tice - building academic language in the classroom handout
TRANSCRIPT
BUILDING ACADEMIC
LANGUAGE IN THE ESL CLASSROOM
Elisabeth Chan
The International Center for EnglishArkansas State University
TICE ESL Mini Conference – November 19, 2010
What’s the difference?
Magnetic attraction occurs only between ferrous metals.
Our experiments showed that magnets attract some metals.
We found out the pins stuck on the magnet.
Look, it’s making them move. They don’t stick.
Gibbons (2002, p.40)
Magnetic attraction occurs only between ferrous metals.
Our experiments showed that magnets attract some metals.
We found out the pins stuck on the magnet.
Look, it’s making them move. They don’t stick.
Gibbons (2002, p.40)
Registers!
Magnetic attraction occurs only between ferrous metals.
Our experiments showed that magnets attract some metals.
We found out the pins stuck on the magnet.
Look, it’s making them move. They don’t stick.
Gibbons (2002, p.40)
Registers!
Non-Academic
Academic
Conversational vs Academic Cummins (1981)
BICS – basic interpersonalcommunicative skills ○ 2-3 years
CALP – cognitive academiclanguage proficiency ○ 5-7 years
Cummins’ QuadrantsContext embedded? Cognitively demanding?
Cummins’ Quadrants COGNITIVELY
UNDEMANDING
CONTEXT CONTEXT
EMBEDDED REDUCED
COGNITIVELY
DEMANDING
Academic Bag of Tricks
How academic English is different &
Activities for building:WritingReadingSpeakingVocabulary
WritingOrganization
Content
Grammar
ORGANIZATIONAL PATTERN CONTENT
TOPIC SUPPORTING DETAILS
GRAMMAR COMPOUND SENTENCES COMPLEX SENTENCES
Difference?
Building Academic Writing
Focus on contentState a topic and develop it
Focus on cohesive paragraph structureReference, conjunctions, nominalization
Teach and practice the writing process Focus on sentence structure
Compound, clauses, signal words Paraphrasing
Writing Activity: Focus on Content
Original
Text
Adjectives
Adverbs
WH Questions
The movie was good. The man met a woman. They fell in love.
Writing Activity: Focus on Content
Original
Text
Adjectives
Adverbs
WH Questions
WHO
WHAT
WHERE
WHEN
HOW
The romantic movie was good. The handsome man met a beautiful woman. They fell in love quickly.
Writing Activity: Sentence Transformation
The police investigation of the robbery lasted for one month.
The police investigated the robbery for one month.
NominalizationSimple form
(verb, adjective)
Difference?
Building Academic Reading
Explicitly teach reading skillsModel the skills! Use “Think Alouds”
Build reading fluency through Extensive Reading
Engage students & increase motivationGoal of knowledge
Reading Activity: Think Aloud
Titles & Headings Figures Bold words Objectives Language!
Guessing from context!Context-embedded + Cognitively demanding
Speaking
Building Academic Speech Extend conversation
Avoid IRE’s = Initiation, Response, Evaluation (Cazden,
2001) Raise students’ awareness of academic
speechUse discussion groups with questions about
differencesListen to lectures or speeches & analyze the
language usedAnalyze research or focus on prevalent structures
Speaking Activities Avoiding IRE’s
Ask more open ended questionsRespond with encouragement and in a way that extends
their response and thinking○ T: The teacher –blank– a book to the class every week.
S: readsT: That’s right! Why do we use “reads” and not “read”?
OR
T: Very good! What other verbs can we use?S: gives?T: Excellent! What is a verb we cannot use there? Why not?
Describe this image
Academic Vocabulary Every day vocabulary vs. Academic
(Brook, D. 1998)
Explicitly teach vocabulary learning strategiesVocabulary notebook activities
Extensive reading
Anglo-Saxon French Latin
fear terror trepidation
win succeed triumph
holy sacred consecrated
Vocabulary Activities
Note cards or Notebooks
academic – adj. academy (n.)
academia (n.)
I learn academic
words when I read
my textbooks.
Vocabulary Activities
Note cards or Notebooks
academic – adj. academy (n.)
academia (n.)
academic achievement
academic performance
academic freedom
school study
academic
hard words textbook
Collocations
Collocations
References Brook, D. 1998. The Journey of English. New York: Clarion Books. Cazden, C. 2001. Classroom Discourse: The Language of Teaching and Learning.
Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. Cummins, J. 1981. “The Role of Primary Language Development in Promoting
Educational Success for Language Minority Students.” In Schooling and Language Minority Students: A Theoretical Framework, 3-49. Los Angeles: Evaluation, Dissemination and Assessment Center, California State University, Los Angeles.
Freeman, Y.S. and D.E. Freeman. 2009. Academic Language for English Language Learners and Struggling Readers: How to Help Students Succeed Across Content Areas. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
Gibbons, P. 2002. Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning: Teaching Second Language Learners in the Mainstream Classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
Guthrie, J. and M. Davis. 2003. “Motivating Struggling Readers in Middle School Through an Engagement Model of Classroom Practice.” Reading and Writing Quarterly 9: 59-85.
Swales, J. 2005. “Academically Speaking.” Language Magazine 4 (8): 30-34.
Arms, K. 1996. Environmental Science. Austin, TX: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. Rowling, J.K. 1999. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Scholastic Paperbacks. Scholastic. Magnetic Attraction. http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=1227. Accessed
October 5, 2010. POS Hardware. International Point of Sale Cash Registers.
http://www.internationalpointofsale.com/store/index.php?cPath=84. Accessed October 5, 2010.
Image Citations
QUESTIONS?CONTACT INFO
Elisabeth [email protected]
http://www.astate.edu/international/tice
http://www.slideshare.net/ElisabethChan
The International Center for English
Arkansas State University