April 2008 — Features
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ELL Spoken Here
Considering the proliferation of online support, there actually may never have been a better time than now to be an ELL teacher, says Austin ISD's Guajardo. In an entry on his blog, Guajardo points up the abundance of materials now available to teachers.
"This is a good time to be a bilingual/ELL educator," he writes. "Bilingual/ELL educators now have access to more instructional tools than ever before. These digital tools include the computer-based programs that we can use to produce and publish things like videos, slide shows, and e-books, as well as the Web 2.0 sites that we can use to collaborate, publish, and reflect on our creations."
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Guajardo, who specializes in the use of digital media with ELL students, has begun a social networking site he calls "Educational Technology for Bilingual/ESL/ELL Educators." As the page's subtitle indicates, its focus is the sharing of ideas about using technology in ELL classrooms. Guajardo believes that in addition to serving as a repository of instructional resources, the web can be used by ELL instructors as simply a place to vent.
"I think that sites like Ning-MySpace/Facebook lookalikes- may be the tool that finally takes us to the tipping point and gets teachers engaged in an online community," he says.
This online exchange of ideas, experiences, and resources doesn't strictly serve teachers, but presents many benefits for ELL students as well, who are also prone to feelings of isolation from the rest of their peer community. Bassoff says that one of her most memorable e-mails came from a middle school student in Illinois.
"She was searching for an answer to why there was a negative perception of ELL students," Bassoff says. "She felt that people in her school believed and perpetuated the belief that being ELL means that you are not as smart as native English speakers. I responded to her that part of our work is dispelling that belief."
Just as Catherine Collier did with the ELL aide, Bassoff let the student know that her struggle was not hers alone. "I urged her to continue working to become an advocate for multilingualism. I told her that I do what I do because I believe, along with many others around the world, that diversity and multilingualism are amazing and powerful concepts. The belief that together we can grow and learn from each other is what keeps me going every day. And the beauty of all of this is that I was able to connect with her from Colorado, through the tool of the internet."
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Neal Starkman is a freelance writer based in Seattle.
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