Joyce - what is your email?
 
Jennifer Barber
English as a Second Language
 
Grays Harbor College
1620 Edward P. Smith Drive
Office: 2214
Aberdeen, WA 98520
360-538-2516
jbarber at ghc.edu
www.ghc.edu/faculty/barber
 

________________________________

From: englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov on behalf of Joyce Bogdan
Sent: Sat 11/29/2008 10:48 AM
To: The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 3164] Re: ESL Teacher Training


Lynda,
Yes, I think that the ESOL English for Speakers of Other Languages programs do adequately prepare teachers.  Mine is a MA in education from UConn, Univ. of Connecticut-the certification is bilingual/bicultural ESOL N, K-12, adults.  It is a master program which includes teaching ESOL students, methods, strategies, materials, practical application,  validating cultures, learning about cultural expectations, linguistics, statistics, brain studies that relate to language acquisition, additional language acquistion in the theories and methods.  I also have completed a 6th year in additional coursework with reading, differentiated instruction,etc. 

My students usually are from about 14 different language groups during one year.  Even between Spanish speaking students there is a range of cultural similarities and differences.  I have taught all levels (grade and ESOL levels).  I presently teach middle school, adult beginners and am a university instructor to mainstream teachers. This year many of my students are from Nepal and Tibet. 

If you are interested in a 3 credit Independent Studies graduate course "Teaching English for Speakers of Other Languages (TELLs") that you can complete at home, e-mail me directly.  It is from Chapman University in CA.  
Joyce Bogdan
ESOL teacher



________________________________

From: LYNDA OSBORNE <lyndaosborne at att.net>
To: The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List <englishlanguage at nifl.gov>
Sent: Friday, November 28, 2008 9:49:55 AM
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 3161] Re: ESL Teacher Training


Greetings, everyone.
 
Quick query. I'm an elementary school teacher and have wondered, "Are ESL teachers required to learn the linguistic frameworks of their students' primary languages?"  My current school does not have an ESL program, but I did work at a school several years ago that had one. I had about 33% Mexican-American Spanish-speaking students and found that their learning and use of English improved during my time with them. This may be because I speak Spanish and know the basics of the language's grammatical/conversational structure. I feel this knowledge helped me to better support English learning and conceptual understandings with these students. I know that there are some ESL courses that prepare teachers in this field over a 6-week summer course, which I'm not certain would be quite enough time to expose teachers to a variety of linguistic constucts [languages] if they didn't already have such knowledge. 
 
My success with those students may also be attributed to their level of comfort with me knowing that I respected them [and their language enough to learn and practice, etc.]. Since language is so intricately tied to the thinking process, a teacher's ability to "understand where a student is coming from" in terms of how they think and speak [and culture] can serve to motivate student learning and help the teacher to access gaps, needs, strengths, etc. I suppose that my final question rounds out to be, "What is the general focus for ESL training and do you think that ESL teachers are prepared adequately in these training programs?
 
Thanks for your input!
 
Lynda Lee
 
Lynda Lee Osborne
Teacher of the Year 2008-9 
FLL Robotics Coach
Global Economics Project Coordinator
A. Philip Randolph Elementary 
Fulton County Schools
lyndaosborne at att.net <mailto:lyndaosborne at att.net> 

 

________________________________

From: "Liden, Astrid" <Astrid.Liden at state.mn.us>
To: englishlanguage at nifl.gov
Sent: Tuesday, November 25, 2008 12:17:02 PM
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 3158] ESL Learners with Low Levels of Literacy



Special Topic: Research and Best Practice Concerning the Instruction of ESL Learners with Low Levels of Literacy

We are pleased to announce that the 25th anniversary volume of the MinneWITESOL Journal is now available online at www.minnewitesoljournal.org <http://www.minnewitesoljournal.org/> . The first section of this volume includes articles that concentrate on our special topic: research and best practice concerning the instruction of ESL learners with low levels of literacy.  Articles include an overview of research-based methods for teaching ESL students with low levels of literacy, a report on a year-long research study on teaching learning strategies to students with low levels of literacy, and several reviews of materials for low-literacy students.

Astrid Liden 
ABE Professional Development Coordinator 
Minnesota Department of Education 
Adult Basic Education (ABE) 
1500 Highway 36 West 
Roseville, MN 55113-4266 
Phone: 651-582-8424 
Fax: 651-634-5154 
Email: astrid.liden at state.mn.us 

 


-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/ms-tnef
Size: 10356 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://www.nifl.gov/pipermail/englishlanguage/attachments/20081201/885f0baf/attachment.bin