 Well, hi Paris. Thanks for joining us today. We are here to discuss ELL supports and equity. I am Steph Lundgren from ESU 8. And I'm Claire Caten from ESU 8. We're glad that you can join us. You see our email addresses below our names. And just know that we're always here for you if you have any questions on, you know, it's something might spark interest or you might have a general pair of questions you can always reach out. Claire's going to start by talking about English language learner support. Okay, so I'm going to have you go ahead and go one more slide. Okay. I am, I serve schools for, oh, go back one. There you go. I serve schools through title three I work with Mark Brady out of ESU seven and together we help support our schools that have English language learners. And this has been a growing area and so we continue to learn about this and my guess is that majority of you have any other student that you work with or someone in your school and so hopefully this is just some general information that can help you support those students when you work with them in the classroom or in small groups or whatever it might look like. So to begin I just want you to think about a highlight from your semester so far it's hard to believe it's April. But think about a highlight from the semester so far, but the trick is when thinking about it, you have to use words that do not have an R and S and in or a T in it. Okay, so if you're with watching this with a small group go ahead and discuss. If you're by yourself you could write some things down, but the highlight from your semester so far, you can go ahead and pause this recording and jot those down. Should go on. Okay, so you probably found it kind of challenging to come up with words that don't have an RS and or T in it when describing your highlight from the semester. So that's just like English language learners as well. A lot of times they have stuff they want to say to say with the in front of the class or to their teacher to their peers, but they just can't find the words to say it. And so again, just like you maybe struggled a little to come up with some words, they struggled to come up with those conversational words as well or when asking questions. Okay, next slide. Okay, so the equation for EL progress is comprehensible input plus low stress opportunities for output equal language development and content attainment. So if you go one more slide stuff. We really highlight the words input and output. So the info. The information we're giving them. Plus giving them opportunities to respond and say what they're thinking. It gives us our good, our language development and content attainment. Okay, so we really want to focus on what we're giving them making sure it's digestible pieces, maybe in smaller chunks and wordings they understand using pictures. So whatever we're giving them, we want to be able to be sure that they can understand it. And then we also want to provide them the opportunities to output so to speak that or write it or whatever it might look like because that is really going to help the language development of these students. So this is really important being an English learner does not exempt a student from participating in your class or in your small group. This is something to remember a lot of times we say are quick to say, get out Google translator. Well, really, we want these students to have success, but we also want them to practice using their language and participating in your class. So that might be again in small group or with a partner or maybe the teacher or yourself go up to that student and ask them for an answer. Before presenting it to the whole class and maybe they can talk through what their answer is, but again, being an English learner does not exempt a student from participating in class during your small group. Claire, I remember when I've had EL students in my classroom, it just meant that they needed extra think time. And so sometimes their answer to a question might come a couple minutes later. But just remember they're thinking through that question that was being asked or whatever. And they just need a little bit more time to think and process. Yeah, I can totally relate to that or maybe even just, they might not understand one word in the sentence or in the question you asked us as soon as you explain that one word, then they are able to formulate a response. So, think time and giving them the scaffolding they need is so important. Okay, so we have three different stages of English learners. So we have the emerging, the progressing and then nearly proficient. So if you are nearly proficient, if you have students that you work with, I want you to just think about where do you think they are at. So, you can see that the emerging students, the characteristics, minimal comprehension does not verbalize, they cannot nod their head yes or no, they draw or point to different objects. They might have limited comprehension without scaffolding, one or two word responses. So these are really those beginning students, those emerging students who are very, very new and fresh to the language. Then you have your progressing students. So those who have been here maybe a while or those who have been in school for a little bit and they're starting to catch on and learn some of that English language. They might have good comprehension. Maybe just have a hard time verbalizing it. They may make grammatical and pronunciation errors, but they're still speaking. Maybe they misunderstand a joke that is made or misunderstand a question that is asked. So again, you can see progressing and then you have those nearly efficient who make very few grammatical errors and are moving towards being out of the EL program. And so, once you think about your students, if they're emerging progressing or nearly proficient, you can look over at the site and look at the prompts for the tiered questions. And so, instead of saying, tell me, maybe you're saying, show me, maybe there's visuals in them and they're pointing and showing you something or they're circling a picture or you're asking, where is it? So again, you're using a lot more visuals with these emerging students. You might be using yes or no questions where they just have to shake or nod their head. And then you move on and maybe you're starting to give them some sentence starters or some ideas. Well, why is this or how can you explain this in a couple sentences? Those short answer sentences. And then for the nearly proficient, you're really starting to think and retell a story or why do you think this and getting that higher level thinking. So again, you have those emerging progressing and nearly proficient students. And again, you're starting if they're at that top that emerging, you're just slowly scaffolding and helping those students progress until they become those nearly proficient students. Because the neat thing about these students are they learn really fast. The more they're emerged in the English language, the more they're going to learn. Yes, it's probably overwhelming for them, just as it would be overwhelming for us to have to learn a second language as well. But the more they are immersed in it, the faster they're going to learn it. And when we're talking about scaffold, scaffold are those supports that help students until they can be successful on their own. So sometimes we call that I do it, we do it, you do it. So I do it would model something. We do it would be helping them through doing it together many, many, many times before that you do it when they could do it all on their own. Yes, I always remember I think it was Anita Archer saying it's I do it I show you, and then we do it we do it we do it we do it we do it then it's you do it they do it on their own. So, and someone else even added y'all do it before the you do it. So now they don't have teacher support but they have a peer support where students are working together before they have to do it on their own. I haven't heard that I like that. So, again, these documents, I can get these to stuff if she wants to send these out in a document format, but again, these emerging students each year they these students have to take the Elpa test, and it will give them their level and so their ELP level is one or two those are considered the emerging students so maybe some of the students you work with have taken this and you can ask their teacher for their levels, and that's where you can see where they are. But again, we're different reading supports so using visuals, responding to questions non verbally pointing drawing again these are just more laid out steps that you can take for students of each level. So these emerging students are those ones who are going to need a lot a lot of support and a lot of that we do it we do it we do it. Using graphic organizers. Using a bilingual dictionary for one or two words again you're still encouraging them to use English but they might not know if there's a math problem, a story problem. And they're talking, we'll see an example later in our video, but you might be talking about a stuff I think it was you always who talks about a student who didn't know what a lamp was. Yeah, yeah, they don't know what a lamp is so you might have to look it up in the dictionary so they can get a better understanding, or you can point to it so just those one or two words they might need that help with and so using color coding. Yeah, there's just lots of different ideas for those emerging students that you can do. I like that build background language to and thinking about the things that they would need to know and have that kind of vocabulary lesson before that could really help them. And maybe if you're working with these students and small groups, maybe you're pre teaching a lesson and building that background knowledge, I am a big advocate for those about pre teaching, especially with these students. So they might hear the lesson with you in a really small group before they have it in their whole group later. And, you know, Paris, you guys are one on one with kids, and you can kind of maybe see sometimes when there's confusion, and maybe the teachers with the whole group and, you know, doesn't isn't right there to, you know, whisper that little bit of support or help in the year. So we teachers really rely on Paris I think in these instances to help out. I'm not sure what we would do without you guys. So then we have the progressing students so we have them emerging now we're moving on to those progressing maybe they've been here a couple years, or maybe they have been in a different school and have started learning the English language. And so again, you can take a look at this different reading supports trying supports mass supports. So providing sentence starters. That's a big one with this, providing them multiple opportunities to read, you know, maybe it's just small bits they're reading at a time because you don't want to exhaust them. But they read it, then you read some and then you give them the opportunity again to read more. Again, that building background knowledge appears sentence starters anchor charts sentence frames. So sentence frames would be. We could give an example Claire of sentence frames. It's very similar to a sentence starter correct. Yes. Or, yep, it could be a sentence starter so when I go to the lunchroom I, and then they fill, they fill in the rest, or frames could also be where you even talk about the who what kind of thing so that it helps them build a sentence and sometimes even written on like sentence strips. So those strips of paper and it could be parts of sentences and they could put them together. And because, you know what different languages sentences are constructed in different ways that's called syntax of making it sound like a good sentence in our language so we could help them that way to I think one important point here for the math supports is giving them formula charts so maybe a multiplication chart just for a while until they get the hanging of that and feel some success, and then you can slowly pull that back. But again we want these students to feel success and be able to do some of that work on their own so giving them a multiplication chart. They can easily find the answer, write it down well they just had some success in our building that confidence. Good. And then we have our nearly proficient students so these are those three fours mostly fours on their LP test. They're really moving to get out of the ill program. I've been here a while, maybe their parents at home speaking English but their native language was Spanish or something else. And so they're really starting to build they might be, you might expect them to have longer sentences, maybe even a paragraph. Again, you can still provide resources for them to use absolutely. This gets more into the conversation piece to going back and forth to build and expand on their English knowledge. So, you know, Claire I worked a lot with reading things and we've learned how it's important background knowledge is and see that on all of these all of them, build background language and then for math also build background knowledge and so background knowledge is all those things that we know about the world and to like mix in with what we're learning about math or reading and be able to use that information and I think, you know, because our students have come from another place we might assume that they have background knowledge on a topic that they don't. And I mean, one time it was the easiest word was like wreath, I was working with a sixth grade EL student in college and she didn't know what a wreath was. She didn't know what a wreath was on the door and I would just have assumed that right and we know what happens when we assume. So, I think building that background knowledge and helping them understand the background of what something means I mean it might be something pretty simple and a math story problem, or in a reading passage that we kind of take for granted so we just always have to be watching for those things that they might not know about. Yep, absolutely. There's many things on top of what we just talked about that you can do so the physical classroom I know you guys are assisting in the classroom but maybe there's something you can spot in the classroom that they really need. You can get share that idea, but word walls with visuals if you look at this map the math words a lot of them have that visual so there it's their math vocabulary, plus a visual can be really beneficial. Really building that knowledge of and this is something you guys could really work on with students is what can you say instead of I don't know how can you problem solve this or if you are really struggling and you don't know. Can you talk to appear and so we want to have a little productive struggle, but we want them to have success you know so really helping them understand if I don't know the answer. Can I try still or am I just not confident. Do I not know it and I need to ask a peer or a teacher, you know so really understanding where we are at and what knowledge we have in it. Peer work. I know last year I worked with some of you pairs on cooperative learning. So working in small groups. The more they hear their peers talk the more they hear that teacher use that English language the more they're going to catch on to and who doesn't like working with a friend and so having a quick conversation or having a worksheet and checking with a partner or something like that can go a long ways just building those relationship peer relationships in the classroom. Having the agenda and targets posted on the wall they're just like any other student they thrive off of routine I know I thrive off of routine and so if there's something different in the day. I'm not aware of that some students benefit from a visual on their desk so they know exactly what is coming up next. And so, if they want that predictable routines. So whether that's you. If you're in the classroom with them and you're kind of helping them understand okay once we are done with this we're moving on to this next thing and just talking them through that because they like predictability. Anything you want to add to that one. I totally agree and I think that the relationship building is a big thing because I'm and I think Paris you're doing that with students just like we talked about before. They know that they can go to you for help, but just remember also to not give too much help. I think sometimes kids get so reliant on having someone around to help and so they don't have to get do those harder tasks. It's kind of uncomfortable to watch a kid struggle sometimes and we don't want too much struggle, but Claire called it productive struggle or that you know it makes your wheels start turning in your brain it makes you have to figure something out for yourself and that's a good thing. And what probing questions can you give them without giving them the answer. Lots of times we call that help don't tell in pair trainings and so you know how can you help them along to get the answer without just telling them and doing it for them. Yeah. So if you have worked with any EL students or you know of any students in your building. I want you to just think about we've talked about that emerging the nearly proficient the progressing students. Just think about what stage do you think they're in, and what effective supports are in place and if there's not really anything that is being done for those students and yours if you're working with a small group or one on one. What is something you can take away. What might be helpful what support might be helpful moving forward like I said I'm going to get stuff the documents so you can look through those and there might be one thing that really stood out to you like our knowledge or using anchor charts or whatever that might be but just thinking about that student where might they be and if you don't have any effective supports in place what can you do for that student. And so we have a little video. See if stuff has it if not I will pull it up on mine. I think we'll probably get a get an add oh maybe not my friend knew that I was having such a terrible me and she sent me this box warm wishes are going to be hard but that's all right because we're going to try really hard isn't that right Cameron. Yes. Okay great everyone listen up. So we're going to want to work on we get ours from the answer the information story okay. We're going to go ahead and scratch your test and try to act as a test. Oh, that's your tips. We're going to create you're going to be. First on page 30. If you saw I broke up a book when I was at an examine. No, it's not practical. We're going to take notes from the story and we're going to turn it into a math problem and we're going to walk through it together okay. Three blocks. So everyone write three blocks. How long did it take him to run three blocks. Very good six minutes. All right so then we have a three blocks and six minutes. How long will it take him to run 20 blocks. What do we do. Eight minutes is that per block. Eight minutes. Okay, no it's not eight minutes. Michelle 18 minutes. No, not 18 minutes. Yes, Enrique 40. 40 yeah very good. How'd you get 40. I don't know. You don't know what 40 is the right answer. How did you get it. I forgot. Okay. Does anyone know how we get 40. Yes, my sense. Yep, that's right. Very good. Great. Can you tell us how you got that. Yeah, very good. Can you explain to the class what you did here how you got that. Joe, you want to lose your recess. No. Okay then. Thank you. Can you take a walk with me. I don't want you to worry about the test. Just try your best. Okay. Do you understand. Not important. You're right, my sense. It is important. I have to go. I'm sorry. Okay, Steph. No. Okay then. Thank you. Please. Can you take a walk with me. I don't want you to worry about the test. Okay myself. See. Just try your best. Okay. Do you understand. Not important. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay, Steph. I'll have you stop the video there. So there's a lot to unpack from that video. You have a student. He's probably an emerging student. There were vocabulary words getting mixed up, you know, he heard the time. So he looked at the clock. He made that connection. He heard blocks. And so he was thinking of the math. Hundreds block, not running the. Blocks around town. So he had those numbers and he obviously had some math skills. That because he was able to solve the problem, but he had no idea how to explain to his teacher how to solve it. You know, so when you think about that, he was really struggling then classmates started laughing. So. Instead of that teacher just asking him to explain, you know, maybe she goes up to the board and writes down that work and talks through how he got the correct answer and gives him some feedback. And so we're getting that correct answer because we want him to feel some success. And as that video showed things were just jumbled in his head. He didn't know how to get speak it. But deep down he did have some of those math skills. And also at the end when she was telling him that that test wasn't important. Well, a lot of these students really want to do well. And so I was just saying, oh, it's not important. You're fine. Well, no, that's, they want to do well too. So there's a lot to unpack from that video. I'm sure you guys took away something other than that step. What was your, the big thing you took away from that video? Well, I always think, and I always told my EL students that I admired them so much because I can't imagine what would happen to me if I had to go to a new country and speak a different language and listen to it and try to learn that language and learn other subjects through that language. And so I really admire all those students who persist all day long, all week long, all year long. And, you know, try to keep up and don't give up on it too. Right. Yes. So as we wrap up with this portion, I just want, again, if you work with this EL student, maybe you don't, maybe you've worked with another student. It doesn't matter. Something that affirmed in my practice was, so what is something that you're already doing that was, we maybe touched on today and you're like, yeah, that is something I should continue doing. Or if not, what is something you can try this week? What is something that you can take away from today and implement in with your small groups or with a student tomorrow in school, whether that's a sentence starter, whether that's some peer chat, whatever that might look like. So go ahead and think about that. And I am going to turn it back over to Steph. And I think on the next slide, it has my contact information. If you have any questions or you can reach out to Steph and she can put you in touch with me. So again, thank you for having me today. And Claire, Kate, and if you need anything, let me know. Thank you so much for joining us, Claire. It's nice to enlist the help of all of our ESU staff in working with Paris. So Paris just know Claire's available and so am I if you have any questions. We're going to delve in and another topic to pair well with thinking about EL supports is equity. Another E, right? So embracing equity in our schools. What does that look like? That's been kind of a catchphrase lately. We've heard a lot about improving the equity in our schools. And so what does that exactly mean? Well, I'm one quote says it meeting students where they are as they are. And so sorry that our pictures are covering that up a little bit, but meeting students where they are as they are is like that mindset that we can have as we think about equity. Equity is a reflection of an educator's humanity toward the students here she serves. How are we serving that student? How are we making sure that they feel valued and appreciated? And how are we meeting the needs of all those kids that we work with? So oftentimes we see this graphic and equality would mean that everyone receives the same support. So no matter what, you know, no matter what, you all get a box, right? Was that box enough for the child in the purple? No, because they can't see. Was it a little bit too much for the child in the blue? Well, yes, because that that one is is up very high. And it seems to be just right for the child in the red. But when we're talking about equity, it's that students receive the support they need when they need it. So in this case, the child in the blue didn't need the box to stand on. The child in the red had their just right support of one box, but the child in the purple needed two boxes, needed a little extra help, extra support. And where we really want to go with our society is to get to that liberation where there is no fence blocking their view where everyone has the access that they need. And we don't need to have that fence in the way. So this is a long quote, but stick with me here. An equity mindset teacher is a teacher who utilizes a variety of appropriate instructional strategies that consider the differing academic, social and emotional needs of each of their learners in a student centered, culturally responsive, culturally relevant, barrier free, equity mindset classroom where student individuality, student cultural identity and student voice matter exponentially. Wow, there's a lot there. There's a lot to unpack. We have a big job as educators, don't we? We have so much to consider when we think about that whole child and everything that they are and making them feel valued and like they matter and that we value all the parts of them, including their culture. I love that barrier free equity mindset classroom. We're going to remove those barriers so that everyone has access to what they need. So one step is thinking about student individuality. Are students visible or invisible? So many students are physically present in the classroom, but don't have presence because they don't feel seen. Educators must ask themselves what they are doing to prove to individual students that they care about them and are committed to their development. I think we all would say we care about our students, but are we thinking about that new one who might be a little bit different than someone else or that shy one that doesn't speak up? Are they visible or invisible? Are we celebrating all of our students? Two, student cultural identity. Is it accentuated or denied? Okay, so students not only come from and face different realities, something that purported color blindness fails to acknowledge. It used to be said, if some people said, I don't see color, I just treat everyone the same. But I think we all want to see who we are and part of our self and our expression should be in our culture and in who we are and being able to celebrate that there. So color blindness fails to acknowledge, but they also need knowledge of their own background and the shoulders on which they stand. They need teachers who can breathe life and relevance into curriculum. So can we talk about our curriculum, the things that we're learning and how that could relate to our culture and make it really relatable for kids. And three, student voice. Is it distinct or obscure? So honoring student voice means both valuing students perspectives, contributions and communication styles, and helping them find their own voice and sense of purpose. It also means helping them develop the courage to use their voices. So how are we doing that? How are we letting them speak up about their feelings, their thoughts and how maybe their culture influences their feelings and thoughts. We need to celebrate all and make sure all of our students are feeling heard and seen in our classrooms. And I want to credit this principal who has an article and he gave a speak at the ASCD conference last year with many of these thoughts. So thank you to him for helping us better understand equity and what it can entail in our classrooms. It's a big topic. Boy, we could spend a long time on equity, couldn't we? Actually, we could maybe more the summer when we all get together. I'm going to save the date. Our para training this summer, I'm going to move our pictures over again. We'll be on July 31st. We hope you can mark your calendar and start talking to your principal about coming to ESU 8 on that day. We'll meet from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. like we always do in August. Lunch will be provided. We always have a lot of fun along with the learning. And this year, our theme is gardening, right? Definitely has the best themes for you guys. Hey, having the paras in is like having a party. You have to have a good theme, right? When you have all your friends over to visit. So, Paris, we know how much you do every day and you amazed me. You're just wonderful and I'm so glad that you're there for students and teachers in our schools. You help it run better. So this last little bit from April till the end of May can be the tough times. So hang in there. You can do this, you know, stick with it because your summer break is coming and a little breather, a little downtime and self-care time is coming your way. Don't forget to do that in April and May as well. Take care of yourselves, hang in there. But please mark your calendars for July 31 and a good day together. Have a good rest of your school year. Thanks everybody.