Give ELLs Time to Play with Vocabulary

Bonnie Vijarro

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to assist a teacher with her class of 7th and 8th grade English language learners (ELLs). At the time, my background as a Spanish teacher got me tapped for the job, but language ability—though helpful at times—is not a prerequisite to engaging ELLs. In fact, with 14 nationalities and 18 languages represented in my first period class, it's not so much about speaking their languages as it is about listening and building their confidence.

Keeping in mind that we first have to understand language before we can incorporate and use it, I try to introduce content vocabulary in writing, a spoken description, and some sort of image or graphic. This also includes any academic language related to skills, assignment directions, and assessments. Sometimes students create pictures or miniskits to illustrate a concept, or I tell them anecdotes to see if they can find parallels between our class content and everyday life.

Whenever possible, I ask students to paraphrase my explanations to give them the chance to manipulate the language. I also ask them to look for examples of our class themes, such as individual rights versus the good of the group or cause and effect, in their own lives. I gear the questions during roll call or about what they did on the weekend toward drawing them out of their shells and into the class conversation.

In a written activity for learning new vocabulary, students create interactive vocabulary entries in their journals. They fold a page lengthwise and cut a flap for each new word. Students then write a definition, using their own words, on the inside of the flap and draw a picture or symbol on the facing column. When they lift the word flap, students see both words and images to better recall the meaning of the new word.

Unpacking a Term

While they are working with the language of a unit, I can often begin to anticipate holes in prior knowledge for both ELLs and English-proficient students alike. For example, in our most recent unit on American independence, I quickly discovered that the simple definition of colony would be inadequate for helping kids understand the Americans' desire to declare independence. When one student asked me, “Isn't a colony something Europeans have?” I realized the underlying assumptions of the word.

I looked for other ways to explain various types of colonies, from bees to bacteria, as well as examples of colonies in the histories of each ELL student's country of origin. Once we unpacked this word, students could finally begin to see the implications that colonial life would have for the future conflict between Americans and England.

What started out as clarification of an introductory concept resulted in a rearrangement of the content and my means of teaching it. In fact, once students really grasped the idea of a colony, the resulting discussions of mercantilism, triangle trade, and the effect of Britain's taxes and treatment of colonists helped students relate emotionally to colonists. When we applied a fictitious scenario of our own class paper tax on students, they were quick to point out the unfairness of a rule in which they had no say. With these activities, they were better able to think of why Americans would want to be independent.

This will only be my second year teaching sheltered instruction social studies for middle school, but much of what I do in this class is similar to how I assist ELLs in my general education classes. Most of these students see the world so differently from those who have been born and raised in what might be considered typical American culture. The best and most exciting part about my job is tapping into that perspective to make way for some of the most authentic, sincere conversations you'll see in a social studies classroom.

Bonnie Vijarro teaches 7th and 8th grade ELL social studies and 8th grade U.S. history at Alderwood Middle School in Lynnwood, Wash.