Teaching Routines Saves Time and Headaches

Sometimes I have noticed in English learning classrooms the lack of classroom management especially in classes where the teacher is there only once or twice a week.  You have so little time that you are in a hurry to get started teaching English.  The problem is that the time you gain by starting right away is wasted by misbehavior and interruptions.  In his post "How to Teach Routines,"...

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Using Eric Carle books to Teach English

One great way to teach Young Learner's English and make it both enriching and more effective is to teach with Children's Literature.  Of course you have to adapt the Literature you use to your ELL students level.  If your students are in 4th of primary or lower, one great author to use is...

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Creating a Safe and Fun Classroom Environment

Teaching English to Adults was new to me, so when I first started I was a bit nervous. I knew that many Spanish Adults although they might have a high level in reading and grammar did not feel as confident in speaking and listening. Therefore I relied on what I knew about teaching children and decided to use some of those same concepts to create a safe and fun classroom environment where they would...

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Improving Response to Literature for YL

When I taught 4th graders they had to prepare for the California State writing test. Since the genre of the test changed every year we had to make sure students where prepared for Narrative and Response to Literature.  The test was in January and I knew that the students wouldn't be ready if...

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Read Write Think-Excellent Young English Learner Site

I am always looking for ways to use online resources to teach English to kids. I discovered the Read Write Think website when I was teaching my 3rd grade English learners.  The first section I started using was their Letter generator because learning the parts of a friendly letter was...

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Raz Kids Online Reading

I've been using Raz Kids with my students for a few years now with nothing but positive results.  I have now started using it with my adult ESL students with great results also.  At first I was not sure if the adults would like the stories because they are targeted to children, but up to...

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Starfall.com

Starfall is a great online free software that allows kids to learn to read in English with phonics in a fun way.  It has great graphics and activities. The animations and sounds are wonderful.  One of the features is the English alphabet where students can learn both the name of the...

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