ELL News Headlines

Last year was a great year for YA novels with Latinx protagonists, and 2022 promises to continue this positive trend. Here are seven titles to keep an eye out for this year.

The high-rise in the Bronx where 19 people died in a fire on Sunday was home to many African immigrants who chose their apartments for the close-knit community and proximity to local mosques. A significant number of the building’s residents were practicing Muslims and originally from Gambia, Mayor Eric Adams said at a news conference on Sunday.

Larry Ferlazzo's question-of-the-week is: "What are you doing — or trying to do — to sustain your morale and the morale of your students in the face of Omicron? What are you doing — or trying to do — to sustain any kind of learning momentum you had built up before the winter break?" Tairen McCollister, M.A., M.Ed., Alice Mercer, and Andrew Simmons contribute their responses.

Keishia Thorpe immigrated to the U.S. as a child, hoping for a better life than the poverty she came from in Jamaica. She's now a teacher in Maryland — and her devotion to preparing young immigrants to succeed just brought her international recognition and $1 million, via the Global Teacher Prize.

Storytelling is a powerful tool in a safe learning environment with classroom norms that reflect respect, honor, and empathy. When students are able to tell their own stories, it helps reverse any deficit mindset to create an asset mindset focused on what migrant and immigrant students can offer in each classroom.

Ji-Young, a guitar-playing Korean American character, will bring rock music and conversations about racism to the long-running children’s show.

It was a cool day for August, which was lucky for the five students busy painting a mural in a courtyard of asphalt and brick. After a long period of learning alone from computer screens, the students were working together to add a burst of color to their school building in the West Bronx, the Theatre Arts Production Company School, or TAPCo. The mural is one of about 200 going up at schools across New York City, funded by $25,000 grants to each school through the city’s Artist Corps, a recovery program through the Department of Cultural Affairs that has sent nearly 400 artists to summer school sites. Mayor Bill de Blasio has touted the corps as reminiscent of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, which funded arts and cultural projects to help lift the country out of the Great Depression.

The coronavirus pandemic forced students out of the classroom and starkly revealed how learning difficulties, distractions and challenging home dynamics can make it tough to adhere to a rigid curriculum. In a year with so much loss, a silver lining is that educators are embracing a flexible approach that meets students where they are, said Juliana Urtubey, the 2021 National Teacher of the Year.

Note: You can see more from Juliana in our Colorín Colorado interview with her!

Natalia Benjamin’s love of learning languages started early. Growing up in Guatemala City, the native Spanish speaker attended a French school. English became her third language when she started learning it in middle school. Now, Benjamin teaches English language learners and ethnic studies at Rochester’s Century High School. And on Wednesday night, in a ceremony under a white canopy on the lawn of the State Capitol, she was named Minnesota’s 2021 Teacher of the Year. She is the first teacher of Latin American heritage to win the prestigious honor.