Chambers !

1
Katelyn Chambers
CI 280
Infante
5/4/15
ELL Teaching Philosophy and Resource Identification

Reflection
At the beginning of the semester, our class discussed what teaching means to us. Some
of our responses included giving students a complete understanding, establishing relationships,
figuring out how our students best learn, and instilling confidence in our students. As an ethnographer, or someone who observes cultural practices (Waston-Gegeo), it is the responsibility of
the teacher to observe and become informed about each students cultural background and linguistic knowledge and understanding in order to provide the most beneficial and supportive
learning experience reflective of their skills and abilities. It is important for teachers to explore
the demographics of the school district they are teaching in and become knowledgable about the
surrounding communities. Often, people assume that English Language Learners are only
present in urban areas, but as more people continue to migrate and immigrate to various countries and cities around the world, ELLs are becoming more common throughout the United
States in both urban and rural communities.
According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), 9.1 percent, or an estimated 4.4 million students in America were English Language Learners in the 2011-12 school
year. As the number continues to climb, more and more students are entering school with limited

Chambers !2
to no English language understanding. Without a nationally accepted definition of English
Language Learner, state definitions vary, and data reporting and collection have yielded inconsistent reports filled with discrepancies (Garcia and Kleifgen). Upon entering school, students
are typically given a home language survey containing questions about the language(s) used at
home with parents, caregivers, siblings, and peers. This is a great first step for teachers to gain
knowledge about their students linguistic backgrounds, and to begin to identify any curricular or
classroom management modifications that may need to be made to reflect students ability levels.
When considering a students language abilities, a teacher should not focus solely on the students English language abilities, but should spend time testing and gaining an understanding of
his or her native language abilities as well. Typically, basic interpersonal communication skills
(BICS), or conversational skills, take about 1-2 years to develop, while cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP), or a students formal reading and writing skills, can take anywhere
from 4-10 years to develop. Research on transfer of these skills from a students L1 to L2 is
abundant, thus enforcing the importance of gaining an understanding of a childs L1 language
and literacy skills before placing them into an English language learning program.
As a teacher gains knowledge of a students linguistic background and begins to plan
their curriculum, it is important to consider the history of the treatment of ELLs, as well as English language education, policies, and programs available for support. Over time, ELL education
has gone through cycles of bilingual and English only approaches or focuses to educational funding and policies. With a push for English only legislation in the 1990s, and most recently, the
passing of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) in 2001, bilingual education has become under attack,
and several states have implemented English only laws within their schools (Garcia and Kleif-

Chambers !3
gen). As seen in Immersion by Richard Levin, such policies often make it difficult to provide the
needed support to ELL students in need of supplemental resources. In the film, young Moises
teacher struggles with the want to support her student and help him pass the standardized test
with bilingual accommodations, and the English only policy that has been put in place within
their district. In this case, the subtractive submersion (or sink or swim) approach to ELL education is being used by prohibiting the use of home languages (L1) within the classroom, and ELLs
are provided with exactly the same services provided to monolingual English speaking students.
Today, the most common type of ELL education is structured English immersion (also known as
sheltered English or content based ESL), a subtractive method which provides ELLs with scaffolded programs tailored specifically to each student through English only instruction.
When using differentiated instruction to meet individual needs of students, teachers
should consider each students L1 understandings and abilities and how they can transfer to the
English language and develop individual learning plans for each student. When addressing the
development of a student, it is essential for the teacher to consider the differing styles and approaches to assessment and decide which one would be most beneficial to his or her students.
Testing refers to the administration of tests and us used to measure a sample of students abilities
at one particular time, while assessment is a more expansive process of planning, collecting, analyzing, reporting, and using student data from a variety of sources over time. Assessment is often the better choice when looking at the development of ELLs, because it offers a more comprehensive picture of student growth and achievement than does a test. Evaluation is then done to
make judgements about the effectiveness of instruction, students learning, and the educational
programs that were provided to assist the students (Wright Ch. 5). Teachers and administrators

Chambers !4
can then use this evaluation to make improvements and to better address the needs of the students on a year to year basis.
When assessing students, however, it is important for teachers to be aware of any language and cultural attitudes and their implications in order to create as little bias as possible. As
displayed in the film, Do You Speak American?, the English language varies greatly across the
United States. Teachers need to consider the impact that language has on a persons world view
and ideologies, how language attitudes can influence vocabulary choice and pronunciation, and
how these factors can both positively and negatively affect the learning environment of their
classroom. In order to avoid racial/ethnic, gender, and socioeconomic biases in classroom instruction, materials, and tests, it is best for teachers to develop relationships with their students to
expand their understandings of cultural practices and perspectives. Before administering tests or
assessments, it is important to review questions and answer options for any biases that may offend students of a particular background or group, distract students from the task, or unfairly penalize a student due to personal characteristics such as gender or geographical location and dialect (Popham), in addition to addressing any linguistic double standards that may be present
when assessing ELL versus non ELL students.
Although formal language lessons will occur within the walls of the school, many external factors affect each childs language acquisition and academic performance. When teaching
English Language Learners, it is important for the teacher to understand and consider each students sociocultural factors in addition to their cognitive skills and abilities when instructing and
assessing them throughout the year. Individually, each childs academic opportunities are influenced by their familys societal status and historical circumstances, their parents level of educa-

Chambers !5
tion, their age of acquisition to the English language, length of time in the country, generation of
immigration, prior schooling, and function of language within their culture, among other things.
Ultimately, every child will see the world differently, based on their language practices and understandings, and it is the teachers job to understand these differing views and learn to work
with them and incorporate them into the classroom environment in order to bridge cultures and
build understanding between students and families.
Coming into an American classroom, many ELLs have different ideas and views than
their teachers, and often this causes misunderstandings or students become uncomfortable and
closed off within the classroom. Both visible culture, such as dress, food, and language, as well
as invisible culture, such as religion, morals, and parent-child relationship, influence how children act within the school setting (Trumbul). Understanding a childs background allows the
teacher to best develop a learning plan reflective of each childs past experiences at both home
and school, as well as their individual levels of academic support outside of school. Recognizing
a childs beliefs and values allows the teacher to understand each students actions within the
classroom and how to best interact with and discipline each child.
Cultures may differ on their approach to community, whether it be individualistic (focused on the individuals wants and needs) or collectivist (focused on the wants and needs of the
group as a whole), and as a result may not fully understand a teachers approach to instruction
through individual or collaborative group activities and projects. In order to best approach these
difference, a teacher must identify and understand each childs funds of knowledge (Moll et al.).
Funds of knowledge can be learned through in school observations, home visits, show and tell of
cultural artifacts within the classroom, parent and student surveys or questionnaires, information

Chambers !6
cards, and data collection. Understanding each students funds of knowledge provides the
teacher and administration with a context surrounding what each student knows about and has
experienced and is ultimately a great starting point for teachers to develop and modify curricular
lesson plans and activities. Using each students funds of knowledge, the teacher is then able to
bridge scientific knowledge with everyday knowledge by providing context to make abstract
concepts more understandable to the student (Translanguaging Guide). In doing so, the teacher
is figuring out how the student best learns by relating material to their prior knowledge or understandings and giving each student a complete understanding of the curriculum.
Identifying and acknowledging each students cultural background is also important in
order to avoid alienating a student or group of students from an activity or from gaining a full
understanding of concepts. Teachers also need to be aware so that they can honor each students
background and avoid silencing their language and their culture and assimilating their students
into the English American culture as the teachers did in Always Running and Name Giveaway in
our Tongue Tied readings.

Application
After graduating from Penn State, I hope to apply for and teach 2nd or 3rd grade at an
elementary school located in a metropolitan area, such as New York City, Philadelphia, or Charlotte, NC. A metropolitan location would provide opportunity for families of all types to live and
work, including lower class, middle class, and upper class. Cultural backgrounds will most likely be diverse due to the proximity to a large city, and I will certainly encounter many students
who speak multiple languages and may have little to no knowledge of the English language. As I

Chambers !7
plan to teach 2nd or 3rd grade, students who entered school with a limited English background
will most likely have developed their conversational English language skills by the time they enter my classroom, but will need to work on their deeper understanding of reading and writing
skills. I see ELLs as an exciting opportunity to explore the curriculum with a new goal in mind.
Rather than simply covering concepts such as weather, fractions, and the presidents, I will have
to develop each lesson to address not only science, math, and social studies standards and concepts, but reading and language arts standards and concepts as well.
In general, when working with an ELL, I will spend much of the first months of school
getting to know the student both as an individual at school and as a part of his or her family.
Conversations with my students parents and past teachers will allow me to become aware of any
cultural or academic modifications that may be required and will enable me to work with them to
develop the best course of action for their student. In much the same way, I will encourage each
of my students to share their backgrounds and interesest with the class in order to get to know
each other. If my student is brand new to the school, I will make sure to pair them with a buddy
that can help them throughout the day if I am unavailable to answer questions or go over the daily schedule with them. In addition, I will make sure to notify the student if anything out of the
ordinary is going to happen that day, such as an emergency drill or a field trip, and detail the
process of what will happen and what their role is throughout the event. Overall, I look forward
to working with English Language Learners, and will welcome them into my classroom as an
added benefit and opportunity for my students and I to become more aware of the cultures and
people both next to us and across the world.

Chambers !8
In order to create an inviting learning environment, I will make modifications where
needed, but also pay close attention to my districts policies and rules around bilingual education.
As I am monolingual, I will be unable to provide direct bilingual education, but plan to give my
students as much support as possible, and develop relationships with them in order to benefit
their academic experience in any way I can.
Throughout my curriculum, I plan to implement differentiated instruction for both native
English speakers and English Language Learners. Through differentiated instruction, I will be
able to work with small groups or individuals and address their needs or challenges. This can be
done through reading groups who are assigned texts focusing on similar concepts and topics, but
varying in reading level. I can then provide students with different requirements or activities that
reinforce skills certain students need to work on and challenge the students who are at a more
advanced level.
Read alouds and verbally unpacking the information into shorter, more manageable ideas
as a class is also something I would like to explore in my future career. I see this as a great activity to do with my class within the reading to, with, and by ideology (Wright) by first demonstrating to my class then getting them involved with unpacking the information with me or in
small groups, and then asking them to read a text and unpack the information individually.
Throughout the year, I would make it a point to relate information to different cultures or
countries around the world, in order to make the information more understandable to students
who may be new to the United States. I would also provide each of my students with a chance to
explore the cultures represented within our community through a community study and by sharing artifacts, stories, food, and forms of art from each of my students cultures.

Chambers !9
For assessment purposes, I plan to create portfolios for each of my students that contain
observations, projects, papers, worksheets, and pictures of my student throughout the year. This
is a great way to keep track and evaluate each students progress from the beginning of the year
to the end, and is much more representative of the expanded understanding than simply giving
tests to evaluate their learning. Tests are inevitable in the education community, but I would use
tests simply as a measurement of what my students know before, during, and after a lesson, simply as a baseline. By keeping portfolios for my students and opening up discussions with my
class, I will be able to best evaluate what worked and what should be modified or thrown out for
the next lesson and school year. Portfolios are also beneficial when meeting with parents, future
teachers, and administrators during conferences and when addressing a students social and academic progress within the school setting.
Looking at my Pinterest (https://www.pinterest.com/kchambers1114/ell-resources-pennstate-ci-280/), I would use the ball with questions printed on it as an activity to break up lessons
throughout the year and to get get to know my students on a more personal, individual level. In
addition, this is a great way for my students to build relationships with each other and identify
some commonalties between their peers. Physical activity is also encouraged through the fun
ESL games that only require a ball, such as Spelling Ball in which my students would stand in a
circle and toss the ball to each other and state the next letter to a given word. This is a great way
to review spelling lessons or vocabulary words that came up in the weekly reading text. Personal
word walls can be given to each student to kept track of new or interesting words they discover
while reading, and can then be collected and condensed into a formal list for the class to use in a
writing task. Summarization skills can easily be taught through the somebody/wanted/but/so/

Chambers !10
then method that can be done using the to, with, and by ideology. If students are not at a level
where they can handle this method, summarizing using basic single words is a great method that
would be easy to implement through differentiated instruction. When using reading groups, I
could introduce the more advanced groups to the somebody/wanted/but/so/then and allow the
students at the lower reading level to summarize using the signal words method. In the same
sense, I can create individualized question strips to engage my students with their readings and
motivate them to think more critically and write with more detail by allowing them to begin at
the bottom of the strip and work their way to the top.
In order to welcome new students into my classroom, and explore cultures around the
world, student passports would allow my students to travel to countries around the world and
develop an understanding of particular countries geography, people, beliefs, traditions, art, native animals, and food options. Each of my students would be able to explore their backgrounds
and we would present their findings on a bulletin board similar to the Where in the world are
you from one I have pinned on my Pinterest. In addition, I can ask my class to do a community
study in which they explore the cultures that are present within their school, neighborhood, and
city as a whole. These findings can then be added to their previous world discoveries, to create a
project like the one on my Pinterest board.
For ELLs who have little to no knowledge of the English language, I would provide them
with word strips with small pictures of items and the word in English so that they can easily reference it when writing or conversing with others. Items around the classroom can also be labeled in the native languages of my students in order to be accessible, and I would provide a
conversation/question box on my desk for students to anonymously place questions, wonderings,

Chambers !11
or confusions into so that I can best address my classess concerns and provide them with the
greatest understanding possible.
In order to develop an understanding of the Roman alphabet and numbers, tracing worksheets would be an easy place to begin and then they could use the salt tray as an added support.
Using the salt tray, ELLs would be able to write their letters and numbers over and over again,
reinforcing their technique and understanding of the letters used in the English language. As
their reading and writing abilities advance, both my native English students and my ELLs would
be able to play around with the Silly Sentences to recall and practice parts of speech, words
and word order, and punctuation.
Each of these activities are great opportunities for my students to discover and reinforce
concepts through an engaging and interactive way. Each of these projects and activities can easily be adapted for differentiated instruction and be kept in personal portfolios to review throughout the year and to pass on to future teachers.