Hello Mrs Sykes

I notice many of my struggling readers in grades 3-5 have a language deficiency. Their teachers are beside themselves as they look at their writing, and come to me asking what do I do? Here's my answer: practice speaking in complete sentences. I bring in photos from magazines or project an interesting picture, and ask students to describe what they see in complete sentences. A small group is a supportive environment for risk-taking, especially for your English Language Learners. I usually spend a couple of 20 minute small group lessons on describing the pictures using complete sentences. Model how to describe the pictures using complete sentences. If you expect elaboration and details from your students, be sure to model that as well.  From there, move on to... Practice Writing Sentences Those pictures you've been practicing talking about? Use them again, and this time have them write their thoughts in sentences. Remind them about the format of a sentence - it needs a ...

If you are a teacher, you will eventually need to have resources to help you teach students who are English Language Learners.  Here's a quick round up of my favorite go-to resources for working with ELLs.  Enjoy!

By popular request, the Academic Vocabulary Word Walls are together in a discounted bundle!  As a special thank you for followers who already bought one of the Academic Word Walls, this set is available for an additional discount - only $8 for the set through March 31!   Had an ice day last week, and began printing/laminating small copies of my new Academic Word Wall Bundle (grades 2-6) .  I printed them with 2 pages per page (one of the options you can choose when printing), to create smaller cards to use during word work activities with my 4th graders - decoding multi-syllabic words. ***Confession time:  I actually finished this bundle last week on a crazy ice day... and fully intended to post the Bundle last week... and then the weather became beautiful again, so I went outside instead.  :)  I'm sure y'all understand...   Want a freebie to try in your classroom?   Here's the link on Teachers Pay Teachers:

The range of strengths and weaknesses in a typical classroom can be quite difficult.  If you aren't careful, your students will generate so much paper (to grade and file!) that you won't be able to manage it.  Here's my suggestion:  Have an ELA Notebook for each child.  Nothing fancy - I'm currently using "fast-teacher-made-special" notebooks, consisting of a long piece of bright construction paper folded in half and stapled as the cover for 20-ish pieces of notebook paper.  When I taught 2nd grade, we used handwriting paper for the first quarter as a support/transition from 1st grade, and this was a fast way to help keep track of the loose papers for each subject. Credits: Mr. Magician , KG Fonts , Hello Fonts I know... it's really not going to hold a lot, so I encourage the kiddos to draw a line, date the entry, and then do their work, which can run over (neatly) to the page after that.  Typically, these journals last everyone for a month or so, and...

Hello!  I was chatting with my grade level today, and we had a question for y'all.  First, let me give you a bit of background - here is a picture of my amazing teammates: My lovely teammates (except for Sondra!) That's me in the middle of the back row.  Not too shabby for a day with no shower...  :)  (Long story!!)  Don't we look like a group who collaborates, works hard, and helps each other?  That's because we do!!! Anywhoo... we wanted to know what y'all recommend for 2nd grade reading intervention programs.  Currently, we have Great Leaps , but we have had mixed results.  Some of our struggling kiddos have used GL since Kindergarten, and we're looking for another option that can be easily implemented.  As a Literacy Specialist, I love, love, loved both Soar to Success and the Benchmark Education materials, but they really don't lend themselves to having a para-professional or volunteer for implementation.  Side note...

I enjoyed dessert with a dear friend tonight. She is an ESL teacher at another school, and we were discussing how to differentiate homework for her uppergrade students who are still acquiring English. Her students get work on their level throughout the day, but they have grade level reading passages for their reading homework. We brainstormed easy methods for the teachers to differentiate the reading passages... keyword easy, since we all know teachers are already slam busy. My suggestion was she find a friendly lower grade teacher to borrow the reading passage supplement book that was bundled with our reading adoption (Houghton Mifflin) make copies for the teacher, and give them a file folder so they can pull differentiated homework daily. How do you differentiate for English Language Learners? I would love to hear your ideas! Don't forget to enter my giveaway below for a set of Common Core I Can posters! I'll notify the winner on Sunday! :)