Breaking Through Barriers To Language Acquisition
June 2011- Have ELLs keep journals over the Summer
ELL Teacher Pros Newsletter, June 2011
Have ELLs Keep Journals Over the Summer!
Summer vacation starts shortly for many of us. Though students welcome
it as a well deserved break from school, teachers shudder at the thought of the
amount of re-teaching that will be needed with the start of the new school
year.
So what can teachers do to motivate English language learners to keep up
their basic skills over the summer break? Why not have them try a VIRTUAL
TRAVEL LOG? The BBC has a wonderful site which allows students to
create travel logs. Here ELLs click on a site that they would like to
visit. There are two options-short and long (low intermediates would
probably take the SHORT version). They then click on AUDIO to hear someone
talk about one of 5 sites. As students listen, they keep notes
because when the audio is finished, students write about the travel adventure. They
may also add their own notes if there is more to say. Students should take
notes as they listen since they will be asked to write a log
afterwards. Once the writing is completed and printed out, students go to
the next page where they drag pictures to the cover of their log. After
the last picture is added, they click print and have a beautiful cover to go
with their writing. The finished product could used as a model for writing
about their adventures over the summer (real or imaginary).
Here is another link that can be used to inspire ELLs to write over the
summer. Though it is listed as elementary school level, many of the topics
can also be used for high school. JOURNAL PROMPTS. If
students just wrote for 10 minutes a day, 4 days a week, and for 4 or 5 weeks
over the summer, they would be ready to talk in detail about what they did over
the summer-both real and imaginary! You might also encourage them to draw,
paste movie stubs in their books, pictures, etc. This would involve
parents also. Just provide them with inexpensive composition books to keep
their entries. Encourage them to decorate the covers (students of all ages
love this).
For high school students, try FREEOLOGY
JOURNAL PROMPTS. Needless to say, students should be encouraged to add
their own topics if they wish. Since they will probably receive points for
their efforts, they need to be reminded that appropriate language must be used
and nothing hurtful included. If you can involve parents in the process,
entries will be most likely monitored.
I hope you find these tips helpful.
Until next month,
Denise, Cheryl, Marnie
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