Leon Funchess

EDUC 565
Prof. Ulcay
Reflection Paper

This reflection is divided into 2 parts: the first section will be my thoughts on what it is like teaching English
Learners and my experiences going into my first year of teaching. The second section will be a culminating
reflection, as I have had multiple experiences with different kinds of ELs throughout the year.

BEFORE
With my mother being an English Language Learner (ELL) teacher for several years,
growing up, I had always been familiar with the concept of the difference in instructing English
Learners (ELs) compared to native English speakers. Intuitively, I knew that ELs had to have
their education adjusted because of the language barrier. However, that was it. I knew nothing of
the nuances and details that went into the practice. Seemingly knowing nothing, I came into this
course with an open mind and an open notebook, ready to grasp as much information as possible,
because I knew what would be ahead of me in the school district of Philadelphia.
Before I begin, I want to point out one thing: as the course progressed, I kept coming
back to the fact that the practices that are put forth in assisting ELs would be beneficial to any
student, frankly. I will go over some of the practices I found to be the most significant, but
overall all of them would be worthwhile to utilize in a general education environment.
Cristina Igoa’s The Inner World of the Immigrant Child proved to be both a worthwhile
read and resource for this course. The thought-provoking text dove deep into how to understand
the thinking patterns of ELs and, eventually, be able to teach them effectively as a result1. One of
the biggest things I took away from the text, as well as other supplementary reads, was how
important understanding everyday language is to any type of learning environment. I usually am
very aware of this when interacting with languages other than English and realizing there are
some things within those cultures that I might just not get if I only acquire the language using
textbooks and academic methods. For a long time, I seemed to have taken this for granted within
my language and culture, and being monolingual, this is understandable to me. With the help of
all this information, I recognized the ease at which one can get lost in this environment.
A really good example of this “lost in the sauce” feeling that applies to me is when it
comes to talking photography. When I am around someone who knows about camera
specifications and the different aspects of photography, I find myself talking in another
language--or at least that is what it may appear to be to someone who is not well-versed in
photography. If I start talking about shutter speed and aperture and focal lengths around the
average person they would get lost and lose interest almost immediately, simply because they do
not understand the language and cannot relate to all the photography “culture.” When thinking
about an EL in a general education classroom, I can only imagine this is exactly how they would

1
Igoa pp. 70
feel when colloquialisms start getting used in conversations, and it becomes hard to keep up.
After doing some research, I found a few articles authored by Rusty Bresser, and in these
articles, they outlined how things native English speakers may take for granted can pose a
challenge for ELs23. One example that kind of blew my mind (simply because I always took it
for granted) was in mathematics when we use the word “left.” The example was: “Suzy has 20
apples. Her friend Danielle takes 8 away... now, how many are left?” An ELL potentially would
have trouble with that statement as that use of “left” may be foreign to them.
All this goes to say that as a teacher it is important to recognize that some students may
not be familiar with everything that you are saying or referring to. This goes for all students, as a
matter of fact, and the fact that I am teaching science will force me to double down on this
thought. All science inquiry classrooms require the acquisition and/or building of foundational
knowledge, and when you have students that do not have the proper materials (aka knowledge)
to build their foundation, then their building (aka learning experience) will fail. It is my job as an
educator to make sure all students, including and especially ELs, have these materials so that
their foundations are strong.
With all this being said, the next thing I realized in a classroom with ELs is how
important the ability to be able to relate to students and their cultures is to a conducive learning
environment. Igoa touches on this at several points throughout The Inner World45. Kathy Irving’s
article, Cross-cultural awareness and the English-as-a-second-language6 classroom also made
notes on this topic. To summarize, both sources made a note on how humans place cultural
significance on a variety of things in life, and an educator must recognize the said significance
and incorporate it into their planning if they want students to feel comfortable in the learning
environment. As I said before, this does not just apply to ELs (although it is almost necessary for
them). If a teacher from the city goes out into a rural area to teach, they still need to be able to
recognize the cultural values that those students have, because chances are there are some
differences there. If that need for cross-cultural awareness is not met, then the learning
environment would not be ideal, and the students would not learn the best that they could.
Another big takeaway from this course was from The Inner World, and that was the
concept of the CAP (cultural/academic/psychological) approach to teaching. Although it
specifically refers to ELs, I once again believe that approach should be implemented in ALL
classrooms. I especially resonated with the idea of dialogic intervention7, mainly because I
always try to see the positive in things. You always hear from people “the energy you give off is
the energy you receive,” and for a long time I was skeptical and just wrote it off. That was until I
2
https://www.colorincolorado.org/article/opportunities-and-challenges-ells-science-inquiry-classroom-part-1
3
https://mathsolutions.com/uncategorized/the-challenges-of-teaching-math-to-english-language-learners/
4
Igoa pp. 13
5
Igoa pp. 75
6
https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/blackboard.learn.xythos.prod/5a3199fc4282a/6408517?response-content-
disposition=inline%3B%20filename%2A%3DUTF-
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7
Igoa pp. 117
tried things like positive thinking and the law of attraction. Dialogic intervention is just the
application of mindsets like these onto others and helping them reverse tendencies.
To reflect, although I did not get a chance to observe any classrooms with ELs up to this
point, (at least not in the mindset I have now as a future educator) I do plan to ask my mother,
who is very familiar in this field, for some advice when it comes to managing a classroom with
ELs in it. It is one thing to watch training videos and read articles, but it is another to hear real-
life advice from someone who has been in that situation. Even in my few days at my placement
school with other faculty members, they have told me stories of how they leaned onto the ESL
staff member for assistance. Overall, I definitely think this class helped me realize that as an
educator you have to be able to cater to your students to make sure that they are getting the best
education possible because at the end of the day they reflect not only your abilities but also your
dedication to your profession. If you do not put in that effort for your students, they will not give
you that effort back!

AFTER
The above was written before a whole year of experiences. Throughout this year, I had the
privilege of working closely with one of my EL students. He is originally from Albania and he
moved to the United States around 6 years ago. His overall laid-back personality and combined
with an inner desire to learn are what caused us to click, and work well together in the classroom.
I felt as though he had a good understanding of the English language, but he just had issues with
certain words and contexts. Considering he is a 9th grader in a new school, he was able to make a
good number of friends and communicate well with his peers. When I first arrived at the school,
he apparently had been having some trouble in some classes, namely English, Spanish, and my
class (before I took over), Biochemistry. The Spanish teacher suggested that he be put into
“Study Skills” which is an extra class that students who need help (for several reasons, including
IEP, 540 Plan, ELL status) can use an extracurricular period for. I have no official records or
measurements, but from my observations, but once he was put into that class, his performance in
those classes got better. I also believe that as he got more comfortable with the school
environment, he was able to navigate in the community and then was able to do his assignments
correctly. When I started to take over the class and give him assignments, I looked over his
responses closely. At first, he had trouble and asked for help with more difficult questions. After
a while, he was able to get sued to my questioning style and he started to answer questions with
more detail and more thought. Additionally, for another class, I had to perform an informal
reading inventory on a student who was at least 2 grade levels below reading level. Considering I
had no native speakers in my school who met that guideline, I decided to work with this
particular EL student. When I told him about the assignment, he was eager to help me out, as
well as help himself out by improving his reading skills. The reading inventory and all the
following lessons I planned based upon the outcome proved to be successful, to a point. From
what I saw in the reading inventory, he was able to read fairly well and could get through
passages outside of a few new words. His real difficultly came with comprehension questions. I
took this as him reading the words, but not knowing what they meant and using context in order
to form his own definitions and make sense of the passages. I decided to help him improve his
contextual definition skills and close reading skills through a number of activities. From what I
saw, as time went on, he improved! I could tell he was becoming more confident and it was good
to work with him to help him achieve that.
I often tried to adjust my lesson planning for the whole class based around the fact that I had a
few ELs in my classes, and did things like use common language or explain myself when I used
uncommon words or phrases, so that they all could be on the same page.
When I spoke with this particular EL student, I often tried to ask him about his own culture and
what his history was, and when defining words for him tried to ask him examples from his native
language and country. I thought this was very important to do, so he felt comfortable and felt as
though I was trying. I think when a student sees the effort that you put into something, they
return that same effort into their own work, and it makes things much more productive.
All in all, my experience this year definitely made me a bit more comfortable working with
ELLs, but I think I definitely have more experiences to have, whether that’s with more difficult
students in terms of their language skills or behavior. I will be taking all the encounters I have
and all the information I have into these situations, and trying my best to show students that I
care about their learning.
 Works Cited

Bresser, Rusty. “The Challenges of Teaching Math to English Learners.” Math Solutions,

https://mathsolutions.com/uncategorized/the-challenges-of-teaching-math-to-english-language-

learners/.

Bresser, Rusty, and Sharon Fargason. “Opportunities and Challenges for ELLs in the Science

Inquiry Classroom (Part 1).” Colorín Colorado, 1 Dec. 2015,

https://www.colorincolorado.org/article/opportunities-and-challenges-ells-science-inquiry-

classroom-part-1.

Igoa, Cristina. The Inner World of the Immigrant Child. Routledge, 2015.

Irving, Kathy J. “Cross-Cultural Awareness and the English-as-a-Second-Language Classroom.”

Theory Into Practice, vol. 23, no. 2, 1984, pp. 138–143. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1476443.