ELL News Headlines
Throughout the week, Colorín Colorado gathers news headlines related to English language learners from around the country. The ELL Headlines are posted Monday through Friday and are available for free!
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What Teachers Should Learn From the Death of George Floyd
Education Week
The death of George Floyd, the community response to it, and the subsequent police violence are shedding some light on racism and its effects — in our country, our communities, and in our institutions — including in schools. Two teachers reflect and communicate about what they think educators should learn from the murder of George Floyd, including the importance of being anti-racist and challenging White teachers to acknowledge their implicit biases.
2020 Horn Book Awards: Notable Titles in Children’s Literature
Book Trib
Since their beginning in 1967, the Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards celebrate notable titles in children’s books, middle grade and young adult novels. The books are sorted into the categories of picture books, fiction and poetry and nonfiction, and then reviewed by a panel of three judges. This year, the judges were Sujei Lugo, Leo Landry and Julie Danielson. In its first-ever virtual ceremony, Roger Sutton, editor-in-chief of Horn Book, announced the award-winning titles and honor recipients in each category.
Federal COVID-19 Guidance on ELs: Better Late than Never?
New America
For the first three weeks that Alba Avila delivered virtual Zoom lessons, only four out of her 15 of English learner (EL) students had the technology needed to participate—the rest got hard copy packets. When her district finally purchased and distributed Chromebooks for families in need, Avila, a fourth grade dual language teacher in San Antonio, was tasked with getting students online. Like Avila, teachers and school leaders across the country made the herculean move to remote learning in response to COVID-19 with no time to prepare and little federal guidance. Published two months after this frantic transition, new guidance from the U.S. Department of Education (ED) aims to clarify what schools and teachers should be doing to fulfill their responsibility to the country's nearly five million EL students during school closures. Federal officials say schools and educators must provide “meaningful access” to remote learning during school closures, but they give schools the flexibility to determine how to provide access to these learning opportunities.
Survey Shows Big Remote Learning Gaps For Low-Income And Special Needs Children
National Public Radio
Four out of 10 of the poorest U.S. students are accessing remote learning as little as once a week or less, according to a new survey from ParentsTogether, an advocacy group. By contrast, for families making more than $100,000 a year, 83% of kids are doing distance learning every day, with the majority engaged over two hours a day, the survey found. From the beginning, experts in distance learning warned that it can magnify inequities, with the most able and highly advantaged learners humming along while learners who need more support fall far behind.
Adding Relevance to Instruction
Education Week
The new question-of-the-week is: What are ways to make lessons more "relevant" to students' lives? Shawn Wooton and Dawn Mitchell from Spartanburg School District in South Carolina write about culturally inclusive practices that add relevance to instruction. Kevin Parr, a 1st grade teacher from Wenatchee, Washington suggests that teachers find relevance via "small things," for example, responding to a student's writing with personal comments related to the student's story (not only the style and mechanics) can help make learning more relevant. Michael Haggen, chief academic officer for Scholastic Education, says that relevance = engagement and to provide access to high-quality authentic texts. Keisha Rembert, an 8th grade English and U.S. history teacher at Clifford Crone Middle School in Naperville, Illinois, suggests bringing in students as co-teachers. Find more suggestions in this blog post hosted by Larry Ferlazzo.
Heartbreak, Love, and Resilience: A Teacher's Letter to the Class of 2020
Education Week
My dear high school class of 2020: Oh, where do we even begin? First, I want to say how much I love and adore you. I’ve known many of you since you were 12 years old, bouncing around my 7th grade classroom, reading, thinking, and laughing with me. You indulged me when I made funny voices during read alouds and participated when I made you go outside to try the “Unity clap” we learned about in a lesson on the United Farm Workers strike. I was so happy that our small school meant I got to teach you as 9th graders as well. I loved watching you grow once you moved on and become the marvelous young adults you are today. You made me so happy to be back in the classroom with you. You reminded me then (and now) why I love being a teacher.
Ways to Make Lessons 'Relevant' to Students' Lives
Education Week
Researchers have found that one key way to encourage intrinsic motivation to learn is by making classroom lessons relevant to students' lives. This element is constant—whether we're doing remote teaching or are with students in our physical classrooms (you can see this video we made showing specific ways to apply it in distance learning). This six-part series will share multiple strategies to put this concept into practice. The series is "kicked off" with responses from Blanca Huertas, Marcy Webb, Anabel Gonzalez, Cheryl Abla, Maurice McDavid, and Nadine Sanchez.
How to Foster a Positive School Climate in a Virtual World
EdSurge
As we continue to adjust to this new virtual learning environment, success will depend, to a large extent, on whether we can shift our focus from tactical to strategic. And there is nothing more strategic than school climate. You may feel like you have too much on your plate to worry about school climate right now. But the truth is, school climate is the plate. More than 25 years of research tells us that the climate of a school matters; it literally guides how well almost everything gets done. Positive school climates are characterized by psychological and physical safety, where students feel comfortable expressing themselves, asking questions and taking risks, and educators are free to raise ideas or try new techniques. Having a positive school climate means practicing collaborative decision-making to ensure students’ and teachers’ voices are heard, building connections with the community, delivering excellent academic instruction and supporting the well-being of both staff and students.
Support Native Language Center to Help Fight COVID-19
Language Magazine
Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) is calling for the inclusion of a provision in the next coronavirus relief bill to establish a Native American Language Resource Center (NALRC) to support Native American language education schools and programs hit hard by COVID-19. The proposed center would promote best practices in Native American language education; provide outreach to students and families; acquisition of distance learning technologies and training for parents, students, teachers and learning support staff; compile digital libraries and curate other online resources in target Native American languages; develop distance learning curricula appropriate for preschool to PhD levels, pedagogical training for teachers, and other efforts necessary to continue Native American language acquisition among American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian communities.
Less learning and late guidance: School districts struggle to help English language learners during COVID-19 crisis
Chalkbeat
In elementary schools, children got 30 minutes of remote instruction in English and math each day. Teachers were supposed to incorporate language skills into that work, but students missed out on 55 minutes of daily English language development they received before the virus struck. The rapid shift to remote learning forced by the COVID-19 crisis has left the nation’s roughly 5 million English language learners in a precarious position. Many have seen their language instruction shrink as districts balance competing priorities and struggle to connect with students attending school from their living rooms. Schools and districts have largely had to figure out how to meet the needs of English learners on their own.
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