American English Dan

Welcome to American English Dan! My name is Daniel Conklin and this blog is focused on presenting and reviewing resources for teaching and learning the English language.  The idea is to build a repository of ideas that I have found helpful and would like to share with my professional colleagues and students.  Some of the teaching resources may be originated by me, since I am a Teacher of English as an Additional Language (TEAL), and I intend to post and link to great resources I find along the way. I will also present tips for Learners of English as a New/Additional Language (ENLs or EALs).  We will probably also discuss these acronyms! This blog is partially the result of a requirement for the program for the M.Ed. in Teaching English Learners at American College of Education   . I am not getting financial remuneration for any part of it.

 The process of choosing good teaching materials for teaching English Language Learners needs to be student-centered.  That may seem obvious, but there is a lot of pressure to just choose Common Core content and drill it home.  Yes, we need to make sure they get the content, but that is probably going to require something beyond repetition and rote memory.  It needs to be relevant to them and delivered in a manner they can absorb.  We, the teachers,  need to find alternative  ways to deliver the content that builds on the English Language Learner's background knowledge. Sometimes. when we hear the words background knowledge , our minds go waaaaayyyy back to the student's cultural and linguistic roots.  Yes, those are important things to build on, but sometimes the background knowledge is just what you have helped the students acquire in the last few days or weeks in your class ( Fisher, Ross & Grant, 2010) .   Pay attention to their...