Portfolio of Activities and Ideas
Conga Line
Levine & McCloskey (pg. 160)
The Conga Line Activity is a vocabulary game that provides an interactive way of studying and reviewing important vocab terms. This games is pretty easy to set-up and play. Before the game even starts, it’s a good idea to check if the students’ cards with the definition and/or examples is correct. If the cards aren’t checked, the students can learn the wrong definition. This would defeat the whole purpose of the review. I remember doing this activity in class, and it was pretty fun to do. I would change the environment of where we do the activity because it can get loud in a small classroom which makes it hard to hear. I like this game and plan on using it in the future to help with reviewing vocab. By the end of the game, each student should’ve been partners with every single student, and they should’ve seen a new word each time. This game is a great way for ELL students to learn vocab in an interactive way.
Word Sorts
Levine & McCloskey (pg. 157)
This activity is where learners organize sets of words into categories, help learners to reflect on meanings of words and extend their understanding. There are two types of word sorts: open sorts and closed sorts. Open sorts is where the learners would choose the categories for sorting. Closed sorts is where the teacher would provide the categories. For closed sorts, I would pick categories like: words that end with -ee, -ea words that say ee, -y words that say ee, and -e words that say ee. I would ask the learners to come up with words that would fit into each category. To make the activity more engaging, I will ask the learners to come up and write the word in the category they think it belongs in. This allows for the learners to see the words in the categories, hear the words based on the category it belongs in, and thinking by writing in the words in each category. Over time, the categories will change as the learners start to get a bit more comfortable doing the activity.
Phonics Flashcards
This activity will help the learners with speaking and pronouncing words in the English language. I think this is a great activity to do with learners to help with their pronunciation of words. Each card would have a word, or part of a word, with the corresponding picture. For example, the card could have the letters fl- and the picture would be of a flag. For this activity, I would start out doing it as a whole class. Once I see each student is practicing and getting comfortable with the pronunciations, they can work with a partner or in groups. This would give the students a chance to work and help each other. I like how the cards have pictures on them. The learners would be able to associate certain sounds or words to this picture helping with pronunciation. “Although ELLs may recognize the pictures, they may not have the cultural experience of jumping rope, playing a flute, or seeing a mule,” (Levine & McCloskey 177). That is the only downside to this activity, but it can be beneficial to the learners to help them learn and speak the English language.
Vocab Sheet of the Week
This was an activity I did back in middle school when taking Spanish. This activity helped a lot back then. I figure I could use this vocab sheet with ELL students to help learn English. In this activity, the learners would get a “word of the day” for their sheet. They would write down the word, definition/part of speech, and an example sentence. For example, you get the word curious. I would write “curious” as the word. In the definition/part of speech column, I would write “(v) to be eager to know or learn something.” For the sentence, I would write “I am curious what that word means.” This is a great visual to have for the learners. It’s pretty similar to the personal dictionary activity. When it comes to writing the sentences, the learners can write about their culture or family. At the end of the activity, I would tell the learners to pair up and share with one another, so they can hear other sentences written by the other students. This is something I would consider using in my classroom.
Personal Dictionary
The personal dictionary encourages learners to be word collectors. They find useful and important words and putting them into their own dictionaries. The learners can organize their words in alphabetical order on a sheet of loose-leaf or in a notebook with a letter of the alphabet on the top pages. When the learners find a word, or words, they want to remember, they write it down. To help them remember, they may write down synonyms, translations, or even have a visual. I think this is a great activity to help remember vocab and different words they want to learn. I like how it’s something they can create on their own, and they can put different ways of remembering the words in the entries. Having a visual or synonyms as hints can really help the understanding of these words. I would encourage the learners to use synonyms or visuals from their cultures that relate to the English word. This can even be a bigger help for the learners to remember the words. This would be an activity I would encourage ELLs to do.
Read, Retell, Summarize
Levine & McCloskey (pg. 160)
This activity is a great strategy for learners to practice using new vocab as they apply their comprehension of text and process what they have read. At the start, I will pick a certain passage from the reading and read it aloud to the students. From there, I will point out key words that help with understanding the reading. I will give the students a copy of the reading, so they can highlight the key words or write notes on it to help them with the activity. Then, working with partners, the students retell the reading, using only the list of words that were given as a reference. I will walk around listening to each group retell the story, and I will make note of words that I should further clarify. This activity is a great way for the students to actively engage with other students and help collaborate with one another to reach the goal. The story I could even use can be related to the students’ cultures. They can be able to relate and even feel comfortable participating because they can relate to it. This is an activity I would use in the future.
Sentence Structuring w/ Flashcards
This is an activity I did back in middle school that helped with forming compound and complex sentences. Each student was given a flashcard with a word or punctuation mark on it. From there, the students would have to work together to form a compound or complex sentence with the flashcards. When they were ready and sure about the sentence, the teacher would check to if the comma was in the correct spot, if the conjunction was in the correct spot, or if the sentence had independent or dependent clauses. I thought this was a great activity, and it helped me understand compound and complex sentences better. Before doing this activity, I would have to teach the students about compound and complex sentences. I can even use words that relate to my students’ culture. It would make some interesting sentences. This activity is more of an assessment to test their knowledge after I see they are understanding the concepts. I thought it was engaging and fun to work with my classmates on this topic. This is an activity I will use in the future to help my students like it helped me.
Learning Logs
Levine & McCloskey (pg. 257)
Learning logs is a great way for learners to record short summaries of a lesson they have learned. This can be written as a summary or as structured writing. This can be used to write about anything they have learned in my classroom or another class. I would stick with basic questions such as: Tell me what you learned about today? What was something important from today’s discussion? Is there anything from this lesson that you want to know more about? Questions like these will get the learners thinking and engaging about the lesson. This is a great way to check on their comprehension and writing skills. Having this as a journal they work on over time, it can engage the learners in wanting to know more and doing research or ask questions about the given topic(s). I feel this is a beneficial activity to do with ELLs. This activity can be done across all content areas with different teachers. This is something I will use in the future.
Create a Story
This is an activity I have done before with my campers over the summer. I have done this as a large group, but I would split the students up into smaller groups. In the small groups, the students will come up with their own stories. It can be about anything they want. It can be something random, something about the group, or even their culture.. I will also give the groups the option to assign jobs where there’s a writer and a reader. This will get to have the students working together and socialized with one another to accomplish a task. Giving the students an option to write about anything will show me their creative side. I would also be able to see their language and writing skills be put in this story. This was always a fun activity to do because we would always make some random and hilarious stories. This is something I am looking forward to expanding out and using with a different group of people.
Seating Arrangements for a Comfortable Environment
When I have my own classroom, I want to be able to create a safe and comfortable environment for my students. I think it’s important to make the classroom a comfortable environment because it gets the students engaged and active with one another and myself as the teacher. When I was doing observation at Metcalf School, a lot of classrooms had work tables, couches, and comfortable chairs. The teacher allowed for their students to sit anywhere. The students liked this and it kept them engaged in the lessons. This is something I want to do for my students. I have learned if they just sit in desks that are in rows, the students will get bored and uninterested. That is something I want to avoid.