Sayyidah Cahyani Bilandari (18716251041)

PBI-B (Graduate Program)

Article Review 1

Cammot, A. H. (1983). Toward a functional ESL curriculum in the elementary school. TESOL
QUARTERLY, 17(3), 459-471.

Identification

The title of the article is “Toward a Functional ESL Curriculum in the Elementary School”
written by Anna Uhl Chamot. The article was published within the TESOL QUARTERLY
journal on 1983. The article discusses about the needs of non English speaking students in the
United States to learn English as their second language as a means to help them not only
communicate socially, but also to help them learn and understand the learning materials at
schools.

Introduction

The writer argues that a functional ESL curriculum for elementary schools is the one that is
able to address the need for students to understand the school subjects that are taught in English.
The curriculum should be able to help students learn new materials or earn new information.
Thus far, the Council of Europe has implemented such type of syllabus. However, it is only for a
higher level of education. Therefore, this article proposes the idea of implementing the functional
syllabus for elementary schools.

Summary

The paper starts by explaining children’s second language learning model. There are six
cognitive levels explained by the writer, which includes knowledge, comprehension, application,
analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Elementary ESL students’ language level is around the first
three levels. However, the three higher levels are the levels of students from regular elementary
classroom. Therefore, the question is whether the ESL students would be able to also show
success within the three higher levels. According to the writer, this gap may be covered by
teaching more academic language skill to the ESL learners and including it within the
curriculum.

Within the ESL classrooms, students whose native language is not English were only
taught how to use English in their daily life, without being taught the English that is used in
classrooms. For example is during math lessons, students will face several English terms that are
only used in mathematics. Therefore, there is a high possibility that they will fail to understand
the lesson because they do not understand the language. This new proposed curriculum wishes to
teach ESL students the English that they use in regular classrooms to help them with their study.
 The curriculum will not be implemented successfully without the help of the teachers. The
writer has provided several suggestions for the teachers to help them in managing the classroom
activities. Those suggestions include: (1) use the vocabulary and concepts from content areas at
appropriate grade levels as you devise ESL drills and exercises, (2) when planning activities that
practice different language skills, keep the realities of the regular classroom in mind, (3) content
area instruction can be initiated in English in linguistically less demanding areas such as art and
physical education, (4) because in the regular curriculum information is acquired more and more
through reading in subjects such as social studies, science, and language arts, comprehension
should be the priority in teaching ESL reading, (5) to develop classroom speaking skills, children
need opportunities to participate in small group discussions, to present oral reports, and to
respond adequately to teacher questioning. (6) ESL writing activities can also parallel the types
of writing assignments required in the regular classroom.

Critique

Teachers and schools in the United States that wish to enhance the quality of their ESL
students would certainly find this article very helpful because it offers a new insight in how they
can manage their curriculum so that it covers all the students. The explanation given by the
writer regarding the curriculum that he proposes is very convincing because the writer also
provides explanation on the types of the students. This helps the schools and students to see how
their students would fit within the curriculum if they were to adapt or adopt it.

However, the article does not provide a clear example of the application of such curriculum
in elementary school level. The only example provided is a brief one regarding its application in
higher level of education. Schools and teachers who wish to find tips on how well this suggested
curriculum will improve the quality of their students would