Dominican Culture

The artifact I chose for Standard 5.a is a research paper that I did for ESC 769: Latinos in US Schools. The overall course allowed us the opportunity to read a variety of research discourse on the education of Latinos in the U.S. For my final assignment, I completed a research project where I focused on the “Impact of Dominican Culture on the U.S.”

The overall artifact focused on the Dominican Culture on the U.S, and how it has influenced educational and economic growth for this particular group. The overall project aligns with standard 5.a, in that, I had to carry out a research on children of Dominican Republic background in the U.S. By doing this research, I was able to gain a deeper knowledge of the political, and socio-economic history of this particular group, and how this has influenced immigration for this particular group. Having first hand knowledge of this information, I was able to be more sensitive to the needs of my students, plan culturally relevant lessons, and most importantly, advocate and enlighten these students about the systems in place to help them as ENL students, and parents of ENL students.

This particular artifact is pertinent to the standard because it not only focused on the history of Dominican Culture on the U.S, but it looked at the Education Implications for Dominicans living in the U.S. Upon completing this research it was found that students from the Dominican Republic are likely to be labelled LTELLs and SIFE due in part that they mainly come to the U.S as adolescents.

This artifact contributes to my professional understanding, skills, and dispositions that ELLs on a whole have their unique struggles when they come to the U.S. However, it is my job as an ENL pedagogue to keep myself abreast with what these struggles are, and to familiarize myself with the different mandates and policies that effect ELLs, and apply this knowledge to inform teaching and learning. Additionally, doing this research opened my eyes to the needs of my students, and helped me to gain a better understanding and insight of their educational fallacies. In relativity to this standard, one area of my teacher development that still needs growth is staying current with judicial mandates, federal, state, and local laws and policies on the instruction and achievement of ELLs.

Overall, completing this artifact impacted my students to an extent. In that, the research was carried out on one particular group, and I have a diverse population of ethnic group in my class. Whereas, I have come to the conclusion that one hat does not fit all. However, on the other hand, it is my job as their ENL advocate to maintain a linguistic and cultural homogeneity within the classroom.

WST Curriculum Unit – Google Docs

Standard 4.c is from my ESC 766 class that I am currently taking at Lehman College. This Unit Curriculum is currently under construction and will be updated accordingly. The purpose of this assignment is for us to create a 10 lesson unit curriculum for a specific grade band.

This curriculum addresses all parts of the Standards in terms of using a variety of performance-based assessment tools and techniques to inform classroom instruction. With that said, the curriculum addresses the students’ Needs Analysis. Once the students needs were analyzed, the curriculum was tailored to meet this specific academic, linguistic, and special needs. In that, the curriculum asked for us to create a Needs Analysis, Essential Questions, and modifications for Special Needs Learners. Additionally,  the curriculum ask that we include: Lesson Topic, Content Objectives, Language Objectives, Key Vocabulary, Overview of Procedures, Scaffolds etc., and Assessment related to Objectives. These specific grids aides in helping us to evaluate and ensure the continuous intellectual, social and physical development of each learner.

The artifact contributed to my professional understanding by making me aware of the variety of assessment tools and techniques that are needed to inform classroom instruction and achievements. In that, when creating this unit curriculum, my partners (Jared Wood and Kimberly Thomas) and I put a lot of thought into what assessments (informal and formal) were necessary in allowing us to cater to our ELLs at varying stages of English language and literacy development. Seeing that curriculum was grid specific we also had to ensure that the whole lesson was in sync. Additionally, this unit curriculum raised awareness of the importance of having an Essential Question which in my opinion  kind is the steering wheel of the overall unit. Lastly, the Content and Language Objectives were two other areas that I think was important to creating this unit, and meeting the different language and academic demands of our ELLs. This overall artifact had a positive impact on me as a teacher. For starters, it made me more detailed oriented, and purposeful in everything that I included in the unit. It created this idea of not just creating another curriculum unit, but creating a curriculum unit that had a variety of performance-based assessment tools and techniques to inform classroom instructions.

Relative to this standard, one specific area in my teacher development that needs improvement is the creation of  Essential Questions. As I have mentioned previously, the Essential Question/s is the steering wheel, and it is the driving force behind how we plan our lessons for our students on a day to day basis. In that, this was one part of the artifact that I had the most difficult time creating.

Seeing that this artifact is still a work in progress, it is too soon to say if the artifact has or will impact student learning.

NYSESLATAnalysis-Final

Artifact 4.A. “Issues of Assessment for ELLs,” is from my ESC 761 class that I took at Lehman College. This particular assignment asked that students write an analysis about the NYSESLAT exam. The aim of this assignment was for us to analyze if this particular  assessment was an accurate assessment of the necessary skills for academic success, of ELLs.” Additionally, based off of our responses, we had to write if the NYSESLAT exam is an adequate assessment of ELL’s ability to do well in mainstream content classes at the secondary level.

This artifact is pertinent to the required Standard, 4.A., where candidates had to demonstrate understanding of assessment issues as they affect ELLs. In this case, I got a chance to analyze the biases, testing, language proficiency, and accommodations in formal testing situations for ELLs. This chosen artifact demonstrates that I have met the required standard because it demonstrate my understanding of assessment issues as they affect ELLs.

The artifact contributed to my professional understanding by giving me a first-hand look at the issues, accountability, accommodation, and biases of assessments for ELLs. For example, all ENL students are required to take the NYSESLAT where they are tested on the four modalities of language (reading, listening, speaking, and writing). While this is pertinent to language acquisition, in terms of expressing one’s thoughts, making coherent sentences, and being able to use facts and ideas to express one’s self, and explain what they have learned,  however, I do not believe that it thoroughly assess the students command of English, such as English rules, and grammar, which are important components of English. This impacted my own thinking and understanding that not only should I teach so that the students can acquire the language, but to teach so that the students can do well on these exams. For example, the NYSESLAT grades students on how well they can put what they have learned in their own words, by using simple and complex sentences. In that, I will need to teach students how to write summaries, and use a variety of manipulators that will enable them with analyzing and summarizing.

Yes, completing this artifact impacted students and students learning because after completing an analysis of the NYSESLAT artifact I was able to adjust my teaching, and teach according to the test. This new knowledge will allow the students to do better on future NYSESLAT exams. Seeing that I teach ELA and ENL, this artifact is a good segue way into helping me to differentiate between how I teach ELA content and language to the students, and what skills they need in order to be successful on both the NYSESLAT and ELA exams.

Final Child Study

Standard 4.b is from my graduate class ESC 727 at Lehman College. The purpose of this assignment was for us to do a child study on one of our current student. The project asked that we gathered pertinent information about the student in regards to their ELL status, their family background, how the school’s overall snapshot informs how I teach this current student, how it influences their behavior towards school, and learning a new language; and how do I use this information to guide my teaching.

The artifact  addresses if I am able “to use a variety of standards-based language proficiency instrument to show language growth and to inform my instruction.” Furthermore, it informs if I am familiar with national and state requirements, procedures, and instruments for ELL identification, reclassification, and exit from language support programs.

In this particular child study I had to cover three major categories. These included, gathering information about the learner, collecting data about social and academic language proficiency, and analyzing the data that I have collected about the student. In the first category, I gathered information about the student L2, their background in terms of family, the impact of the school on the student in order to inform my pedagogy. Taking into consideration the student’s social background it aided in what services I provided for the student, and helped me to tailor my assessment to fit the student’s need.

Overall, this artifact did help me to better service this child academically, however, the student was impacted by other social constraints which created a lot of student-teacher set-backs. On the other hand, I think that assessing our students, and finding out directly from them what how they learn, and meeting them halfway is beneficial to both the teacher, and the students. Whereas, this artifact serves as a guide on how I can cater to all the needs of my students in order to prepare them for college and career.

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