In my district, NC Math 1 is usually the first academic core class that high school newcomer MLs have on their schedule, and while that class may not require as much reading in English as a history class, the spoken language of math poses its own challenges. Consider: we use the word “times” to indicate multiplication, “twelve divided by four” is completely different from “twelve divided into four,” and we use cardinal numbers to name numerators but ordinal numbers for denominators. Unless it’s one-half, of course. What a mess!
Students need help to make sense of this academic language so they can understand instruction and can gain confidence in their ability to express their math knowledge. Unfortunately, ESL curricula don’t adequately address the language of math, if they give it any coverage at all. But your students can turn a simple manila folder into an invaluable, interactive resource to help them learn the language of math.
In this workshop, you will see an example of a math resource folder, create a few interactive components for a folder of your own, and get ideas for practice activities to reinforce math language in ESL classes. Finally, you will leave with templates that you can use, or customize, to create the components with your students. Come ready to cut and glue! No artistic experience necessary!
Project Learning at its finest! Throughout this journey, students and families engaged in a meaningful learning experience that celebrated culture, tradition, and connection. Together, we:
Explored Agricultural Products – Learned how each country’s geography influences its traditional ingredients. Built Cooking Vocabulary*– Expanded our knowledge of key cooking and food-related terms. Connected Ingredients to Culture – Discovered how these products are used in traditional dishes. Experienced Hands-on Cooking– Prepared an authentic, easy-to-make recipe in class. Created a Cultural Recipe Book– Compiled family recipes and stories into a shared collection, highlighting our diverse backgrounds.
This incredible project fostered a deeper appreciation for different cultures while bringing families together through the joy of cooking.
Learn about a project made possible through the generous support of the Learning Product for Uniting Our World Project, with donations from Participate Learning.
First Grade Dual Immersion Spanish Teacher, Mooresville Graded School District
Dual Language Spanish Teacher Master Degree in Education Chilean teacher with 21 years of experience in Early Years and Elementary Education in English-speaking private schools. 4 years in Public Elementary Education in the U.S. Bilingual International Teacher (Spanish... Read More →
Studies have shown how co-teaching can lead to higher achievement among multilingual learners in terms of engagement, language acquisition, and participation (Dove & Honigsfeld, 2021; Lenard & Townsend; & Modfield, 2020). However, one of the core challenges in implementing co-teaching in the classroom is the relationship between the teachers to make sure that it is implemented intuitively. When the implementation of co-teaching in the classroom is fluid, it can simultaneously achieve different objectives in one single action. In this discussion, different activities that were observed to be effective in learning the content in Social studies while also learning the target language, will be shared. We will also discuss each activity’s challenges and the possible areas to look at when adopting it to a different content to ensure that each activity is beneficial to ML learners across all subjects.
