It’s amazing how much great storytelling advice Scott Simon from National Public Radio fits into a three-and-a-half minute video.
I’ve added it to The Best Digital Storytelling Resources.
October 2, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Monthly Archives: October 2009
October 1, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Talking Calculator
CyberChase from PBS has a great online talking calculator.
It’s a perfect way for English Language Learners to do their math and, through listening skills, developing their language abilities.
I’ll be adding it to the Math page on my website.
Thanks to Casey Mayfield for the tip.
October 1, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
“Family Literacy, English Language Learners, and Parent Engagement”
“Family Literacy, English Language Learners, and Parent Engagement” is a short excerpt from my book (written with Lorie Hammond) — Building Parent Engagment In Schools – that appeared in the Library Media Connection this month.
They don’t have the article online, and but gave me permission to post it on my website.
The book was published yesterday, though I haven’t seen a copy yet…
You might also be interested in my other blog, Engaging Parents In School.
October 1, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
“Why Rising Test Scores May Not Mean Increased Learning”
Education researcher David Berliner has just written an excellent guest post in The Answer Sheet, a Washington Post education blog. It’s called Why Rising Test Scores May Not Mean Increased Learning.
I’ve posted in the past about Berliner’s exceptional work.
In his guest post, he makes six key points, and he elaborates on each one. I’d strongly recommend you read his entire post. I’m just going to briefly quote each of the six:
1). Virtually all states have changed the passing score on tests so that more children are classified proficient.
2). School districts across the nation engage in excessive, perhaps unethical, and, in some cases, illegal test preparation. This results in higher test scores, but not necessarily greater learning.
3) Familiarity with the objectives and the items on a test invariably results in increased test scores.
4) The test items we use do not tap the knowledge we really want to assess.
5) Afraid they could be fired or their schools closed because of NCLB test scores, district and school administrators invent ways to prevent the poorest performing students from taking tests.
6) It is common for scores to go up because of cheating. For example, there are companies that look for anomalies in test scoring. They often find incidents such as a low-scoring student suddenly getting seven items right in a row, or a class in a low-performing school suddenly outperforming classes in a neighboring high-performing school. These may or may not be instances of cheating, but several hundred of these anomalies are associated with NCLB tests in many states.
October 1, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
ESL/EFL/ELL Carnival Is Up!
ELL Classroom has just posted the thirteenth edition of the ESL/EFL/ELL Carnival. Jennifer Duarte and Michelle Klepper have done an amazing job! I’d also encourage you to subscribe to their blog.
ESL/EFL bloggers from around the world have contributed thoughtful posts about issues related to teaching and learning English, and it’s not to be missed.
The next edition will be hosted by Alice Mercer. Any blog posts, including examples of student work, that are related to teaching or learning English are welcome. You can contribute a post by using this easy submission form.
Future hosts will include Shelly Terrell at Teacher Reboot Camp: Challenging Ourselves to Engage Our Students on February 1st and Karenne Sylvester at Kalinago English: Teaching Speaking Using Technology on April 1st.
You can see all the previous twelve editions of the ESL/EFL/ELL Blog Carnival here.
October 1, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Even More On The Tsunami
Here are additions I’ve made to The Best Sites To Learn About The Tsunami In American Samoa:
Tsunami Strikes South Pacific is a slideshow from TIME Magazine.
Quake Triggers Tsunami is a slideshow from ABC News. ABC also has a video that shows the actual tsunami.
Here’s some “raw” video of the actual tsunami.
October 1, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
The Best Websites For Learning About Multiple Holidays & Anniversaries
I’ve created “The Best…” lists for many, if not most, of the major holidays and celebrations in the United States. To locate them, just go to that link and find the “Holidays” section.
If, however, you’re looking for resources accessible to English Language Learners about holidays that I might not have covered, here are a list of sites that provide information on many different celebrations.
Here are my choices for The Best Websites For Learning About Multiple Holidays:
Heads Up English Holiday Lessons for English Language Learners.
Holiday Lessons from EL Civics.
American Holidays from Susan Schneider’s ESL Website.
Religious Festivals from the CBBC Newsround.
Self-Study Holiday Quizzes from Activities For ESL Students.
U.S. Holidays For ESL Students
Dave’s ESL Cafe Idea Cookbook — Holidays
Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations From Around The World comes from “Topics Online Magazine,” a resource specifically designed for English Language Learners.
Education World’s Holiday Center
Holidays and Traditions from Ressources Pour Le College
Ressources Pour Le College also has a collection of great Internet Scavenger Hunts, which include several on different holidays.
History Channel’s History of Holidays
Calendar of Themes from Houghton Mifflin
National Patriotic Holidays from Glencoe. Glencoe also has a broader resource on holidays called Beyond The Textbook.
Fact Monster has numerous resources on holidays
Holidays Worksheets from Lanternfish
The Orange County Register Interactive Graphics
Thinkfinity’s Spotlight On The Holidays
If you type the name of a holiday into the search engine at the New York Times, the first item that pops-up is a page the newspaper has with basic information about the celebration and, more importantly, multimedia it has created related to the day.
The Canadian Association of Second Language Teachers has a Holidays and Special Days section on their website.
Renee Maufroid, an English teacher in France, develops a lot of excellent ESL/EFL online activities. You can find ones she’s created on a number of holidays by going to his site.
If you go to Edsitement and type in the query “holiday” in their search engine, you’ll find a number of resources. Many might be too advanced for ELL’s, but can be modified.
A site called Whyzz has two sections filled with a lot of accessible info on holidays. One is called Holidays and the other is Holiday Q & A’s.
ESL Holiday Lessons has many good lessons about…holidays.
ESL PDF has many printable hand-outs on various holidays.
Kid’s Turn Central has an extensive collection of accessible holiday resources.
Mr. Donn has a good page called Ancient Roots of Modern Holidays.
The Museum Of Science and Industry has an extensive Holiday Traditions section. It has a ton of information, though it’s probably only accessible to Intermediate English Language Learners.
Better Homes and Gardens has slideshows and eCards related to all major holidays.
The Saskatoon Public Schools in Canada has an Online Learning Center with a lot of Holiday links. Scroll down to “Monthly Themes & Holidays.”
Teaching Tolerance has numerous high-quality lesson plans on many different holidays and anniversaries.
Time and Date doesn’t quite fit in with the other sites here, but it does let you quickly determine the dates for holidays in pretty much any country and any year. It’s a good curriculum planning tool.
If you go to Cookstr and click on “Holidays” on the left menu, the screen will show many holidays you can click on to get appropriate menu ideas.
Pete’s PowerPoint Station has a bunch of accessible PowerPoint presentations on different holidays.
Teachers First has a Holiday Central filled with useful resources.
John’s ESL Community has simple explanations for many holidays.
Woodlands Junior School in Great Britain has resources on many national holidays.
Festivals and Celebrations – Quizzes, Games & Printable Worksheets is the title of a great page from ESOL Courses. It has links to resources pages they’ve put together for a bunch of holidays.
Julia Gillard’s American Holidays is a slideshow from TIME Magazine.
I’d certainly be interested in hearing other suggestions, so please feel free to leave them in the comments section.
If you found this post useful, you might want to look at previous “The Best…” lists and also consider subscribing to this blog for free.
