Unit 5
Blog 2
TIP OF THE WEEK
Check out this site for some fun games that will engage your youngest ESL students!
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK
Classroom CommUNITY
Forming a community within our classrooms is one of the first tasks that we focus on and strive to maintain throughout the duration of the school year. As teachers, we rely heavily on getting to know our students to ensure that their interests and needs are being well met. This community is not instantly built or on its own. We need to work on building it each and every day we have those kids in our classrooms. Without a strong foundation of community, we will never reach the point of unity.
One of the alerts I set was ELL in Elementary Schools. I came across so many intriguing articles about teachers taking the necessary steps to include their language learning students and their personal traditions. THIS. This right here is incredible and makes a world of difference to our students and the community that we are building in our classrooms together. Often times, our ELL students feel a sense of confusion and at times, can feel that their classroom is not really their classroom. We're all so used to celebrating Halloween, Christmas, Hanukah, New Year's Eve, Easter, etc in the classroom; but what about our L2 learners who do not have the opportunity to celebrate their holidays as openly or with as much support? I came across one specific article where a teacher took interest in her L2s personal traditions. She had an ELL student in her classroom who was accustomed to celebrating the Lunar New Year. This student looked forward to it and wondered why they didn't celebrate, let alone even talk about this holiday in their classrooms. This teacher listened to the student's concern and instead of nodding her head, she was proactive and made a change to better instill unity within her classroom. First, she had the ELL students teach the other students about the Lunar New Year. They did this through creating videos to share with their peers. Ed tech for the win! They then created their own Chinese dragon using math and measurement skills. As an entire class, they then celebrated the Lunar New Year together. What was really special about this activity is that the entire school lined the hallways to support and watch the ELL students participate in the Chinese dragon dance. This was the perfect way for these kiddos to celebrate the 2020 Lunar New Year.
Again, THIS. This is how you build classroom unity. As our number of ELL students rise, our initiative to bring a little bit of their home to school should rise as well.We must create that environment and strive for the unity to be evident in our community built on love, understanding and respect.
Image from Supporting ESL Students. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.readinghorizons.com/blog/post/2012/01/24/supporting-esl-students-10-tips-for-mainstream-teachers
One of the alerts I set was ELL in Elementary Schools. I came across so many intriguing articles about teachers taking the necessary steps to include their language learning students and their personal traditions. THIS. This right here is incredible and makes a world of difference to our students and the community that we are building in our classrooms together. Often times, our ELL students feel a sense of confusion and at times, can feel that their classroom is not really their classroom. We're all so used to celebrating Halloween, Christmas, Hanukah, New Year's Eve, Easter, etc in the classroom; but what about our L2 learners who do not have the opportunity to celebrate their holidays as openly or with as much support? I came across one specific article where a teacher took interest in her L2s personal traditions. She had an ELL student in her classroom who was accustomed to celebrating the Lunar New Year. This student looked forward to it and wondered why they didn't celebrate, let alone even talk about this holiday in their classrooms. This teacher listened to the student's concern and instead of nodding her head, she was proactive and made a change to better instill unity within her classroom. First, she had the ELL students teach the other students about the Lunar New Year. They did this through creating videos to share with their peers. Ed tech for the win! They then created their own Chinese dragon using math and measurement skills. As an entire class, they then celebrated the Lunar New Year together. What was really special about this activity is that the entire school lined the hallways to support and watch the ELL students participate in the Chinese dragon dance. This was the perfect way for these kiddos to celebrate the 2020 Lunar New Year.
Again, THIS. This is how you build classroom unity. As our number of ELL students rise, our initiative to bring a little bit of their home to school should rise as well.We must create that environment and strive for the unity to be evident in our community built on love, understanding and respect.
Image from Supporting ESL Students. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.readinghorizons.com/blog/post/2012/01/24/supporting-esl-students-10-tips-for-mainstream-teachers
I really enjoyed reading your post and found it resonated with me and my beliefs so much. One of my biggest goals in education is to create that welcoming, nurturing and safe environment for my students. It is a huge indicator of how they will perform and feel everyday. There are classrooms I see that don't have that sense of belonging and it makes me cringe whenever I see it. You can most definitely tell the teachers that take the time to purposely plan with such intention everything they do. This is so important and going along with our EL students feeling that they belong, they have to see themselves in the classroom so they feel that it is their learning space too. I love the different activities you can do establish this sense of unity and culture in a school and classroom. As you said, it is so vital. Thank you for writing and sharing about this extremely important topic!
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry, this is Julia.. I think I was logged in under my other email!
ReplyDeleteHi Tierney!
ReplyDeleteFirst off, I must tell you how much I adore your blog. Your theme, your bio, and the way you format your posts is awesome!
Second, I loved reading your post this week. You are making such an important point, and I think your dedication towards unity is admirable. I wish more people in the world felt as you do! Not just in regard to schools, but in regard to community and society as a whole. Your point on the holidays we choose to celebrate in schools reminded me of a recent initiative started by my principal. Like you, he was unhappy with how little attention was paid to the many holidays our students celebrate. Specifically, he felt our district as a whole was only paying attention to the "major holidays," like Christmas. Our district only recently started recognizing major Jewish holidays such as Rosh Hashanah. Because of this, he decided to interview a variety of students and ask for them to explain the holidays and traditions specific to their cultures. Then, he projected this interview through our school television channel so that the entire school could educate themselves on the different holidays celebrated. What I loved about this initiative is that the students who were interviewed felt empowered because they were given a platform to share their culture with their peers.
Thank you for sharing, and I look forward to reading your future posts! :)