Preparing an Engaging Social Studies Lesson for ELLs: 12 Tips for Educators

There are many ways to engage English language learners (ELLs) in Social Studies and History instruction, as well as in related subjects, such as Geography, Civics, and Economics. Many of these strategies can also support students' access of grade-level content while drawing on their own unique background knowledge and perspectives. Here are some ways to get started!

Background Knowledge and Key Concepts

1. Assess students' background knowledge

One of the most important areas to prioritize in Social Studies and History instruction for ELLs is the role of background knowledge. ELLs bring their own valuable experiences to the classroom, and their background knowledge may differ than their peers. Students may also still be learning to show and share that knowledge in English.

You may find the following:

• Students have relevant experiences and/or knowledge related to the content you are studying — even if the context is different from their peers. For example, students may have experienced elections in their home countries, and that experience may be different from U.S. elections. These differences provide an important opportunity for class discussion and learning as long as they are handled in a sensitive and respectful ways.
• Students have limited background knowledge on the content you are studying, including on topics that might seem well-known to their peers.

Note: For students with interrupted schooling, knowledge on certain academic topcis may be limited; however, these students are likely to have important "funds of knowledge" and strengths, such as resourcefulness and resilience.

First and foremost, it's important to determine what your students know about a topic. How? There are several ways, including:

• Asking students to share what they know through drawing or writing in their home language
• Using a graphic organizer, such as a K-W-L chart or Circle Map
• Using a See-Think-Wonder strategy, which uses a visual as a prompt to introduce a new topic
• Using a Concept Map to capture what students know and the connections they see between key topics
• Inviting students to write their own questions about a topic
• Asking students to speak with peers in their home language about a topic and report back in English

These steps will give you an idea of the connections your students may be already making, as well as areas that you need to fill in.

How To Build Social Studies Background Knowledge

Teacher Amber Prentice Jimenez explains how she builds her ELLs' background knowledge in a lesson about the 50 states.

2. Identify key concepts necessary for understanding the lesson

When choosing your key concepts, keep in mind the following:

• What are the key objectives for this lesson?
• What are the key concepts and points they need to learn?
• How might you connect this topic to students' experiences?
• What references or concepts to history, pop culture, or other topics may need to be explicitly explained?
• Are there any tough topics or controversies that might come up in your discussions? If so, prepare for these topics with our in-depth guide, Navigating Tough Topics in the Classroom: Tips for ELL Educators.

Content and language objectives

Another way to focus your instruction is through objectives. Content objectives focus on the material, while language objectives focus on vocabulary or language structures that students should be able to use throughout the lesson (Haynes and Zacarian, 28).

Think about how you are going to:

• Introduce these concepts using simple language
• Break the concepts down into the most basic elements
• Keep the objectives visible to students during the unit (i.e., post them on the board or provide a simple outline to keep in binders)
• Translate them if possible into students' languages

Here is an example of content and language objectives together:

3. Identify key skills needed to complete the lesson

Think about what students will be asked to do in order to meet their learning objectives. Will they need to read a timeline or a map? Will they need to compare two pieces of text? Will they need to examine a primary source? These skills may need to be taught explicitly in order for students to be successful.

See more ideas in the following:

• Reading Graphs, Charts, Timelines, and Infographics
• Teaching Map Skills
• Primary Sources, the Library of Congress, and English Learners

Language and Literacy

4. Identify key vocabulary and academic vocabulary

Mitad del Mundo Monument at the Equator. Quito, Ecuador. Photo by Lydia Breiseth.

Another important element of Social Studies and History instruction is academic language and vocabulary. ELLs must learn the academic language and vocabulary needed to comprehend and produce new content — all while learning the new content and concepts at the same time!

Start by identifying key terms, words, idioms and phrases — TWIPS, according to Dr. Zacarian (19). Choose the vocabulary that your students need to know in order to support their reading development and content-area learning, in addition to key content vocabulary. Remember to prepare student-friendly definitions for TWIPS ahead of time. It may be helpful to look at other Social Studies vocabulary lists as well. (This is also an area where content-area teaches and ELL specialists can work together!)

On the 4th-grade standard above, that might include examples such as the following:

• Terms: pole, Equator, meridian, hemisphere, latitude, longitude
• Words: map, globe, North, South, East, West
• Idioms: on the Equator
• Phrases: Degrees North, Degrees South, Degrees East, Degrees West

In addition, look for words that have multiple meanings or homonyms:

• Word with multiple meanings: prime, pole, plot, key, degree
• Homonyms: pole/poll

Other tips include the following:

• Include signal and directional words: Remember that students may also need explicit instruction in signal or directional words ("because" and "explain"), especially since those words that are likely to appear frequently in the content materials or activities.
• Don't overlook the basic words: There may be many words used through a lesson that native English-speaking students will understand but that ELLs don't know. Keep an eye out for these words, no matter how basic, and make a list of words that your students have questions about so that you can refer back to it when teaching the lesson in the future.
• Use visuals and realia when possible: Having a reference for new words is particularly helpful for ELLs, whether through visuals or realia (real objects).
• Keep words visible and accessible to students: Post words on a word wall, or try using a "portable word wall" chart that students can put in their binder. The chart might include categories such as new words, old words, people, everyday words, words to review, etc. (Haynes and Zacarian, 59-60).
• Remember to include lots of student practice: For students to really know a word, they must use it — or they will lose it. Use new words in class discussions or outside of class in other contexts if appropriate, such as on field trips. Give the students as many opportunities to use and master the new vocabulary as possible, both in writing and speaking activities. You may find this six-step process for teaching academic vocabulary from Dr. Robert Marzano helpful.

5. Draw upon students' home languages

Students' home languages are a valuable resource that you can tap into, even if you don't speak those languages. Using students' home language can give them an opportunity to identify content they already know or master new concepts before transferring those ideas and learning how to express them in English. Ideas include the following:

• Use bilingual glossaries, such as these content-focused glossaries from New York University.
• Draw on cognates, words that are related in two languages. They have a similar pronunciation, spelling, and meaning. Many academic English and Spanish words are cognates, such as geography/geographía.
• Plan group work in which students can use their language with peers to discuss main ideas or vocabulary words, brainstorm ideas, or write summaries.
• Look for related content materials in the students' native language from publishers like Scholastic or National Geographic/Cengage.
• Collaborate with a bilingual paraprofessional and identify areas where bilingual language support will be most helpful.

6. Prepare to preview the text

It can be helpful to preview the text with students before diving in. Here are some strategies:

• Chapter Walk: In a "chapter walk", students predict what the chapter will be about based on pictures and highlighted features of the textbook. An activity like this may take some time at first, but if you use it with regularity, however, it will become easier and quicker, and students will be able to do this on their own at the beginning of a new chapter.
• Navigating Textbooks: In addition, at the beginning of the school year, teach your students how to navigate a textbook effectively so that students can pick out and use textbook tools throughout the year.

You may also consider pre-teaching vocabulary or content in mini lessons or small group work before introducing the lesson to the whole class.

Student Engagement

7. Prepare multimedia, visuals, and related readings

These resources can be used to build background knowledge and provide context for ELLs, especially when students are learning new concepts and words. Ideas include:

• Using visuals, such as photos from books, magazines, or the Internet to supplement textbooks.
• Showing brief, focused video clips of history or social studies programs.
• Listening to a short podcast or radio clip of an interview or speech.
• Discussing additional readings such as related articles, poems, letters, and graphic novels.

8. Plan plenty of opportunities for students to interact with the content

Give students lots of opportunities to engage with and review the material in different ways:

• Graphic organizers: Use graphic organizers to review key concepts and vocabulary words.
• Flash cards: Have students make their own flash cards with pictures, definitions, key facts, etc.
• Working with the text: Teach students to underline, highlight, and make notes. You may also find that sticky notes, Wikki Stix, and highlighting tape are a big hit with students (68). According to Haynes, some school districts order extra textbooks for their ELL classes so that teachers can keep a highlighted copy on hand as a student reference.
• Use acting: Have the students write skits about the material they are learning, or create an activity in which students provide a physical representation of a particular event or vocabulary word.

Samantha describes her approach for checking understanding and offering some differentiated assignments in a third-grade Social Studies lesson about different types of economic resources: natural, capital, and human.

9. Plan to include group work throughout the unit

Peer learning activities such as Reciprocal Teaching and Think-Pair-Share can be powerful tools for engaging ELLs with content learning.

In peer work, use modeling and clear instructions to ensure students understand:

• How the activity works
• Their role in group work
• The objective of the activity
• Any key vocabulary or phrases they should be using.

Here are some other tips on group work for ELLs from Haynes and Zacarian:

• Assign students group roles that match their language ability (37).
• Promote students to new roles as their language skills improve (42).
• Make sure that mainstream students understand that they will be working in diverse groups, and that everyone's contributions are important (41).
• Keep an eye on the balance of student participation; if some students are speaking more than others, ask them to think of some ways to even participation out (42).
• Ask students to reflect on their group work after they have finished an activity. Haynes and Zacarian include a chart in their book with some guiding statements for student reflection (48).

10. Use inquiry- and project-based learning

Look for ways to make learning hands-on through project-based learning (PBL) and inquiry-driven assignments. These avenues can give ELLs different kinds of opportunities to explore a topic that interests them in different modalities and formats.

Assignments and Assessments

11. Be creative and flexible with writing assignments

Writing can be an important way for students to show what they've learned:

• Be creative and flexible: When choosing writing activities for students, be creative and open to different ways for students to express their new knowledge. I have seen students successfully convey what they learned by writing letters, poems, news articles and mosaics with vocabulary key points. Writing an essay may be more difficult for ELLs, and although they will need to learn to write an essay, they should be allowed to demonstrate their learning through a variety of writing activities.
• Look for writing exercises that relate to the topic at hand: This may include a biography or autobiography, a letter from the point of view of a historical figure, or a short news article about a famous event.
• Provide models: Give ELLs explicit structures and sentence frames to follow. Frames may vary in complexity and specificity, but they will help students to model correct structures and usage from the beginning.

12. Plan to adapt homework and assessment as needed

While it's important to have high expectations of ELLs, it is also important to have realistic expectations of the amount of work they can do. Haynes and Zacarian note, "The teacher's goal should be to making learning accessible and meaningful for every student without lowering expectations or sacrificing rigor" (104-105).

They continue in Chapter 7 of their book to provide a number of helpful rubrics and step-by-step procedures for evaluating your homework and assessment activities with ELLs in mind. And Haynes also suggests that teachers "adjust homework assignment to your ELLs' English language proficiency (and) modify assessment so that your ELLs have an opportunity to show what they have learned."