Let’s get real…teaching English Language Learners can be a challenge. I have been teaching students who are learning English for 11 years and every year it is a challenge, but I love it!
Today in a discussion with a colleague we discussed the difference between scaffolding and simply dumbing down the curriculum. It is so important that we learn that scaffolding isn’t just giving less work, writing less, doing less problems, providing sentence frames…Scaffolding is giving the students the tools/support needed to access the content.
I think that the seesaw has always been the image that I have used to help me understand how best to scaffold to reach my students.
I start by teaching my students the skill, the process using content that is familiar and little easier for them to access. Then after students have mastered the skill, then I begin to raise the rigor of the content. I may use sentence frames to support students in the beginning but what I hope is that those frames support them in learning the skill that they can then apply to more rigorous content.
Mrs. Joyce 