Young students work so hard when reading because they are
focusing a lot on decoding and will miss details necessary for comprehension
like vocabulary and voice. Here are two
children’s books that young ELLs many struggle with and why;
The Pigeon Wants a Puppy by Mo Willems
-This book
has a lot of voice; it is full of exclamation points and question marks. This can be difficult for a ELLs to maintain
fluency or have comprehension when so much punctuation. I do think this is a great book for young
children however, there are just a few steps the teacher, or parent, should
take first before the student reads it on their own. i.e. picture walk, adult
model reading
-The main
character is a pigeon and some ELL may not be familiar with that type of
bird. The teacher would need to help
develop their background knowledge by identifying a few characteristics of
pigeons and show the students real pictures of them.
-The story
has no identifiable setting. The setting
is a major component of a story and usually helps students with
comprehension. Not having a clear
setting my be difficult for ELLs who have used its identification as a strategy
when understanding text. The teacher
should go through the story elements with the students and possibly identify a
setting together.
-The
pigeon’s behavior may be foreign to a few ELLs making it difficult for them to
identify with the story. It seems the pigeon
is throwing a tantrum and that may be hard to understand unless the actions and
cause is labeled for the students. The
teacher can also explain to the students other instances when that behavior may
be displayed.
The Mitten by Jan Brett
-Some ELLs
may not be familiar with the word “mitten” or the process of knitting. The teacher could use this opportunity to
bring in realia and explain the process of knitting. A mitten and a glove can also be used for a
compare and contrast activity.
-The setting of the story is in the
forest in the winter. Some ELLs may be
unfamiliar with snow and the teacher should build background information by identifying
characteristics of a snowy climate, geographic information, and possibly even
things that can be done in the snow.
-There are
some vocabulary words that should be identified for ELLs like, burrowed,
kickers, jostled, fast, silhouette, etc.
The teacher can define these words for the students and use them in
another context.
-The
animals in the story may be foreign to some ELLs. The teacher should identify each animal and a
few facts about them, i.e. what they look like, where they live, and what they
eat.
I really enjoyed reading your ideas on things to discuss with ELL students about the story The Mitten. Showing your students what it means to knit and comparing a mitten and glove are a great way to begin the story. I also loved your idea to build background knowledge about snow - what you do in it, and where you find it in the world - so cool. When I taught 1st grade only a couple of my students had ever been out of Colorado, and no one had ever been to the ocean. One year I brought back seaweed so they could feel it, smell it, and see something they had never seen before. It was fun but stinky.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was observing an ELL class this week the teacher stopped many times and goggled an animal, image or a map to show her students if she felt like they needed a real world example. It was very handy and the kids really enjoyed it. Your book coupled with an I-pad could show snowing actually falling or the behavior of one of the animals.
I enjoyed reading your post on working through ELL struggles with children's books. While I have not read the first book that you mentioned, I often use The Mitten book in my Kindergarten classroom because Jan Brett is such a great author. I thought that your idea of building background knowledge about snow was absolutely wonderful. It's hard to realize that some kids have not experienced snow before whether in Colorado or not. I know that the teacher that I observed this week googled many images. In this case she would have most likely googled images of snow and found virtual videos of snow so that the kids could comprehend what snow was/is. As for the other vocabulary words and characters/animals it might be best to be googling these different vocabulary words/animals so that kids have a better understanding of the nonfiction animal/word. Nice post!
ReplyDeleteSara