Beginning Level Housing Stories for Adult ELLs

Resources for building literacy and reading fluency with beginning level adult learners. These two short stories were originally created for a beginning level class of adult Somali women. The stories are set in a familiar context and are designed to help the readers learn the names of rooms and features in an apartment or house. Additional activities for language extension are included after both of the stories.

Material Type: Reading

Author: Andrea Echelberger

Introduce Yourself Beginning Writing Project

I created a series of lessons that culminate in a student created document of themselves to post in the classroom (mini poster). The lessons focus on student interaction, dictation, grammar, writing, editing, typing and other digital literacy skills. This is more like a project that is broken down into lessons.

Material Type: Activity/Lab, Lesson Plan

Author: Kahtryne Chiqui

When Pigs Fly: A Lesson Plan on Idioms

This lesson plan centers on a fun, interactive activity that allows students to explore and understand common English idioms.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Author: Sarah Sahr

What Does Text Complexity Mean for English Learners and Language Minority Students?

This paper addresses the implications, for ELLs, of the new standard's requirement that students be able to read and understand complex, informationally dense texts. The authors discuss the types of supports that learners need in order to work with complex texts. They also provide a sample of what academic discourse involves, using an excerpt from Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter from Birmingham Jail. They demonstrate how English learners can be provided with strategies for accessing complex texts, such as closely examining one sentence at a time. The authors argue that instruction must go beyond vocabulary and should begin with an examination of our beliefs about language, literacy and learning.

Material Type: Reading, Teaching/Learning Strategy

Authors: Charles j. Fillmore, Lily Wong Fillmore

Commonsense Composition

This textbook follows California Language Arts Standards for grades 9-12 to provide a generalized understanding of composition and to serve as a supplementary aid to high school English teachers.

Material Type: Textbook

Author: Bruno, Crystal

English Composition 1

Composition I focuses on principles of writing, critical reading and essay composition using rhetorical styles common in college-level writing (narrative, example/illustration, compare/contrast, cause-and-effect, argument).

Material Type: Full Course, Textbook

Level 1 - Weather Lesson

In this lesson, students will learn review days, months, and seasons. They will also learn weather vocabulary and limited clothing vocabulary. This unit is a teacher-facilitated, interactive lesson designed for a 3-hour course. For shorter class times, you may use the scheduled break as an ending point and resume the rest of the lesson the following day.

Material Type: Lesson

Author: Erin Vobornik