Uncertainty and sleeplessness seems to be the cost of uncertainty for teachers. Are we doing our best for a student? Have we implemented the best strategies, or is there something better? Fortunately differentiated instruction for ELL Students (English Language Learners) is not about having a new educational strategy.
When you plan differentiated instruction for ELL students you are fulfilling your commitment to meet the diverse needs of students and to enhance their learning experience and academic and other outcomes.
By taking your differentiation further to include your ELL students you open things up to a more inclusive, engaging and supportive classroom environment.
These principles will also apply to any student who is immersed in education in a language that is foreign to them. So, even if you do not have ELL students, this blog post is still for you.
When you focus on social-emotional learning (SEL), classroom community, and tailored instruction, you will ensure that each of your students has the opportunity to both thrive academically, and to feel valued and understood.
Differentiation Strategies for English Language Learners
Content Differentiation:
Adjust the complexity of the content to match the students’ proficiency levels while ensuring the mastery of essential knowledge.
Process Differentiation:
Modify the way students engage with the material, offering multiple ways to explore and develop understanding.
Product Differentiation:
Allow students to demonstrate their learning in various formats, like presentations, projects, or written assignments, catering to their strengths and preferences.
Learning Environment Differentiation:
Consider the look and feel of the classroom, and provide a safe and positive environment for learning. This means allowing for individual work preferences and managing the learning space.
Why is Differentiation of Process Necessary for English Language Learners?
1) Differentiation for ELL Students Meets Diverse Learning Needs
As a teacher you already know that it is necessary to meet the unique learning styles and needs of your students. Students who come from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds need this even more.
Differentiated instruction for ELL students is how you tailor instruction to meet the various needs of your students which creates equity in the classroom.
Your ELL students are no different, and they need this as well.
Learn more about differentiation in one of these blog posts, “Tales of : Why is Differentiation in the Classroom Important?”, or “10 Powerful Ways to Implement Differentiation in Classroom”
2) Enhancing the Engagement of ELL (and all) Students through Differentiation
Differentiated instruction for ELL students makes learning relevant and accessible keeping students engaged. By incorporating the backgrounds and experiences of ELL students in the lesson, they are more likely to become active participants, and ,perhaps, even resources for their peers.
3) Address the Language Barriers of ELL Students through Differentiation
In her 2001 book, *How to Differentiate Instruction in Mixed-Ability Classrooms*, Carol Tomlinson identified that within the principles of differentiated instruction are multiple ways to present content that helps ELL students. These methods help students to overcome language barriers and support their understanding of complex concepts.
4) Differentiation Provides Personalized Learning Approaches Supports ELL Students
Differentiated instruction for ELL students means to tailor lessons to the needs of the individual learner, including their strengths and interests to create a more meaningful experience for them.
5) Create Tiered Assignments and Flexible Groupings as Part of Differentiation and to Support ELL (and all) Students
By providing tasks at different levels of difficulty and grouping students flexibly according to their current skill levels and learning needs the material will then be differentiated instruction for ELL students
What are the Needs of English Language Learners
1) Understanding Cultural Backgrounds as a part of Differentiation for ELLs
By acknowledging and respecting the cultural backgrounds of ELL students, teachers create
a safer, more inclusive and supportive classroom environment for all students.
2) Emphasize SEL
Help ELL, and all, students to manage their emotions, set goals, and establish positive relationships by integrating SEL instruction into your day. This will support their ability to develop both personally and academically.
3) Differentiation Provides Language Acquisition Support for ELL (and all) Students
Use strategies like language scaffolding and interactive learning to support ELL students. For example:
1) Scaffolded Instruction – break learning down into manageable chunks and provide support structures like visual aids, graphic organizers and step-by-step instruction.
2) Language rich environment – having labeled items available to see, word walls, bilingual books. Also, opportunities for students to talk, listen, read and write in English as often as possible. Even if, at the beginning, some of the writing just involves copying notes from the board.
3) Visual and Contextual Supports – Offer your students: charts, diagrams and videos. Each of these can help your ELL students understand complex concepts. Think real-life objects too. Demonstrations and body language can also support comprehension.
4) Interactive activities – Group projects, think-pair-share and other cooperative learning activities provide students with an opportunity to practice speaking and listening in a simple, gentle way. In my class they played a lot of games, participated in small group work together, and we did a lot of Readers’ Theater.
5) Explicit Vocabulary Instruction – Directly teaching vocabulary is key for many students, and ELL students are amongst them. Pre-teach words prior to reading a text, maybe using word maps to explore definitions, synonyms and usage, and revisiting vocabulary during the lessons.
6) Differentiation in Assessments – Please take their language difference into consideration when assessing your ESL students. Allowing options like visual projects, and simplified (even visual) instructions minimizes language barriers. Rubrics that separate content understanding from language ability will also help to show a clearer picture of their understanding.
7) Cultural Relevance and Sensitivity – by incorporating culturally relevant materials and showing sensitivity to students’ backgrounds builds a sense o inclusion and motivates ELL students to engage the content more deeply.
Moreover, there may be cultural differences in learning and communication styles and preferences that you may need to be aware of.
Even students who are native English speakers can experience a culture shift between one school and another. Adapting to the new environment takes time and effort. How much more is this true for a child from another culture altogether?
Why Do Differentiated Instruction for ELL Students?
When differentiated instruction for ELL students is integrated into the classroom, all students are profoundly impacted. Your students become more engaged, and their confidence grows.
By catering to the specific needs of your students through methods like ongoing SEL instruction and practice, building a strong classroom community, and setting clear expectations, educators are able to achieve higher academic outcomes. A sense of belonging for all students occurs.
The positive reinforcement which is a part of these strategies also motivates both students and teachers. This creates a ripple effect of success and satisfaction.
Differentiated instruction for ELL students is, truthfully, not significantly different than differentiated instruction for ALL students. The power of differentiated instruction is, and always has been, how we, as teachers, learn what helps one student can help another student that we don’t even know needs it.
Differentiated instruction for ELL students is just another planning choice that you take one step at a time. You’ve got this!!
How to include Social Emotional Learning Activities All Day Long
Tales of : Why is Differentiation in the Classroom Important?
