ELD Teacher Interview 1. What is the make up of your ELD classes?

A: My classes are made up of 95% Spanish speaking Hispanic students. I have one Vietnamese student and one Korean student. I have one class that is made up of CELDT levels 1-3 and one class that is made up of CELDT levels 4 and 5. The students ages range from Freshmen to Seniors and they have been here ranging from 1 month to 5 years. 2. What type of ELD classes do you teach? A: Our school has ELD classes. They are pull out classes that consist entirely of just English language learning. The CELDT levels 4 and 5 have me for 2 hours a day and the CELDT levels 1-3 have me for 3 hours a day. 3. What does a normal class period entail? A: My classes are generally structured the same everyday to give the students a sense of routine. They come in and I have a warm-up on the board, either a question they have to answer or an English idiom they have to attempt to explain. Its essentially a free-write. They then write in their journals are 1015 minutes. They are not allowed to use dictionaries at this time because it gives me a more accurate view of their writing ability. Next, we read, as a class, a short story or excerpt from our textbook, I ask comprehension questions as we go along. Lastly, we have a grammar or writing activity, usually a worksheet. 4. What aspects of learning English do your students struggle with the most? A: Most of my students absolutely dread writing. They tend to have their dictionaries out the entire time and attempt to translate directly from their first language thoughts, oftentimes resulting in sentences and paragraphs that make very little sense. 5. What are some ways you motivate your students to learn? A: I find my students need a lot of extrinsic motivators. Many of the students in my class will not finish the year with me. They will either move back to their home country or to a different school. This makes it difficult for me to instill in them a desire or a need to learn English. So to get them to a point where they actually want to learn I instill a points system. When student complete assignments or do something exceptionally well they receive a point. At the end of every two weeks, I tally the points in each class and the top three students get a predetermined prize. We pick it as a class, its either a chance to use their phone in class or an extra five minutes at break. I try to mix up who gets the points and its not based on language ability but on effort or improvement. 6. How do you incorporate other content areas into the learning? A: Because I have all different grades in my class it is incredibly difficult to incorporate specific content in my class as it relates to what they should be learning in the other classes. I do try to make time every week for students to come to me with questions they have about the work in their other classes. The stories we read are quite varied and so I try to expand on whatever

were reading. Sometimes its related to something in science or history, so then Ill try to make those connections. 7. Do you teach American culture or norms in your class? A: As I already mentioned, we go over idioms and celebrate American holidays and its an opportunity for me to explain the traditions and history behind them. 8. Do you celebrate your students cultures? A: I try to know what national or significant holidays are occurring in my students cultures and we celebrate those. I also try to ask at 1-2 students a semi personal question about their culture or traditions each class and then I try to make a note of it and bring it up later to connect with them.