Discussion Questions

Nekeisha is a struggling student. Her spelling is way below level and as such many of her other subject areas are suffering. Her writing and reading are not up to level as to her speech. She has a grasp on the main idea of English but she is yet to develop and though patters. She is yet to develop her thoughts in to a comprehensible manner.
1.In which developmental stage of English acquisition is Nekeisha?
2.Has Nekeisha shown any progress related to her CALP as opposed to her BICS? If so, how?
3.Would Nekeisha’s situation benefit from increased parental and/or faculty involvement and encouragement?
4.What approach to English reading instruction would be most beneficial to Nekeisha?
5.If Nekeisha were to become close friends with a classmate, would her situation improve?
6.How does Nekeisha’s academic performance compare to that of other ESOL students at her level of English acquisition?

Solutions:
>Recommend to parents and student to label things around the house. This will help connect word sound to objects as well as develop vocabulary. Words should be written in Spanish and English. This would also help increase the father's language acquisition as well as benefit the relationship between father and child as they both learn a new language.

>In order to increase parent involvement, the teacher can send home newsletters, individual letters, and announcements in Spanish. This would provide parents with the opportunity to feel involved in Nekeisha's school life as well as open the doors for communication with the teacher.

>Literacy Task: Since Nekeisha struggles with spelling I would like to design a lesson which will focus on word families. A great way to approach this is through the onset and rhyme Easter egg lesson. This is where one half of the egg is labeled with the onset (for example: T, S, P, and C). The other half of the egg is labeled with the rhyme (following along with the previous example: "at"). Then the students can make them on their own with eggs and markers. These eggs become a manipulative tool that can be twisted around to form various words from the same word family. As the student develops an increased fluency we can change the rhyme to a more difficult level such as "each"..."Teach", "Reach", or "Beach" or "ight"..."Tight", "Right", or "Light".