Saturday, April 24, 2010
Teaching and testing ah ha moments...
Well, I reconnected with my ELL experiences this week as I tested two ELL students at LPES. I realized SO much the need for intensive vocabulary instruction every day as many times a day as possible. This was the one thing that held them back during testing. You may be saying duh, but it was huge for me. Everyday words that we take for granted just really threw them. One of my students said, "I didn't know so was a homophone til now." He was faced with the word sew on the test. He got the answer because his little brain was working overtime. I also experienced the power of prior knowledge with this same child. After answering a question about using a filter in science, he told me he knew it because in his country they "put these things around trees to catch them and dirt gets in them and we have to shake the dirt out to get them." I am not sure what "them" was... some kind of fruit maybe?? At any rate, it reaffirmed what I know to be true about learning. It also made me miss teaching.
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Wynde, I love the "aha moments!" There have been so very many since we loaded that bus on July 31. Little did we know we would be stretched and challenged so often. Thank you for sharing your lightbulb discovery. Every time I turn around I find someone talking about vocabulary instruction. Never before had I realized it's importance as much as I have this year. I'm also struck by the notion that SO MUCH of what we ought to be doing for our ELL students, we ought to be doing for ALL students. There's MY "duh" for the day. :) Thanks for sharing!
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