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| 2008 State Conference |
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Session Reviews and Links
from the TexTESOL V Board
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Teaching or Editing? Giving Effective Feedback
Presented by Dr. Deborah Johnson-Evans, UTA – ELI (SE, HE, Workshop)
Dr. Johnson-Evans began this down-to-earth workshop session with a review of current practice in teaching editing within second language writing instruction. She introduced three specific approaches to building student autonomy and self-confidence. Then she gave attendees a very well balanced packet of student writing to use for marking student feedback. We worked in small groups to try the various approaches and then reported on what we learned. Attendees specifically noted the value of our speaker’s reminder to include specific positive comments as well as notes for improvement. At the close of the session, attendees left with helpful materials and a very current bibliography.
(Reviewed by Margaret Redus, Membership Officer)
Reading Product Labels: Realia Power
Presented by Nancy Baum (AE, Demonstration)
Nancy Baum brought to light how labels--for hazardous materials, prescriptions and over the counter medicines as well as clothing and food can also be good material for reading class. As the students learn to break down and garner information from the labels they are also doing some critical thinking--comparing, inferring, etc. The presenter provided worksheets for the attendees to take back and use with their students. All the attendees need to do is collect the labels--put out an email to your colleagues and watch your desk pile up!
(Reviewed by Caroline DeCoux, Past President-Liaison Officer)
Serving English Language Learners with Special Education Needs: Future Trends and Current Best Practices
Presented by Nancy Cloud (Keynote)
Nancy Cloud reviewed ways in which ELL's with special education needs could be identified and provided with an appropriate level of services. She focused particularly on Response to Intervention (RTI). The following website provides resources from around the nation on a number of issues and best practices: http://www.ric.edu/sherlockcenter/RISIG/urban.html.
(Reviewed by Mary Peacock, Technology Coordinator)
Specific techniques for Dealing with Grammar and Vocabulary in Writing Classes
Presented by Keith Folse (Featured/Publisher, breakout session)
Keith Folse began with the suggestion of using sentence combining as a way to get students to produce longer, more complex sentence structure while still allowing for acceptable variation. He said he has groups of students tackle a series of sentences. (One example: The Faculty Center hosts a conference. The conference is for faculty development. The conference is for three days. The conference is at the end of the semester. It is the fall semester. This happens every year.) After a set time, one group representative writes that group's combined sentence on the board, and then all sentences are checked for accuracy. This allows for variations, lets students see that there is not just one correct way to write a sentence with the same given information, and cuts down on teacher correction time.
Keith also suggested having students complete already-written paragraphs with only a topic sentence or conclusion sentence or a couple of details, underlining their contributions. The instructor need only check each paragraph for the students' added sentences, not whole paragraphs for each student.
In journals, encourage students to try a newly-learned grammar structure and underline it so the instructor can see it clearly, check if it's being used correctly, and offer any advice or encouragement to them. Another helpful suggestion was that instructors set up a series of e-mails before the term starts, and send one once a week to the entire class although the assignment is optional. In each e-mail, have 8 or so sentences with one error each, and tell the students in the e-mail what kind of errors they are. If students choose to do the assignment for extra practice, they must correct each mistake and send back the whole e-mail. Only those truly interested in learning will do it (Keith calls them "the sponges"), and it will not take up a lot of teacher time to read the students' e-mail and respond once. Whether or not instructors wish to continue the correspondence after they send a response to the students' submission of corrections is up to the instructor.
(Keith Folse’s website: www.keithfolse.com/index.html)
(Reviewed by Anne Savidge, Higher Education Interest Section Representative)
What I Wish I Had Known When I Started Teaching ESL
Presented by Kathleen Kenfield (Keynote)
Kathleen Kenfield charmed and inspired the conference attendees with her treatment of this topic. In addition to sharing specific instructional strategies for teaching English Language Learners, Kenfield encouraged the practitioners to keep learners engaged with interactive activities and provide differentiated instruction. To emphasize her belief that “Facts Fade but Stories Stay”, she gave examples of how academic concepts can be reinforced through relating personal anecdotes and humor. Every time I listen to Kathleen Kenfield I am reminded why I am an educator and am inspired to do a better job for my students. (Kathleen Kenfield’s website: www.kathleenkenfield.com)
(Reviewed by Cindy Brennan, Adult Education Interest Section Representative)
Scaffolding the Development of Reading Comprehension for ELL
Presented by Stephen White (EE, TE, Workshop)
This excellent workshop was very interactive and included hands on instruction. Mr. White provided ample handouts of his power point presentation we could review as he delivered his presentation.
He presented a scaffolding lesson on reading and vocabulary strategies. He also shared his results from his classroom instruction of these strategies. It was an exciting presentation with materials, several handouts and concrete ideas we could take away and immediately use in our classroom.
(Reviewed by Janine Kornegay, Member-At-Large
Federal Education Update
Presented by John Segota (Featured)
John Segota provided a useful update on what we can expect to see from the Federal level that will affect our work in the near future. His presentation outlined the previous and projected leaders and balance of “powers” that will impact the interests of those who work with ELLs, the bills that are being proposed that we need to be aware of and active in advocating, and the websites where we can stay current as issues evolve with the new administration and legislature. He generously shared his presentation PPT, linked HERE.
A related document of interest from Senator Florence Shapiro’s Newsletter, regarding a new Texas Public School Accountability Proposal is also linked HERE.
(Reviewed by Rita Deyoe-Chiullán, Publications Coordinator)
Onward and Upward: Meeting the Needs of English Language Learners (ELLs) Through Instruction and Assessment
Presented by Laura J. Ayala and Georgina González (Featured)
In addition to a detailed explanation of how the revised TEKS are meticulously aligned with the assessment procedures the state requires, the speakers shared large posters that attendees could take home to display, illustrating the relationships of curriculum and instruction to assessment in the State’s framework for ELLs. The two posters present Texas Administrative Code, Chapter 74. Curriculum Requirements; Subchapter A. Required Curriculum, 74.4 English Language Proficiency Standards, presented as Part 1 and Part 2. The standards became effective 12-25-07. The posters may be reproduced for use in Texas public schools without charge, so long as they are reproduced in their entirety, unedited, unaltered, unchanged and without monetary charges beyond the cost of reproduction/distribution. Others must obtain written approval from TEA and enter into a licensing agreement to pay royalties or licensing fees.
The extremely detailed and useful 137-slide PPT the speakers used is available online at http://www.tea.state.tx.us/student.assessment/admin/rpte/index.html#training.
As of this writing (ll-30-08), their presentation appears near the bottom of the page under the heading “Resources from Presentations, Conferences and TETNs”, as “TEXTESOL Joint ELL Instruction and Assessment Presentation, November 2008 (PPT) (posted 11/26/08." This will be a valuable resource for teacher educators and for school district personnel who are training and mentoring new teachers. This PPT is also linked HERE.
(For frequent users of the TEA Student Assessment page for LEP or ELL, please note that there have been numerous changes in what is available on the assessment website page.)
(Reviewed by Rita Deyoe-Chiullán, Publications Coordinator)
Beyond the Book: Developing an ESOL Toolbox (Workshop, HE)
Presented by Kimberly Munoz and Brenda Floyd, Eastfield College
Ms. Munoz and Ms. Floyd began their workshop by asking the attendees to list anything that would facilitate student learning in the classroom. Further, they gave the attendees an opportunity to explore three tools such as technology, collaboration methods, and authentic text. As a technology tool, the i-pods were brought to show how students can use them to listen to their lessons and do the exercises. The i-pods seem to be a popular device to attract young students and help them in their learning. As a second tool, they demonstrated how some websites can be used for collaboration. They talked about Wikis, a collaborative website which allows anyone that accesses it the ability to modify the content. Some examples of wikis are wetpaint.com and pbwiki.com. They also discussed how blogs can aid students to post writing samples and respond to each other. Some examples of blogs are blogger.com and edublogs.org. As a last tool, they demonstrated how picture books can be used to devise many activities to create interest in reading. The attendees were asked to pick-up a free book and come up with creative activities relevant to the content of the book. I am glad that I attended this interactive, hands-on workshop, which provided many useful ideas to implement in the classroom.
(Reviewed by Jey Venkatesan, Publications Copy Editor)
Academic Vocabulary Learning in Context
Presented by Cheryl Boyd Zimmerman (HE, P, Demonstration
Ms. Zimmerman began her demonstration on the idea that when studying vocabulary, students must learn word consciousness, an understanding of the subtleties of a word. One of her examples included a short reading and a subsequent comprehension exercise that asked students to consider the difference between the words live and survive. Students would need to understand not only the words’ meanings, but also collocations, and grammatical behavior. Do these words have more than one meaning? What other words usually appear with these words? Can the words act as nouns, as verbs? Once students are able truly to manipulate a word, it will enter their active vocabulary, thus allowing students to make accurate word choices and succeed in academic courses. Ms. Zimmerman bases her choice of vocabulary words on the Academic Word List (AWL), a list of words that appear with high frequency in English-language academic texts. Her approach is the basis for Inside Reading, the series of which she is the author.
(Reviewed by Elizabeth Smith, Secondary School Representative)
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Created on 02/01/2008 04:11 PM by MaryPeacock
Updated on 12/20/2008 03:38 PM by MaryPeacock
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