Aligning WIDA with the Essentials of Inclusive Planning
Liliya Stefoglo, Pam Schaff; Seeing Beyond
This presentation is intended for anyone who is looking to elevate their capacity to understand what inclusive planning entails. Participants will be introduced to and experience the following WIDA components as essentials of inclusive planning and teaching:
– Language Expectations: Key Language Uses and Modes of Communication
– Proficiency Level Descriptors/Dimensions of Language
Establishing Comprehensible Input
Tan Hunyh
One condition for academic success is when instructions are accessible to students. When instruction, text, videos, and other forms of content delivery are inaccessible to MLs, they experience significant barriers. Fortunately, there are strategies and approaches to make instruction more comprehensible. After attending this interactive session, participants will leave with additional methods to establish comprehensible input. Though the examples will mainly be from Grades 5-12, the principles can be applicable to elementary as well.
Leveraging the Bilingual Brain: Fostering Collaborative Inquiry and Engagement in the Classroom
Chelsea Brannock, Alice Jaakola, Daisy Pfeifer; Wahluke School District
Explore strategies to enhance classroom discussions and promote equity for MLs through a growth mindset lens. Practice structures of collaboration that foster critical thinking & academic discourse, creating inclusive environments that elevate the learning experience for MLs and enrich the classroom community. Multilingualism is a superpower with cognitive, academic, & social advantages!
Structuring Academic Output
Tan Hunyh
Social and academic language are equally important. However, MLs often use social language when the task requires academic language. Therefore, it rests upon educators to explicitly teach and structure academic language output if MLs are to communicate proficiently like scientists, historians, musicians, engineers, and business people. By the end of this interactive session, participants will learn approaches so that MLs can effectively communicate in an academic register at the word, sentence, organization, and context level. While the examples come from Grades 5 – 12, these approaches can be modified for the elementary school.
Formative Assessment Practices to Promote Content Learning and Language Development
Yvonne Williams, Amy King, Marisa Silva; WCEPS
State Superintendent Reykdal is asking the Legislature for funds to provide statewide access to dual language education. Learn about the plan and the role of heritage language programs as on-ramps for dual language education. During this interactive session we look forward to hearing your thoughts and recommendations.
Decoding the Code for Language Acquisition
Bibi Bermudez-Stosberg; Savvas
This session will support Multilingual/ EL educators in promoting professional growth and learning experiences that impact practices within today’s classrooms. I will be discussing the importance of enhancing instructional best practices and curriculum that when applied enhances and develops language acquisition. These instructional practices will help promote and enhance bidirectional transfer of students’ knowledge and language skills which will reinforce the value of the student’s voice.
Fostering Student Agency through Project Based Learning: Using Dramatic Role-Play to Support Language Learning
Margit McGuire; Seattle University
Student agency is key to learning, and language learners benefit from hands-on, minds-on explorations into real world challenges. Using drama to create a story about mountain gorillas builds on Zwiers’ research on the academic benefits of teaching students how to have rich conversations about content. Curriculum will be shared.
Language Routines: Instructional Moves to Integrate WIDA Standards into Content
Katelynn Brown, Carrie Sorensen; WABE
This workshop provides experiencing and engaging with Integrating WIDA standards through intentional planning and delivery of language across content areas. The process of planning and delivering language routines within an instructional repertoire allows for students to access and learn the language needed Key Language Use for the purpose of elevating and activate language and learning.
Language Unlocked: Effective Strategies for Comprehensible Input with Multilingual Learners
Cecilia Cardenas, Salvado Murillo; Union Gap School
Discover four essential techniques to enhance comprehensible input in your classroom: effective modeling, the use of visuals, clear output expectations, and utilizing slowed speech and hand signals. This training equips teachers with practical strategies to support multilingual learners, making language learning accessible and engaging for all students.
Just Do it!: Small Changes that Center Students and Families
Karina Vanderbilt, Puget Sound Educational Service District; Jill Klune, Riverview School District/WABE
Improvement is not about perfection, but trying out small changes while centering students and families. In PSESD 121’s Multilingual Learners Network, school teams evaluated where they were and set small goals to strengthen support for MLLs using continuous improvement methods. In this session we will share concrete tools that teachers, specialists and administrators can apply. Participants will try out some of these tools to self-evaluate and identify a small change they can work towards in their context.