What We Know about Writing Instruction for Emergent Bilinguals
- Age and prior knowledge affect ELLs’ writing ability.
- The writing development process for ELLs is similar to the process for proficient English speakers.
- ELLs’ ability to express themselves in written English is highly dependent on their level of oral English proficiency. When ELL's are able to read proficiently they are able to write proficiently. This means that reading and writing are closely connected for ELLs and oral language supports written language.
- Oral language skills in English have a big impact on text-level writing skills but not on word-level writing skills.
When emergent bilinguals had previous literacy instruction in their home language, they are more prominent to transfer their knowledge from their native language to their second language such as English, this is called cross-language transfer. With cross-language transfer, students can also struggle with translated writing. This is when an ELL student is developing their ideas in their native language and then try to translate them into English. This makes their writing feel unstructured because it is full of inaccurate verb tenses and undeveloped sentences. And some students may not have been exposed to any literacy instruction in their native language. With these challenges, writing instruction needs to be thoughtfully planned out, explicit, and students need the chance to practice what they are being taught across genres. (Chambers, Schuldt. 2019)
Activities for Writing Instruction
- Modeled Writing: this is when the teacher is modeling how to do their writing, such as writing verbs into sentences. The teacher usually models writing on a white board so students are able to see writing demonstrated and are introduced to how their own writing should look like. Teachers also talk about their writing while they are writing, such as ”When I want to talk about more than one plant, I add–s, to make it plural, when I’m talking about two or more plants. Sometimes there are words (like “bushes”) where I add –es when I’m talking about more than one.”
- Shared Writing: during this time, teachers are conducting a "think aloud". The whole class of students are sharing their ideas for writing and the teacher is talking with students on which ones are more accurate that should be in their writing. Everyone is inputting their ideas and the teacher is writing on the board or a visual device.
- Guided Writing: this is when the teacher is combing through the areas where students need extra support. During the mini lesson, the teacher is providing a review for students so they can strengthen those areas that need to be worked on. When students are independently working on their work after the review, the teacher will observe and aid those that need extra scaffolds for their wiring process.
- Independent Writing: this is when students are able to independently write and demonstrate their ideas in their writing.
Writing Supports
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Sources:
Chambers Schuldt, L. (2019). Teaching Writing. PowerPoint Slides
Colombo, Michaela. Teaching English Language Learners: 43 Strategies for Successful K-8 Classrooms. [BryteWave]. Retrieved from https://shelf.brytewave.com/#/books/9781506320137/
Wright, Wayne E. Foundations for Teaching English Language Learners: Research, Theory, Policy, and Practice. Philadelphia: Caslon, 2015. Print
Image/Video Sources:
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8lyzvrvLeS4/T299J6hxatI/AAAAAAAACik/XNCweghD5WU/s1600/IMG_2025.jpg
Chambers Schuldt, L. (2019). Teaching Writing. PowerPoint Slides
Colombo, Michaela. Teaching English Language Learners: 43 Strategies for Successful K-8 Classrooms. [BryteWave]. Retrieved from https://shelf.brytewave.com/#/books/9781506320137/
Wright, Wayne E. Foundations for Teaching English Language Learners: Research, Theory, Policy, and Practice. Philadelphia: Caslon, 2015. Print
Image/Video Sources:
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8lyzvrvLeS4/T299J6hxatI/AAAAAAAACik/XNCweghD5WU/s1600/IMG_2025.jpg