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Success for All

Jenifer Chandra 260979768

Department of Integrated Studies in Education

EDES 351: Third Professional Seminar

Professor Melanie Bennett Stonebanks

November 18, 2022

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Stage 1: Background

The classroom of the student I have selected is a regular secondary 2 English classroom

in a school which has both regular and enriched ELA classes. Generally, in the beginning of the

year, regular English classrooms are expected to average between 65-68% in grades on average

for the first term. This specific class contains 11 IEPs out of 22, which means that the class is

allotted an attendant that will help the students who need the help. The students in this class are

relatively calm, though more because of disinterest than shyness. Because of this, most of the

class requires a lot of help during assignments and other activities, meaning that I am not able to

focus on specific students as much as I would like to.

The student I have selected is a refugee from Ukraine. They will be referred to as

Stardew. They have been in Canada for 5 months as of November 2022 and struggle with

speaking, writing, and understanding English. I have selected this student because it is very

difficult to go from an environment where English is taught in the context of a second or

additional language to an environment where English is the language of instruction, and students

are expected to be completing work of a higher level than what is expected in an ESL classroom.

Because of this, Stardew is very dependent on their translator to do their work, which is both

inefficient and unsustainable. My goal for Stardew is to boost their confidence in their English

speaking, writing, and comprehension and slowly wean them off using their translator as much

as they do.

Stage 2: Student Profile

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Stardew’s greatest strength is their dedication to their work. They are very determined to

succeed as much as they can. They are also aware of the limitations of a translator and have a

good enough awareness of the English language to know when a certain translation is off. Their

reading comprehension level is quite good, however, as I mentioned above, they are very

dependent on their translator because of their low proficiency in English. Because of this, they

are struggling with the writing component of the course, which sets them back quite a bit since

written productions are a very prominent part of the class. Here are examples of a series of

benchmark tests that we did at the beginning of the year to illustrate this.

In the first picture, we can see that they are unable to answer one of the questions because

they had a hard time understanding it, even with their translator. In the second picture, we can
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see that they have difficulties with spelling. Most of the words are spelled correctly because of

their use of the translator, but some words, even the ones that are used many times in the story

they had to read, are misspelled when they do not make use of their translator, such as “haker”

and “felippe”. We can also observe that their vocabulary seems quite advanced but that is once

again due to the use of a translator. However, overall, they are doing decently in terms of the

reading comprehension aspect in and of itself, as is seen by the grades they have obtained. I

would like to note that there have not been any learning strategies or learning tasks that have

been implemented as of yet for Stardew, aside from allowing them to use their translator in class,

due to the fact that they have just arrived in the school, and this is the first time that anyone in

Canada has worked with this student.

Stardew is particularly at a disadvantage because different languages are learned in

different ways, and it is difficult to determine how to best match up ELA classes with their

previous language of instruction class. Furthermore, they find it difficult to understand

instructions in English, meaning that they are often unable to complete work or are severely

delayed in doing so because of the extra time that it takes them to understand the task. They also

cannot get much support at home because their parents do not speak English. One thing that I

have also noticed about Stardew is that they are hesitant to say that they do not understand

something and will tell the teacher that they understood the assignment when they truly didn’t.

In terms of learning style, being in a classroom in a foreign language has forced them to

become a visual learner, since it is much easier to learn when there is visual support in a

classroom where one does not understand the language. They need for instructions to be written

out on the board or to be projected on the smartboard because it is hard for them to process

spoken English. They do not seem to have any learning disabilities beyond the fact that they do
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not much understand the language of instruction. There is no IEP associated with their file.

Socially and emotionally, they seem to be adjusting quite well. I’m not sure if they have friends

in the school that can support them in their transition, but they seem to be taking life and school

in Canada in stride. There are definitely some topics that we have to tread carefully around when

they are in the classroom, as they are a refugee from war, but other than that, they seem to be

very open to learning and to do the best they can.

Stage 3: Strategies Tried to Date

September:

The first strategy that my CT and I implemented to support Stardew in the classroom was

to let them use their translator in the first place. This allowed them the chance to gain some kind

of confidence in the classroom, as they are not completely lost in the way that they would be

without their translator. Another strategy that we implemented in order to allow them to be more

comfortable in the classroom is a method called “pre-teaching.” According to Jennifer Gonzalez

(2014), pre-teaching, or giving the student the material in advance, allows ELL students to

familiarize themselves with the class material ahead of time and explore it on their own pace at

home so that once they get into the classroom, they can focus on other things (Tip 8).

Unfortunately, Stardew was absent during the class that we “pre-taught” to them, so we weren’t

able to see if doing this actually helped them, and there haven’t been many opportunities to try

this method another time.

Another thing that we tried was to give them as much visual material as possible.

Whenever we have PowerPoint presentations, we would print out the slides and give the printout

to them so that they can focus on understanding the material instead of taking notes. We also
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give them summary documents, especially for long and complicated concepts such as the

different literary elements and their function in a story. This allowed them to use their translator

on the printed materials so they would try and understand the concepts being taught. Overall,

however, there wasn’t much progress made in September, as we were still trying to see what

worked and what didn’t.

October:

October is around the time where I completely took over the classroom, meaning that I

had to start thinking of ways to help Stardew on my own. It was also around the time where

students were expected to write their first reading response. I tried using Constructivist methods,

specifically scaffolding, in order to support Stardew’s learning and help them gain confidence in

the classroom. Scaffolding involves providing enough guidance for a student to do work that

they would not have been able to complete without said guidance (Ormrod et al., 2008, p.27). In

this case, it involves breaking Stardew’s student’s learning down into smaller, more manageable

pieces so that they can slowly work themselves up to the final product. The first thing I tried was

to give the students a response outline that they could fill in instead of throwing them into the

deep end of writing a response. I decided to use the response outline with all of my classes

because not only does that keep Stardew out of the spotlight, but it also benefits the other

students who might need more guidance to write their first response. The outline contained all of

sections that the students are expected to write in their final copy, and all the students needed to

do was fill in the blanks with their own ideas.

Outline document:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13OYydJOMkIrmlCTYDbXWEt6nMtAVT8OE/edit?

usp=sharing&ouid=101353639529694990342&rtpof=true&sd=true
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Writing in the outline document helped Stardew greatly, because they were able to lay

out all of their ideas and break them down into small sections before beginning to write. They

initially had a lot of difficulty understanding each section and what they had to write to complete

their response, but having everything broken down into small pieces allowed me to scaffold their

learning and explain the response elements piece by piece. In the end, they were able to complete

the “Analyzing Features” section by themselves, with only little explanation from me.

Another thing that helped them write their response were the sentence starters that we

projected on the Smartboard. I also created sentence starters specifically for them and wrote

them down in their outline document. This is another tool that Gonzalez recommends to help

ELLs in the classroom in order to get them used to formal English writing (2014, Tip 7). With

the help of these sentence starters and the outline that I had provided for them, Stardew was able

to complete their first response in English, and even write with more detail than their English-

speaking peers.
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As pictured in their response sample, while their paragraphs are quite short, they were

able to produce a coherent analysis of each literary element and how they facilitated

understanding of the theme of the story. This is extremely impressive, seeing as many of their

English-speaking peers produced responses of a similar or lower calibre, even with many years

of English education and more experience writing English responses under their belts. Their

grade on this response is a 63%.

The biggest development, however, came about when I introduced Stardew to another

Ukrainian student from one of my enriched classes. Gonzalez speaks of allowing ELL students

some scaffolding with their mother tongue in the classroom, which we have done by allowing

them to use their translator (2014, Tip 5). However, a translator can miss much of the context of

conversations or instructions and can very easily provide inaccurate information. The student I

introduced them to immigrated from Ukraine when they were young and therefore has been

studying in English for most of their life, while still speaking Ukrainian at home. They have a

much more developed understanding of the English language, as evidenced by their presence in

the enriched classroom. The regular and enriched classes mostly do the same assignments, and in

the case of the first response, are writing them on the same short story and are given the same

documents.

Both students agreed to be introduced to each other so that Stardew can have a peer to

ask questions to and translate instructions that are unclear to them. Since being introduced,

Stardew has come to me a couple times during my remediation hours with this other student to

ask questions about the response and get clarification and in-context translations for concepts

that they don’t understand. I believe that this allowed them to gain confidence in both their
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schoolwork and in their spoken English, as well as allowing them to establish their place socially

within the school. I noticed that since being introduced to this friend, Stardew has been catching

on to instructions more quickly and has been requiring less individualized help in class, which is

immense progress compared to just a few weeks before this, when both the attendant and I had to

constantly check for their understanding in class. They also became quite good friends with the

other student. I see them constantly walking in the hallways together and accompanying each

other to my remediation hours. They also mentioned going to each other’s houses. I think that

making a good friend has been beneficial for them in terms of gaining confidence and their

adjustment to life in Canada.

November:

In November, I tried to place Stardew in cooperative learning situations with students

who are a bit stronger in comparison to their peers so that they can have a good example of what

they need to be doing in English class. I did this with the goal of allowing them to learn from

their peers so that they can adapt the course’s requirements to their own learning style.

Additionally, this will allow them to practice conversing with their peers during class. By this

point, Stardew has gained more confidence in their English speaking, and one of the students in

their group has taken it upon themselves to guide Stardew through the group response that they

had to write. Their group has told me that Stardew tried their best to contribute and came up with

some ideas of what could be written.

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Throughout the semester, I also adapted my speech and writing when speaking to

Stardew. When we are having one-on-one conversations, I try to use simpler language so that I

can get my message across without resorting to using their translator. I also write longer

comments on their assignments so that I can make it completely clear what the expectations of

the class are. Here is a comment I wrote for them on their first response. The other students in

the class got no comments on the rubric for this particular assignment, and only got feedback

inside the response itself.

Stage 4: Conclusions and Recommendations

Compared to the beginning of the year, I believe that Stardew has gained more

confidence in their spoken and written English. As mentioned above, they were able to write a

full response in English and pass. They had written 4.5 pages on their response, making it more
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detailed than many other responses in the class. They are also catching on to instructions more

quickly. It is very easy to tell when Stardew doesn’t understand an instruction but pretends to

and when they actually do understand the instruction. Their response for both situations are

completely different. I was able to observe the latter much more over the past few weeks

compared to the beginning of the year when it took a lot longer to get their “lightbulb moment.”

Furthermore, the biggest development happened on November 17th, when they participated in

class twice. It was the first time that they had ever done something like that, which shows that

they have finally gained enough confidence in their English skills to answer questions in class.

They still take more time to complete their work compared to their peers, but I noticed a

significant improvement in terms of how quickly they start their work compared to the beginning

of the year.

For the future, I would recommend further scaffolding by pre-teaching as many lessons

as possible, especially with the upcoming novel studies unit. It would be beneficial to maybe

provide them with a summary of the book we will be reading, and if possible, maybe a summary

of each chapter, so that they can familiarize themselves with the content of the book before

reading it. I would also recommend continued support through group work and the use of visual

media in the classroom, whether it be writing down instructions, using sentence starters, or

watching videos. One thing I would like to do specifically is to ask them to complete a simple

assignment without using their translator, and to continue doing this intermittently throughout

the year. This will help us gauge the level that they have attained in terms of their English skills

and allow us to build off that to further support their learning. I fully believe that with their

perseverant work ethic and the fast progress that they are making with the support of their peers

and teachers, that Stardew is the perfect candidate for future success.
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References

Gonzalez, J. (2014, Dec 11). 12 ways to support English learners in the mainstream classroom.

Cult of Pedagogy. https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/supporting-esl-students-mainstream-

classroom/

Ormrod, J. E., Saklofske, D. H., Schwean, V. L., Andrews, J. J. W. & Shore, B. M. (2008).

Principles of educational psychology (2nd ed.). Pearson.