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Using Digital Graphic Organizers in Distance Learning

Graphic organizers are such an important, versatile support for growing readers and writers. They break down reading and writing skills in a visual way to make each skill clear, and therefore easier to understand and apply.

In distance learning, more than ever, students need supports that can work for them in completing reading and writing tasks independently.

With digital graphic organizers on Google Slides, you can assign students an entire pack of organizers at once to refer to throughout the year, or you can assign students one graphic organizer at a time.

In the elementary reading classroom, or ELA classroom, I describe below how they can be used for Writing (Prewriting, Revising & Editing) and Reading (Nonfiction, Fiction, Reading Strategies, and Genres).

DIGITAL WRITING GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS:

Just getting started with a piece of writing, and organizing ideas, can be overwhelming for growing writers. Graphic organizers that break down exactly what students need to do helps students get off to a successful start.

Students can benefit from graphic organizers not only in prewriting, but also in editing and revising their writing.

Writing strategies like creating a strong hook, using strong word choice, exploding a moment are so important in revising writing to be the best that it can be. Graphic organizers make these difficult strategies more accessible to students when writing independently.

They are also helpful in a teacher conference, or peer editing. The teacher or partner can fill in forms to make it clear to the writer exactly what they need to work on.

DIGITAL READING GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS:

Independent reading response in distance learning can be made so much easier for students with digital graphic organizers. They are so helpful in supporting students of multiple reading levels with practicing the same reading skills.

Graphic organizers are so versatile in that they work for addressing tons of reading skills, whether you are working on fiction specific skills, nonfiction skills, elements of genres, or reading comprehension strategies with any text.

Personally, I like breaking down reading graphic organizers into 4 categories – Reading Comprehension Strategies, Fiction Skills, Nonfiction Skills, and Genres.

1. Reading Comprehension Strategies:

These are graphic organizers that can be used with ANY book, nonfiction or fiction. They focus on strategies good readers use to monitor their comprehension and understand the text. Some strategies include making predictions, visualizing, using background knowledge, asking questions, determining importance, etc.

2. Fiction Skills:

These digital fiction graphic organizers target skills specific to reading literature. Some fiction skills include identifying story elements, analyzing character, retelling, character point of view, types of conflict, etc.

3. Nonfiction Skills:

Breaking down nonfiction skills with graphic organizers is such a great way to support students in navigating and comprehending nonfiction. They are so helpful for independent reading or distance learning, since they break down each skill with visuals.

4. Genres:

Understanding genre is so important in helping students to make connections, and ultimately comprehend, a new book of the same genre. It helps students learn who they are as readers, and put a label to the types of books they tend to enjoy.

Digital genre graphic organizers are so helpful in breaking down elements of different genres for students. Read more about ways to teach genres in this blog post.

Check out the Digital Reading Organizers packs in my TpT Shop! All graphic organizers are available as digital only, paper only, or a bundle of both paper and digital organizers.

Low Prep Halloween Activities and Crafts for Elementary Students

by Cass

Halloween is such an exciting time for kids! When Halloween is constantly on your students’ brains, it is so helpful to have meaningful, low prep activities for them to put this energy into.

Halloween crafts and activities are the perfect creative outlet for students. Below are a bunch of digital and printable activities that I include in my $5 Halloween Activities Pack, plus a freebie!

HALLOWEEN GLYPHS (PAPER AND DIGITAL):

Students love glyphs! They are a no prep, fun way for students to get creative while learning about each other. They also make a great Halloween bulletin board or wall display.

Included in this pack are 2 printable glyphs and 1 digital Monster Glyph.

A printable or digital bar graph is a fun way to tie in some math as students char their answers as a class!

HALLOWEEN WRITING ORGANIZERS:

Halloween writing graphic organizers are great to use as is, or to use as prewriting for writing about Halloween. Some of the topics included are Halloween Favorites, My Perfect Halloween Night, My Halloween Movie Reel, and All About My Halloween Night.

WITCH’S BREW RECIPE:

Students create the ingredients and recipe to make their very own witch’s brew! This writing activity really lets your students’ creative shine. It is so fun to see what students come up with!

For this activity, I do think it’s helpful to activate background knowledge. You can either come up with examples of some ingredients as a class, listen to Witches’ Brew by Hap & Martha Palmer, or read a book that includes examples of what could go into a witch’s brew, such as the book I am a Witch’s Cat.

HALLOWEEN CANDY CORN CRAFT:

This free, low prep Halloween craft is a great, easy way to celebrate Halloween in the classroom. It is a hands-on way to get students writing about their Halloween favorite!

INDEPENDENT ACTIVITIES:

Having activities students can do completely independently is perfect for early finishers or centers. Included in this pack are also Halloween Word Searches, Halloween Making Words and a Halloween Break the Code.

Click the cover below to be directed to the Halloween Activities in my TpT Shop!

Interested in Fall Activities as well? Read about Low Prep Fall Activities for Elementary Students!

Low Prep Fall Activities and Crafts for Elementary Students

by Cass

Fall is hands down my favorite season for setting up crafts and activities in the elementary classroom! Pumpkins, apples, changing leaves, and holidays like Halloween and Thanksgiving provide so many ways to bring fall vibes into the classroom.

I love having different formats and options of crafts and activities for students to choose from. Below are a bunch of digital and printable activities that I include in my Fall Activities Pack (which is a total steal at only $5), and a freebie!

Because of the huge number of activities included, it can work great for centers. Centers are always fun and motivating for students since they get to choose what activity they complete.

It can also work to assign some resources in a printable format and some in a digital format to switch things up.

PRINTABLE AND DIGITAL FALL GLYPHS:

Students love glyphs! They are a no prep, fun way for students to get creative while learning about each other. They also make a great fall bulletin board or wall display.

Included in this pack are 2 printable glyphs and 1 digital cornucopia glyph.

FALL GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS:

Fall themed writing graphic organizers are great to use as is, or to use as prewriting for writing about fall. Some of the topics included are Fall Favorites, Fall Senses, “When I Think of Fall…”.

This “FALLing memories” has students write and illustrate 2 or 4 memories they have from either the current or previous falls. It is also included in a digital format.

FALL INTERACTIVE GRAPHIC ORGANIZER:

This Fall Senses Craft comes in a 1-page option or 2-page interactive cut, fold, and glue option. Students write about how they use their five senses in fall on a leaf. It is also included as a Google Slides™ organizer.

FALL WRITING JOURNAL:

With fall’s arrival comes lots of excitement in your growing writers. This is a great way to motivate them with prompts that are applicable to what is currently happening around them.

These writing prompts come in different formats, but my favorite is the cut and paste journal option.

Student choice is another way to encourage them to write, so with this activity students get to pick which prompt they want to use to guide their writing that day.

FALL VOCABULARY:

These free fall vocabulary cards are perfect for a fall writing center. It is also available digitally as a fall vocabulary poster.

These digital and printable word searches are a fun way to interact with the fall vocabulary words as well. The printable version is available for free here.

Click on the covers below to check out some of my Fall Activity Packs:

Looking ahead? Read about No Prep Winter Activities for the Elementary Classroom.

How to Print a Large Poster

by Cass

Knowing how to print a large poster from your own home printer or school printer is so useful. Sending out a poster to be printed is quite costly, so printing on 4 standard 8.5” by 11” pages from your own printer is the way to go.

This will look different depending on the program you are using and the version you are using. Here is an example for how you can print a large poster by printing on four 8.5” by 11” pages using Adobe Acrobat.

1. SELECT POSTER PRINT SETTINGS:

After selecting “Print”, you will select “Poster.” Change the “tile scale” to zoom the percentage you would like to zoom in (shown below).

I prefer to print posters on card stock, but standard paper works just fine for printing posters too.

2. CUT OFF BORDERS:

After printing, you will need to cut off the inner borders where the pages will be taped or glued together. Adobe Acrobat does have an option to include cut marks if you select the box, but I personally don’t use them.

Below, you can see how I cut off some sides with extra white border, and leave some sides with the extra border. Then, you can use the extra border as an anchor to glue or tape the pages with cut edges.

3. PUT THE POSTER’S PAGES TOGETHER:

Then, tape or glue the 4 pages of your poster together.

4. LAMINATE YOUR POSTER (OPTIONAL):

You can laminate your anchor charts or posters to protect for future use.

Looking to use your posters efficiently? Read this blog post on 6 ways to use the same poster.

The posters used in the pictures above come from my Reading Posters and Writing Posters sets found in my TpT shop!

Teaching Efficiently: Ways to Use the Same Poster

by Cass

It is so helpful to have reading and writing anchor charts or posters available for students in multiple formats. This way, students have their posters to refer to at home or in different classroom settings besides just the classroom.

A few months into the school year, it can be easy to have posters taking over your walls. Although it is certainly helpful for students to have access to visuals on the wall, they have the opposite effect when they become overcrowded and too busy. When students have access to their own posters, it allows you to clear off posters from the wall after you have worked on a skill.

Below are some other ways you can use the same poster:

1. ORGANIZE POSTERS ON A KEY RING:

Organizing posters on a key ring is a great way for students to easily access tons of reference posters. They can remove or add posters to their key ring as needed. You can have them organized in different key rings by topic (i.e. reading strategies, vocabulary, etc.) or by skills they have worked on and skills they are/will work on.

On the key ring above, I printed this set of posters at 4/page under print settings. You could of course print them larger or smaller and still use the key ring though.

2. MAKE DIVIDERS:

If you are working on a specific reading or writing skill, you could have students create dividers using their posters as the cover of that section.

They can glue their poster right onto a 3-ring binder page tabs or onto a page with a sticky note in their binder. Then, students can reference their poster as they fill in targeted graphic organizers or writing on the following pages.

3. DISPLAY AS A FOCUS NEXT TO A WORD WALL:

I like to have a word wall of terms with basic, brief, student-friendly definitions up for a topic all year long. The smaller cards don’t take up as much wall space. Then, next to the word wall cards I display a full-page, more detailed poster zooming in on the skill we are working on.

4. PRINT POSTERS SMALLER FOR INTERACTIVE NOTEBOOKS:

You can print posters at a smaller percent or even 2/page to make smaller posters that fit more easily into a composition notebook.

5. PRINT AS A LARGE POSTER:
If you are looking to print a full-page anchor chart even larger, check out this blog post on how to print a large poster using four 8.5” by 11” pieces of paper.

6. PROVIDE POSTERS DIGITALLY:

Providing reading and writing posters in a format like Google Slides™ is a sure way to keep posters intact and organized. It also ensures students will pretty much always have access to them, whether they are at home or in school.

The posters used in the pictures above come from my Reading Posters and Writing Posters sets!

Teaching Students to Make Connections

by Cass

Teaching and practicing reading strategies with students encourages active reading and critical thinking. When students successfully use reading strategies while reading, they are more engaged, and therefore better comprehend what they are reading.

Making connections is one of the most important reading strategies to teach and practice often with students. Teaching students to make connections allows them to activate prior knowledge. This brings real world examples and their own experiences to the text in front of them.

WHAT ARE THE TYPES OF CONNECTIONS?

The three types of connections good readers make are:

Text to Self Connections

Text to Text Connections

Text to World Connections

Each connection type is practiced separately before students can independently make all three types of connections.

HOW TO TEACH STUDENTS TO MAKE CONNECTIONS:

Text to Self Connections:

Because all students come with their own opinions and experiences, the first connection to work on with students is text to self connections. It is important to choose books that you know students will be able to connect with in some way.

Students will start with basic, vague connections and it is our job to push their thinking deeper to create more meaningful connections. For growing readers, it can be helpful to provide sentence stems as a support, such as:

“I felt the same way as this character when…”
“This part of the story reminds me of the time I…”
“This same thing happened to me when…”

Text to Text Connections:

Following text to self connections are text to text connections. When teachers begin to practice text to text connections, it is important to choose books that have at least a few obvious connections. These could be between text features, character traits, setting, theme, author’s craft, text features, etc. For growing readers, it can be helpful to provide sentence stems as a support, such as:

“The character in this story is similar to the character in…”
“This problem is just like what happened in…”
“The way this author writes reminds me of the writing in…”

Text to World Connections:

The final, and most difficult, connections to teach are text to world connections, especially with young learners. It is difficult for them to step out of their own experiences and branch out to make connections to the larger world.

Choose books around topics in the world they do have some experience with, such as recycling, community helpers, weather, animals, famous historical figures, etc. Again, use helpful sentence stems, such as:

“I know about this, because…”
“This is like something I heard on the news when…”
“This part relates to the world around me, because…”

WAYS TO PRACTICE MAKING CONNECTIONS WITH STUDENTS:

Below are fun, hands on activities to reach all of your learners in becoming experts at making connections while reading:

PAPER CHAIN CONNECTIONS:

This lesson works when all students are making connections to the same book. Somewhere in the classroom put posters or anchor charts up for each type of connection with a clip or hook underneath each to hold the paper chain. As students make connections, they write them down on rectangular paper cut-outs to attach to the appropriate paper chain.

It helps to give 3 color coordinated rectangular pieces of paper (i.e. blue for text to self, yellow for text to text, etc.). The paper chains all hang down, reaching the book that the connections came from.

MAKING CONNECTIONS CRAFTS:

Reading crafts are a way to reach all of the hands on, visual learners in your classroom when teaching students to make connections. These crafts come with an option for students to work on just one connection type at a time (great for when you are introducing each connection one at a time), as well as an option for ongoing practice on all three types of connection at once.

CONNECT & STICK IT

The teacher creates space for each connection type on either 3 blank anchor charts hung up on the classroom wall, or 3 large shapes made on the white board. Students are given at least 3 sticky notes to come up with each type of connection while they are reading. After reading, students place their connection where it belongs.

MAKING CONNECTIONS GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS:

Graphic organizers are extremely useful in breaking down difficult tasks for students in a concrete, visual way. You can begin by using graphic organizers that focus on just one skill at a time and then move onto graphic organizers that focus on all three at once. They are so helpful in teaching students to make connections independently.

MAKING CONNECTIONS BOOKMARKS:

Beyond having anchor charts or posters on the wall, giving students bookmarks to use as a constant reference (in school and at home) can be a more personal way for them to continually see what the strategy is and how good readers use it. These bookmarks include each connection type one by one for students to use as they are being introduced, and then all three connection types for students to use when they are comfortable with them all.

Click here to read more about how to teach reading strategies in your classroom.

DIGITAL ELL NEWCOMERS VOCABULARY FOR TEACHING ESL

by Cass

Whether you’re trying to eliminate tons of prep time, save paper, or support ELL students in distance learning, using digital vocabulary units can be extremely helpful activities for ELL newcomers. These digital units target reading, writing, and listening (audio) domains.

Included are 20 Thematic Vocabulary Units that cover important beginning vocabulary that are the building blocks for teaching English:

Tons of activities in each unit increase in difficulty from interactive flashcards with audio to actually writing sentences with the targeted vocabulary words.

1. POSTER:

Each poster introduces 9-22 words with visuals and audio for each unit. Introducing thematic vocabulary helps ELLs make connections between words, rather than teaching random vocabulary words at one time.

2. INTERACTIVE FLASHCARDS:

Students lift a picture to see AND hear the word for it underneath. They cover and uncover the word to practice beginning ESL vocabulary words as needed.

3. BEGINNING ESL DIGITAL PRACTICE PAGES:

These 5 pages (per unit) provide students supports to build up from simple matching to writing with the vocabulary words. They are great for independent practice.

DIGITAL PRACTICE PAGE #1 – MATCH UP:
Students drag and drop numbers to match vocabulary words to their pictures.

DIGITAL PRACTICE PAGE #2 – DRAG AND DROP:
Students drag and drop the picture that belongs under each word.

DIGITAL PRACTICE PAGE #3 – COLOR CODING:
Students follow the color and shapes chart at the top to drag a shape around a matching vocabulary word.

DIGITAL PRACTICE PAGE #4 – TYPE IT OUT:
Students practice typing each vocabulary word.

DIGITAL PRACTICE PAGE #5 – LET’S WRITE:
Students write basic sentences for each word. They follow an example that includes the sentence structure needed for their writing.

4. INTERACTIVE MINI READER:

These are simple books with repetitive sentence starters. Students drag and drop pictures or phrases into their mini reader. Students can re-read their books to build English fluency.

5. LISTENING COMPREHENSION CHECK:

Students play the audio for a word and then drag drop the matching picture next to its audio.

6. PHOTOGRAPH FREE-WRITES:

(3 or 4 per unit) Students have space to write vocabulary as they brainstorm for their free- writing. Then, they write about the photograph.

To the left of each photograph free-write is a chart with questions to think about, and sentence starters for each question. These are great for boosting writing confidence for this activity. However, you can feel free to delete them from some or all of the free- writes for more of a challenge.

7. WORD SEARCH:

Students find the words for pictures based on the picture only. Having the picture only requires them to try to remember how it is spelled.

Students use the provided ovals to stretch out as needed in order to circle the word for each picture.

ELL NEWCOMER DIGITAL PICTURE DICTIONARY:

A digital picture dictionary is also included for students to have access to all of the thematic vocabulary in one clear, organized space.

These Digital Beginning ESL Vocabulary Units for ELL Newcomers can be found in my TpT shop individually or in a 50% off bundle!

They can also be purchased with a printable version that includes even more beginning ESL vocabulary activities in each thematic unit.

TEACHING ESL DISTANCE LEARNING: WAYS TO DIFFERENTIATE FOR YOUR ELLS VIRTUALLY

by Cass

Whether you are virtually teaching, or teaching ESL in distance learning, it is important to differentiate for ELLs just as you would in the classroom setting.

Without the face to face interaction of an ELL student, teacher, and their classmates, learning English in authentic ways can be much more challenging. It is important that we keep this in mind in our expectations for where ELLs should be at in their English acquisition throughout the school year.

Getting creative with ELL supports and modifications is key in supporting their English acquisition in virtual teaching. Below are some ways we can differentiate and make information accessible to ELLs:

1. PROVIDE LOWER LEVEL READING MATERIAL:

If you are reading text-heavy passages with your students on a topic, give your ELLs access to reading material on the same content information at a lower reading level. These are some of my favorite websites to look for nonfiction passages with great visuals for ELLs (I am not affiliated with any of these websites):

ReadWorks: This is a HUGE collection of nonfiction and fiction reading passages, including a collection specifically for ELLs. There is a search option to find articles on tons of topics that you could be studying in class, and you can search by Lexile or standard. Students can play audio that reads the article aloud to them. Highlighted words can be clicked on for a student friendly definition in English, as well as a Spanish or Chinese translation for the word. Students will need to sign up with an e-mail address in order to access the free reading passages.
National Geographic Kids: Tons of great free videos and nonfiction reading passages for kids that are very high interest with beautiful visuals. They are especially great for researching specific animals.
Highlights Kids: Fiction stories and short nonfiction texts with visuals. The website is geared to younger kids and could be appropriate for ELLs up to around 6^th grade.
Scholastic News: If you scroll past the paid magazine subscription, there are free articles that change periodically. These are great because they have helpful visuals and nonfiction text features, as well as a text-to-speech option. You can even select reading level “on level” or “lower level” as an added level of differentiation. There is also an option to “open magazine view” in Spanish or English.
Scholastic Student Activities: Search by grade level and resource type (games, listen and read, etc.) to see different topics currently available for kids. The “Listen and Read” passages are great, because they are read aloud and presented as a book displaying a small amount of text with a visual on each page.
CommonLit: Reading passages for 3^rd-12^th grade. You can search by grade level, Lexile, genre and standards. They also have reading passages available in Spanish. Many of the passages can be read without a login, but to access the read aloud or translation features you do need to create a login with an e-mail address.
Smithsonian Kids: Nonfiction texts and games on tons of topics in history, social studies, and current events.
DOGO News: These are high interest, current events articles that would be helpful for middle level to advanced ELLs. Students can click on vocabulary words to see their meanings. In the paid version they can have the articles translated to Spanish or read aloud to them.
Newsela: These articles cover a wide range of topics including sports, arts, science, economics, etc. The passages can be read aloud, and there’s a feature where you can change the Lexile on a specific article to make the same content more accessible to lower level readers. Although they do offer some articles without a login, you need to create a free login to access all of the articles with your e-mail address.

2. PREVIEW INFORMATION AND VOCABULARY:

Previewing upcoming information with students and families does require planning ahead, but it is a great way to make lessons accessible for ELLs. This is especially true in a virtual teaching setting.

If you know you are going to be working on a specific thematic unit or topic in the upcoming days, you can give your students vocabulary to preview or lower level texts to read ahead of time. This way, when it comes time to do the work with the rest of the class, they are that much more prepared.

3. GIVE ACCESS TO ONLINE SUPPORTS:
These are some great tools for students to use in order to access the same material as their classmates.

Wiktionary: This is a “basic English” searchable dictionary. Many words include a visual or audio, so when students search for a word they can click “play” to hear it aloud.
Simple English Wikipedia: This is a “basic English” version of Wikipedia. Even in this version, the pages can be text heavy so it is more appropriate for middle level to advanced ELLs.
Google Translate: Translate literally any word into pretty much any language. It is really important to teach students not to rely on this tool too much for their writing assignments though – especially in a virtual learning setting where that could more easily happen.
Read & Write: This is a helpful software toolbar with tons of literacy supports for students to use with any online text on any device. The toolbar includes features like translation, text-to-speech, picture dictionary, highlighting, and a dictionary.

4. UTILIZE ELL SUPPORT STAFF:

Figuring out ways to support ELLs virtually can be very overwhelming. Involving other teachers that specialize in specific supports for ELLs is key. Lynn from LMB Literacy, an ELA teacher with ELL students, adds her ESL teacher to her Google Classroom to help modify assignments. The ELL teacher further instructs students that need extra help, just like in the classroom.

5. AUDIO SUPPORTS IN GOOGLE SLIDES:

You can create an audio file of yourself introducing a topic, giving verbal directions, etc. Then, insert into any Google Slides activities you assign to ELLs. It does need to be inserted as a .wav or .mp3 file type.

6. SCREEN RECORDINGS:

Similar to a screen shot, a screen recording is a helpful visual support for all students, including ELLs. Recording your own screen showing how to do a task is a great way to show exactly what students need to do to complete a task. You can insert this screen recording as a video to any Google Slides task.

7. CREATE A UNIQUE ELL GOOGLE CLASSROOM:

Creating an extra Google Classroom just for your ELLs is an effective way to organize all ELL supports and modified assignments into one place (idea from LMB Literacy).

8. PROVIDE SUPPORTS FOR WRITING:

Use graphic organizers to support students in any writing task or response to reading. Graphic organizers break down skills into more manageable parts. This can make a response to reading, or a writing task, much more accessible to your ELLs.
Need more resources for virtual teaching with ELLs? Check out my TpT shop for ESL Resources, Differentiated Reading Passages, and Digital/Printable Graphic Organizers!

Back to School Activity: Digital All About Me Book

by Cass

Whether you’re starting out the year teaching in the classroom, virtually, or in a hybrid model, getting to know your new students may look different this year. Trying to plan with so many uncertainties is difficult, so having resources that can be presented to students in many ways will be key for feeling prepared.

No matter what the start to your school year looks like, an All About Me Book is a great way to learn about your new students on a personal level, even if you aren’t able to meet with them face to face.Since this back to school All About Me Book comes printable or in Google Slides™, you can use any or all of the pages/slides included:
– This is Me (Portrait)
– More About Me (Traits)
– Favorites
– Hobbies
– My Family
– When I Grow Up
– Home
– School
– School Favorites
– Life Snapshots
– Summer Vacation
– My Goals
– What I Want to Learn
– Free Write

Some teachers also report success with using this as a first week of school writing activity to assess students Google Classroom knowledge in a non-threatening way.

Having multiple formats allows you to use either just the paper or digital version, or provide students with both options.

A separate link is also included for 2 slides for new ELL or immigrant students. Of course you can have all students fill them out, but they are especially helpful for welcoming your new ELLs.

This Digital and Printable All About Me Book can be found in my TpT shop! The digital and paper can also be purchased separately if you only need one option.

10 Steps to Build Reading Comprehension in ELLs: Part 2

by Cass

The first part of this blog post focused on how to set your English Language Learners (ELLs) up for success BEFORE reading. In Steps 1-5, we discussed previewing vocabulary, building background knowledge and providing helpful visuals. Now, we are ready to dig into how to support students during reading and after, in their response to reading.

6. SUPPORT ELLS IN READING:
After previewing vocabulary, providing visuals, and building background knowledge, ELLs need support during the act of reading, especially with a text above their reading level.

Choral reading, which is having students read aloud at the same time, is a great way to support ELLs and build their reading fluency. It can be done as a whole class or in a small group. This is a very unintimidating way for beginning ELLs to practice reading aloud. It also offers each student the most opportunities for reading aloud as opposed to taking turns or even partner reading.

Give your ELLs as many exposures to the text as possible. This could be first listening to the teacher model fluent reading, then choral reading, partner reading, silent reading, etc. With each read, your students will build their fluency, gain confidence in their ability, and improve their understanding of the vocabulary and topic presented. You can also set a different purpose for each read, like in close reading. There are many variations of how to implement close reading, but below is an example of what a fiction close read could look like for your ELLs:
Taking any opportunity to have ELLs practice their oral language skills is important. So, after giving them time to organize their thoughts in writing, students share their thoughts with a partner or small group.

Students can record information in a notebook, graphic organizer, or other reading response such as this close reading cap craft below.

7. TEACH READING COMPREHENSION STRATEGIES:
Modeling and practicing reading comprehension strategies is beneficial to all students in building strong, independent readers. Having visuals displayed with student-friendly definitions and clear pictures is key for introducing and reinforcing reading strategies. I always display a reading strategy word wall of all the strategies we use, in order to refer to them regularly. I also use a larger, more detailed poster as we dive into a specific strategy.

I like to start with modeling one strategy at a time through think-alouds, then whole group practice, and ultimately independent practice. I will stick with that strategy until I feel students really understand it before moving on to the next. The goal is for students to eventually use multiple strategies at the same time in their own independent reading. Using graphic organizers, reading crafts, and other visuals that break down each strategy can really make them “stick” for ELLs and all students.

8. FOSTER DISCUSSION:
As the teacher, it is important to pose thoughtful questions, both literal and inferential, to your ELLs. This class discussion is critical in the comprehension of your ELLs. It helps to clarify any misconceptions they may have had from the text.

As this discussion can sometimes be information overload for your ELLs struggling with listening comprehension, it can also be helpful to keep track of information from the class discussion in a visual way. This could be done by the teacher on a white board/anchor chart or by the students in their own individual record or graphic organizers.

9. PROVIDE MULTIPLE WAYS FOR STUDENTS TO SHOW UNDERSTANDING:
When considering comprehension activities for your ELLs, remember that there are 4 areas of language acquisition ELLs always need to be working on – Speaking, listening, writing and reading.

Since we have already covered listening and reading, that leaves 2 areas of output ELLs can use for showing comprehension – writing or speaking. It’s important to provide plenty of ways for students to practice these areas. This allows them to show their language strengths through some activities, but also improve on the areas they struggle with in other activities. Some ways students can show their comprehension is through:

class discussions,
oral presentations (given one on one or to a small group for beginners),
meeting with the teacher,
creating a poster,
a PowerPoint presentation,
a graphic organizer,
short answers,
a reading response craft,
a piece of writing, and so on.

10. CONTINUE TO BUILD ON NEW KNOWLEGDE:
As with all students, research has shown that ELLs need multiple exposure to vocabulary and information for it to really sink into their long-term memory. To make information on a topic stick, reading texts that can build on information they have just read in one lesson provides a great way to reiterate what was already learned.

For example, if I read a text on sea turtles, I could then choose a fiction or nonfiction texts around oceans or ocean animals to expose ELLs to similar vocabulary and ideas. This allows them to build on their background knowledge of a topic and begin to make deeper connections. This can be much more effective than consistently choosing topics that are all over the place from one day to the next, especially with ELLs.

If you are interested in any of the reading resource pictured above, click on the resource covers below for a closer look!