There is an increasing amount of English language learners represented in our schools for whom a unique approach to developing literacy is necessary. The development of literacy by English language learners (ELLs) includes all of the challenges implicit for English speaking children literacy attainments, and is additionally compounded by a diversity of linguistic, cognitive and academic variables.
In general, the following are critical variables that need to be targeted in effective reading instruction:
Phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary development, reading fluency, including oral reading skills, and reading comprehension strategies. The National Research Council’s Committee on the Prevention of Reading Difficulties in Young Children recently completed the most authoritative, comprehensive review of the research on normal reading development and instruction and on preventing reading difficulties in young children1. This study documented a number of important findings about teaching English reading to language-minority children. These include:
- English-speaking children making initial attempts at reading understand, if they are successful, the products of their efforts; they read words they know and sentences they understand, and…can self-correct efficiently. Non-English speakers have a more limited basis for knowing whether their reading is correct because the crucial meaning-making process is short circuited by lack of language knowledge.
- Giving a child initial reading instruction in a language that he or she does not yet speak can undermine the child’s chance to see literacy as a powerful form of communication by knocking the support of meaning out from underneath the process of learning.
- Initial reading instruction in the first language does no harm. To the contrary, it seems likely both from research findings and from theories about literacy development that initial reading instruction in the second language can have negative consequences for immediate and long-term achievement. Primary language and reading literacy is critical and should be strongly encouraged.
It was highly recommended that “initial literacy instruction in a child’s native language whenever possible” and suggested that “literacy instruction should not be introduced in any language before some reasonable level of oral proficiency in that language has been attained.”
On the question of which language to use when teaching English language learners to read, the committee recommended the following guidelines:
- If language minority children arrive at school with no proficiency in English but speaking a language for which there are instructional guides, learning materials, and locally available proficient teachers, then these children should be taught how to read in their native language while acquiring proficiency in spoken English, and then subsequently taught to extend their skills to reading in English.
- If these second language children arrive at school with no proficiency in English but speak a language for which the above conditions cannot be met and for which there are insufficient numbers of children to justify the development of the local community to meet such conditions, the instructional priority should be to develop the children’s proficiency in spoken English. Although print materials may be used to develop understanding of English speech sounds, vocabulary, and syntax, the postponement of formal reading instruction is appropriate until an adequate level of proficiency in spoken English has been achieved. In other words, the instructional priority need to be to develop spoken oral English prior to attempting to facilitate reading in English.
This author has used this approach with many second language children and has developed effective methods to facilitate literacy in English language learners based on these recommendations which have been associated with high levels of efficacy.
Deborah Jill Chitester received her Masters of Science in Speech-Language Pathology from Adelphi University in New York and was granted her Certificate of Clinical Competence (C.C.C) by the American Speech and Hearing Association (ASHA). She has 10+ years experience working with all age levels both mono-lingual and Spanish speaking, having received special certification by the State of New York as a Bilingual (English/Spanish) Speech-Language Pathologist. Deborah has worked with all age levels and all disabilities. She began her practice in New York, where she worked with both private patients as well as with the major school systems and corporations.
In her practice, Second Language, Literacy and Learning Conection LLC she treats both monolingual and Spanish speaking clients of all ages and disabilities and utilizes some of the latest computer based treatment especially designed to promote optimal language development. Her expertise in second language learning is extensive and as such, she is currently publishing a resource guide to be used by educators in “connecting” with ELLs.
March 23rd, 2010
Try to locate a person in your school or area that is a fluent speaker of English, and ask that individual to meet with you on a regular basis in order to practice your English. You will have the chance to ask this native speaker questions about English grammar and pronunciation, while speaking about issues that both of you have an interest in. Bring a pen and a note pad with you so that you can write down any words that are unfamiliar to you. When you return home you can use your English dictionary to look up the meaning of these words, if your English language buddy has not already helped you to understand the meaning of these words. It is a good idea to make the person that you are practicing with someone who does not speak your native language. I know that it is quite tempting to practice English with a person who speaks your language, but this is not the best thing because you want to learn to think in English. It will be harder for you, but also better for you to pick someone who must help you in English only because they do not speak your native language. If your English speaking friend does not speak your native language, you can help them to learn it also. I am sure they will really appreciate this assistance from you as much as you appreciate you appreciate their help.
If you do not know where to go with your new English friend, you can try the grocery store. No matter where you are from, you must eat. In your country going to the grocery store may not be an exciting activity, but in a new country it can be quite fun. You should ask you English speaking friend to let you practice your English by asking for things in English. For example, you can ask the grocery store employees where the meat is, which aisle the soda is in or other other food related questions. Before you go to the store itself you should have a written list of items that you will need. This is something that your friend can help you with in advance. After you have bought the things that you need from the grocery store you can invite your friend to dinner. You should both be very hungry at this point.
Much Continued ESL Success,
The creator of ESL Free Lesson
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January 6th, 2010
Did you know there are only 6 ways of forming Chinese characters?
Yes, 6 kinds of Chinese characters make up the 50,000 Chinese characters in existence today.
Amazing isn’t it?
It shows that there is a logical symbol system used to create Chinese characters. That they are not just made up of random lines and strokes.
Once you know these 6 types of Chinese characters, you’ll find that learning Chinese writing isn’t so difficult after all.
Oh, one more thing…
The “radicals”
No, these have nothing to do with extremists or terrorists.:)
They are the “root elements” of Chinese characters. The meaning part of Chinese characters. There are 214 of them and they exist independently or as part of complex characters.
Once you get a general idea of the common radicals, you can guess the meaning of Chinese characters.
Modern Chinese dictionaries are organized by radicals - starting with one-stroke radicals, two, three and so on, and hanyu pinyin, the modern Chinese Romanization system.
By knowing the radicals and the 6 ways of forming Chinese characters, one can pretty much guess the meaning and sound of Chinese characters.
So, what are the 6 ways of forming Chinese characters?
The earliest Chinese characters some 4,000 years ago were shaped like the things they represented. Known as “pictographs”, these were pictures of humans, animals and natural objects, like “sun”, “mother”, “bird”, “food” etc.
There are only 300 plus pictographs but they form the building blocks of modern Chinese writing.
To create more words, symbols were added to pictographs to form “ideographs”. For example, by adding a horizontal stroke, “wood” became “root”, and “mouth” became “sweet”.
Later, two or more pictographs were combined to form “composite ideographs”. These are “meaning plus meaning” words. For example, “man” 人 added to “tree” 木 forms the Chinese character “rest” 休 — a man leaning against a tree. And three characters for “wood” 木 together make a “forest” 森.
This way of forming Chinese characters shows the creativity of the ancient Chinese, but it could not produce a lot of Chinese characters easily.
“Borrowed characters” came into being. This means a Chinese character with the same sound as another was borowed to form new characters with no regard for its meaning.
The result? New characters with the same sound but different meanings were formed. For example, the Chinese character for “north” 北 showed two people “back to back” and originally meant just that. The original character 北 was borrowed to represent a direction, while the sound remained unchanged.
But what happened to the original meanings of these borrowed characters? In order to retain their original meanings, a meaning component was added to the sound component. So using the same example, the character meaning “back to back” was given a “flesh” component 背 so it could keep its original meaning.
As a result, “sound plus meaning” words or phonetic compounds were formed. These are Chinese characters with a sound part and a meaning part. Today, this type of Chinese characters make up 80% of Chinese characters in use.
The last type of Chinese characters is called Transferred characters.
Transferred characters share the same radical and have the same meaning but their pronunciations are different. This is the least important of the 6 ways of forming Chinese characters.
So early Chinese characters were created based on meaning alone and started from pictures.
Eventually, each Chinese character became “a unit of sound and meaning” like what we have today.
But it remains possible to guess the meaning of Chinese characters from the meaning component, the radicals.
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December 31st, 2009