.pdf

from TESOL Blog http://blog.tesol.org/should-els-be-allowed-to-speak-their-l1-in-school/

Monday’s Quote

from Fun To Teach ESL – Teaching English as a Second Language http://esleld.blogspot.com/2019/03/mondays-quote.html

TESOL 2019 Electronic Village Overview

Having just returned from TESOL, I am excited to share. Here is a special treat for those who were unable to attend TESOL this past week or even those who were there but unable to attend the events that took place in the Electronic Village (EV). All of those events are now available as archived recordings. The Computer Assisted Language Learning Interest Section (CALL-IS) offers a number of compelling and impressive events within the conference that provide insights and guidance for visitors who are interested in learning more about integrating technology into their teaching. These sessions essentially result in a complete CALL-focused conference within the larger TESOL conference with sessions all day every day. For many years, I spent nearly all of my time at the TESOL conference in the EV. It can be difficult to even keep up with all of the sessions in the EV.

The CALL-IS relies on a dedicated team of volunteers to stream, record, archive, and curate these sessions, and you will soon realize that we are all in their debt. I know I am personally grateful as I was only able to catch one of these sessions myself in person, but I have spent the past few days catching up on all that I missed. Here is an overview, including links to information about the presentation and presenters as well as links to the archived recordings. Readers can also find all of the archived sessions on the CALL-IS YouTube channel; I’ve linked directly to some of the recorded sessions or to further information about individual sessions.

Hot Topics

Each day begins with Hot Topics, a session that focuses on the latest trending topics in CALL, such as the following:

Communities of Practice
Online Teacher Training
Digital Writing
Teaching Reading Online
Augmented Reality
Social Media
Game-Based Learning

There is also a second Hot Topics session each afternoon. These sessions provide various perspectives from around the world on these current topics with detailed examples of practice. Some sessions are organized by theme, including “The Role of Technology and The 6 Principles,” “CALL to MALL,” and “Public Speaking Skill Development Online.” Other Hot Topics sessions address a variety of interesting issues, including the following:

Wednesday

Blogging as an Interdiscursive Tool for Building the Communities of Practice (CoP) Among K–12 ELL Teacher Candidates
Local Constraints in the Implementation of CALL Training for English Language Instructors in Pakistan
Massive Online Open Access Course and EFL Instructors’ Professional development in Pakistan

Thursday

Comparison of Three Dual Language Frameworks from United States, Middle East, and Europe
Digital Multimodal Writing in ESL Classes
Successful Online Collaborative Writing Requirements

Friday

Incorporation of Instagram in Language Teaching
Use of Low-Cost Technology in English Language Classrooms in Rural India
Augmented Reality to teach EFL to Hearing-Impaired Students
Beliefs of Preservice ELL Teachers About the Benefits of Game-Based Learning

On the Cutting Edge: Graduate Student Panels

Wednesday and Friday also featured a session called On the Cutting Edge: Graduate Student Panels that focuses on the emerging research of graduate students. This collection of presentations was quite compelling and included a variety of current topics, such as

Wednesday

Integrating Google Suite for Education
Using Pokémon Go Augmented Reality
Computational Thinking Curriculum for Dual Language Learners and Multimodality in L2 Writing

Friday

Teaching Metacognitive Online Reading Strategies
Learners’ Attitudes, Learning Purposes, and Beliefs of Effectiveness Toward English Learning Through WeChat Add-ons

Mobile Apps

On Thursday and Friday, Mobile Apps sessions provided attendees with insights into numerous MALL options. On Thursday, topics included

vocabulary in reading studies (VIRS),
WeChat,
Busuu,
making intonation visual through the use of recorders,
Quizlet for reading fluency,
Flipgrid,
Bitmojis, and
video games.

On Friday, topics included

Knudge.me,
the CLIO App,
Airbnb app for authentic language in authentic tasks,
Johnny Grammar’s Word Challenge App,
WeChat,
ClassDojo,
Master English Pronunciation via Mobile Apps,
Telegram Bot, and
Quizzizz.

Academic Session

Each year the CALL-IS Academic Session features a panel of scholars sharing their perspectives on a broad topic related to CALL. This year, the panel addressed the use of social media in language learning with the session “SMALL – Research, Practice, Impact of Social Media-Assisted Language Learning.” The presentations were framed with the explanation:

While CALL provides the access portal for online learning, SMALL furnishes the language learning experience with research-based benefits and learning outcomes that engage and motivate students through discussions and interactions in familiar social settings. Panelists present ways social media assists language learning, success stories, and SMALL’s impact.

InterSections

The EV Hosted two InterSections. The first is focused on open educational resources (OER) in conjunction with the PK–12 IS, titled “Open-Education Resources (OER) in K-12 Education: Balancing the Nexus of Infinite Possibilities with Instructional Efficiency.” According to the summary:

The draw OER is impossible to resist in the age of diminishing budgets and the increasing digitization of knowledge. This panel explores the pros and cons of OER in K–12 education, including implementation of OER products, training teachers how to use OER effectively, and protecting student personally identifiable information. Furthermore, K–12 teachers will demonstrate key OER products they implement in instruction and collaboration.

The EV also hosted an InterSection event between the Adult Education Interest Section (AEIS), the CALL-IS, and the Video Professional Learning Network (V-PLN), titled “The Blended Learning Classroom and the ESL Teacher“:

During this InterSection, a panel of experts from CALL, AEIS, and V-PLN explore the concept of Blended Learning by first looking at its origin and then explaining best practices in multiple adult education settings. The V-PLN complete the presentation with short video clips of students giving testimonials of how this new concept has affected their learning.

The Developers’ Showcase

Each year, the Developers’ Showcase provides a rare opportunity to hear from those individuals who are designing their own CALL-based solutions. Over the years, this session has introduced audiences to emerging technologies that tend to influence numerous other developments. This year, presenters shared projects that included

pragmatic feedback through an academic advising simulation,
promoting independent pronunciation practice with “American English Sounds,”
making quizzes more secure using the Moodle Reader Plug-in and the MReader database,
using virtual reality in the classroom, and
audio tutorial for LiveCode.

The Electronic Village Online (EVO) Best of 2019

The EVO provides professional development CALL preparation online prior to the TESOL Convention. Every year, for 5 weeks in January and February, participants and ESOL experts engage in collaborative, online discussion or hands-on virtual workshops of professional and scholarly benefit. These 5-week sessions allow a fuller development of ideas than is possible in convention sessions. EVO sessions are sponsored by a TESOL Interest Section or affiliate, an IATEFL Special Interest Group, or other groups or affiliates who provide no financial support. You can visit the EVO webpage to learn more. These sessions are an opportunity for those involved to share the highlights of that online experience.

Here is an overview of the program. I suggest you clear your schedule to catch up on all of this. It is incredibly engaging!

What EV sessions did you find especially interesting, useful, or important this year?

from TESOL Blog http://blog.tesol.org/tesol-2019-electronic-village-overview/

Colorful Poetry!

Hello everyone, My darling niece Alex wrote some amazing poetry all around color. Super cool… Pink Pink is the princess in every girl Pink is the shine of a beautiful pearl Pink is a lollipop, nice and sweet Pink tastes like cotton candy , a special treat Pink smells like lovely, light perfume Pink sounds like music that fills all the room Pink feels like a friend when you are love sick Pink looks like a pot of cute lipstick Pink makes me happy and light on my feet Pink is what makes the color wheel complete Blue Blue is sadness, depression, despair Blue is crying everywhere Blue is never having hope Blue tastes like ice cream when you’re trying to cope Blue smells like your friends’ clothes when you’re sobbing on their shoulder Blue sounds like sobbing louder when it gets colder Blue feels like the tears streaming down your face Blue looks like a frown hidden behind a smiling case Blue makes me watch movies that are depressing and sappy Blue is a color that is never happy Green Green is life sprouting out of moist soil Green is a magnificent garden belonging to the royal Green is a tree swaying gracefully in the soft breeze Green tastes like a fresh salad eaten with ease Green smells like a handful of mint, picked fresh and new Green sounds like rustling bushes with critters passing through Green feels like sharp branches poking through your clothes Green looks like a long, thick stem of a deep, red rose Green makes the world full of life and joy Green is the leaves of flowers given to a girl by a boy I hope you all liked them! Thanks for reading! XOXO, Alex Happy Teaching! Lori
from Fun To Teach ESL – Teaching English as a Second Language http://esleld.blogspot.com/2019/03/colorful-poetry.html

Regular Past Tense Verbs!

Hi everyone,💃

A few years ago I was teaching past tense verbs to a group of my students. I started to roll out the songs and old charts and realized I needed to make some new ones. I like beginning my past tense unit with “The House That Jack Built”. I thought I would post a variety of charts from the past. They aren’t the prettiest charts in the world, but they are effective.

I love this song I wrote!

The brown paper showed the marker well.

The orange paper reflected light.

The white made the marker show easily.

There they are….now I am off to make some new ones!

Happy Teaching!

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Regular-Past-Tense-Verbs-Song-and-Picture-Cards-3-sounds-of-ed-35776

https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/educents-images/links/affiliates/funtoteach/39176.html
from Fun To Teach ESL – Teaching English as a Second Language http://esleld.blogspot.com/2019/03/regular-past-tense-verbs.html

Classroom Games: Designing for Experience

Hello everyone! Welcome to another games and learning blog post. Safe travels to all those venturing to the TESOL Convention. For those staying home, be sure to check out the CALL-IS session webcasts for live broadcasts from the Electronic Village.

Jonathan DeHaan prompted this month’s blog post with his incisive comment to last month’s Redesigning the Classroom Board Game. As I wrote a response to his comment, it became apparent I should make it a full blog post. Be sure to check out his comment in full and sorry for the late reply, Jon!

Jonathan questions what makes language practice unengaging enough that we need to gloss it over with game mechanics, which we often do to middling results. He asserts the solution rests in examining how we can make language and interaction more meaningful for students. I agree.Perhaps that’s the hidden motivation for this blog series as well—as educators we can, and should, look to games and game design and apply those techniques to our own craft. Yet we should not do so on a superficial level with points, badges, and leaderboards. We need to explore the art of games and study how they intentionally design for experience.

Our board game example last month was improved with the addition of game mechanics, but it is not much more engaging. I would argue that both Jonathan’s unengaging language practices and my mediocre board game suffer the same fate—there is no experience. Jesse Schell in his excellent The Art of Game Design stresses that game designers do not design games, but experiences. I would parallel that with “teachers should not create activities, but experiences.”

What we as educators should take from games is their intentional design. Intentional design considers at each step in the design process the experience of the user. Games, done well, are a constellation of design considerations all focused on eliciting a feeling in the user. Our board game has game mechanics, it has design decisions, but they are not meaningfully implemented. The game at its core is still a language exercise with a “roll and move game slapped onto it” as Jonathan wrote in his comment. The experience at the heart of the board game is to practice wh– questions, which is no experience at all.

Many educationally focused games suffer the same problem. The experience of the user is not at the heart of the design decisions as the focus is teaching content. Compare our board game from last month to the Nintendo classic Super Mario Bros by checking out Extra Credits’ fantastic analysis of the game’s first level. It shows how each design decision has meaning; every aspect is intentionally designed to teach the player the game. The culmination of all the design decisions results in a memorable experience for the player. We should strive to do the same in our classroom activities and games.

Jonathan muses, “I am trying to think about when and why students might use the language from your game example that might get that engagement in a purposeful, not slapped on game-like, way.” This makes me think of a “cops and robbers” activity on American English; it too is practicing wh– questions but within an experience of a bank robbery. On its surface, the activity is far less a game than our board game example, but at its heart, it is truer to what a game should be: an intentionally designed experience.

Jonathan closes his comment with the assertion that classroom games are dressed-up textbook exercises, and he’s right. If we combine the craft of game design with the near infinite creativity of educators, we can design meaningful experiences for our students. We just need more examples of how to do it, which games provide, and educators like Jonathan asking the right questions to keep us innovating.

Until next month, play more games!

Want to learn more? Check out Jonathan DeHaan’s website.

from TESOL Blog http://blog.tesol.org/classroom-games-designing-for-experience/

Idioms for St Patrick’s Day

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/St-Patricks-Day-Idioms-2271273

💫💫St Patrick’s Day is right around the corner!

I love using this holiday to teach about idioms!

💫St Patrick’s Day Idioms💫

What is an idiom?

Idioms are words that don’t mean what they say! They are usually a group of words, well known and used by native speakers of a language, that can’t be understood by the individual meaning of the words.

Click here to go to my TPT store for this fun St Patrick’s activity!

Why teach idioms?

Students develop a clear understanding of idioms with direct instruction, read-alouds, teacher modeling and student-centered activities. According to readwritethinkteaching idioms offers students the ability to further comprehend texts that contain metaphorical and lexical meanings beyond the basic word level.

Here is one way to teach idioms:

· When presenting idioms to students, introduce a group of 4 to 5 idioms together. It is best to group the idioms into a category, for example; before St. Patrick’s Day teach idioms that use green in them!

· Always use stories or relate personal conversations to introduce each idiom in context.

· Use an Idiom Journal to record the idiom and it’s meanings. Don’t forget a picture.

· Practice by offering students a student centered activity.

Now you are on your way to teaching idioms!

Click here to go to my TPT store for this fun St Patrick’s activity!

I like these idioms for green!

· Get or give someone the green light

· Green with envy

· Grass is always greener on the other side

· To be green

· Green thumb

· Green around the gills