ESL Teachers - Can You Help? Please!

[Daxx]

Ok, my school (private, parochial) is not an ESL school, nor do we have the resources for ESL. However, we seem to get more and more ESL students entering the school due to the neighborhood and demographics.

Thankfully, I teach Kdg. and am getting some of these kids right out of the gates (so to say). I had one student from Uganda this year who, on the first day of school had no idea what a crayon was. I thought teaching her would be far more difficult than it was! Thankfully, her older siblings knew a fair amount of English and Mom did, too. Fortunately, my student was able to pick up a ton really quickly and was reading English and comprehending above level by the end of the year!

It turns out that this school year, half of my class are ESL w/many parents barely speaking English. Three just registered last week -- one from Africa, one from Russia (she does know Polish, the principal tells me -- like that's gonna help) and one from Viet Nam. I know that I have more registered, but am not sure where they're coming from or what their English is like.

Since they're Kdg. students, they're like little sponges and it'll be easier to get them acclimated. I'd love any tips that any of you ESL teachers have to offer. This is my first time teaching more than one ESL student in a class and I'm a bit worried about it!!!

Thanks in advance! Daxx's Wife

 

[Blondy876]

Most years my class is over half ELL (English Language Learners, same as ESL)students. I have never hand any difficulty communicating with the children. They pick things up so quickly. My curriculum is big on labeling so I label things in each language that I have represented. Black ink is English, red is Spanish and so on and so on. We follow the same schedule each day and I use a lot of pictures to supplement what I am talking about. The children pick up things within a few weeks. My biggest difficulty is in communicating with their parents. I am fortunate that there are several Spanish speaking staff members to help when I have to communicate with Spanish speaking parents, with other languages I am on my own. Good luck and try not to worry, your students will do fine.

 

[Boston Tea Party]

For information on second language acquisition check out Stephen Krashen for theory and Bertie Segal for practice.

 

[Daxx]

Thanks for the input! I appreciate the help! Anyone else have any tips/recommendations?!