Teachers Values

R9 – Sheltered Instruction and Comprehensible Content

Objective: Learners will demonstrate effective use of SIOP strategies to support English Language Learners by providing content area examples for each of the 8 techniques and incorporating a Comprehensible Input technique in the lesson planning guide.

Sheltered Instruction is an approach to instruction that makes content comprehensible for all learners and one that teachers can use to assist English language learners to acquire English. 

The dual goals of 
Sheltered Instruction are to

1) provide access to mainstream, grade-level content

2) promote the development of English language proficiency.  

Researchers developed a process to promote literacy across all academic content areas for English Language Learners called 
Sheltered Content Instruction or the 
SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol).  

This process ensures that students understand the concepts and terminology in all academic lessons.  

The delivery of content must be 

comprehensible
 – which means

· Instruction must be clearly 
communicated.

·  Learners must be able to understand the vocabulary used in lessons.

· Instruction must be 
sequenced.

· Differentiated Instruction aligns with student progression. Use supplementary resources and materials – pre-teach social and academic vocabulary.

· Instruction must be 
scaffolded.

· Structure support to lead to an independent acquisition of content. 
Orally scaffold through repeating, paraphrasing, and wait time. 
Procedurally scaffold by progressing from whole class to group to individual and 
instructionally scaffold by using story frames, patterns, and graphic organizers.

Seven Steps to Make the Content Comprehensible

1. Identify the language demands of the content

BICS – (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) often called Conversational Language     

· philosophical, religious, or political conversations

· use of conversational skills

· use of sentences

· adequate social communication

· use of phrases, even one- and two-word phrases

· receptive/and expressive use of language

 
CALP – (Cognitive-Academic Language Proficiency) often called Academic Language

· grade-level literacy

· study skills and advanced reading skills

· reading and writing fluency

· expository writing

· expository and narrative reading

· reading comprehension skills

· narrative composition

· school skills: following directions, cooperation, and listening

2.  Plan language objectives for all lessons and make them explicit to students

· Reflect back to Strategies for Success, Teach the Vocabulary (SS1). This activity emphasized the importance of identifying important vocabulary that all students would need to know for your lesson to be effective. Need more of a refresher? Review your GO TO Page – TEACH VOCABULARY, where you wrote down four strategies to teach vocabulary in your lesson.  

When you have English language learners in your classroom, you may also be required to create language objectives for your lessons. 

What is a language objective?

Language objectives are lesson objectives that specifically outline the type of language that students will need to learn and use to accomplish the lesson’s goals. 

These objectives involve the four language skills (
speaking, listening, reading, and writing), but they can also include

· the language functions related to the topic of the lesson (e.g., justify, hypothesize)

· vocabulary essential to a student being able to participate in the lesson fully (e.g., axis, locate, graph)

· language learning strategies to aid in comprehension (e.g., questioning, making predictions).

Below are examples of language objectives for different content areas and grade levels. 

Your school district may require you to identify language objectives in your lesson plans. You will need to identify which of the four skills (
speaking, listening, reading, and writing) and/or vocabulary concepts that are necessary for students to be successful in your lesson. 

3. Emphasize academic vocabulary development

· Be highly selective about which words to teach. Content area terms should be selected for their use in helping children apply word-learning strategies and for engendering interest in using the words as tools for meaningful communication (Blachowicz & Fisher, 2000).

4. Activate and strengthen background or prior knowledge

·
Begin by teaching words in categories. For example, you can try something as simple as this: “I’m going to say the following words:
 strawberries, bananas, papayas, pineapples. They all are a type of… (fruit).” 

·
Use contrasts and comparisons. For example, you can give children puzzlers like, “Is an artichoke a type of fruit? Why is it, or is it not a kind of fruit?” Puzzlers help children think outside the immediate context and consider the reasoning behind these contrasts and comparisons, which can further their understanding of categories and concepts.

·
Use analogies. An analogy is another type of comparison, but this time the comparison is made between two things that are usually thought to be different. Analogies help children build knowledge because they compare something new to something they already know. For example, try something like, “bird is to feather as dog is to… (fur).” Children can use similes (comparisons using the words 
like or 
as) or metaphors (comparisons without using 
like or 
as) to build new knowledge.

·
Encourage topic-focused wide reading. Reading builds knowledge, but wide reading has typically been interpreted as reading about a lot of different topics, demonstrating breadth rather than depth in reading. Try this variation: encourage children to identify interest and read as many books as they can on one topic. What you find is that children will develop a deeper knowledge and expertise on a topic. These interests will drive children to read more.

·
Embrace multimedia. We often think that direct experiences are the most compelling ways to build knowledge. As many teachers can attest, there is nothing more thrilling than watching children engage in learning through direct experiences or seeing their delight and excitement on field trips and other activities. Although it is certainly not a replacement for real-life experiences, multimedia can often provide a wealth of information that we could only wish to experience firsthand. Further, it can introduce children to important words and concepts in a highly motivating way and build a shared knowledge base among all of your students.

5. Promote oral interaction and extended academic discussion

· Provide multiple encounters with targeted words. Multiple exposures to content vocabulary can occur through collaborative, active tasks, and can be supported by technology (Kamil,2004). The quality of each encounter is important, as is causing students to use writing, speaking, listening, and reading when collaborating with targeted words (Pearson et al., 2007).

6. Review vocabulary and content concepts

7. Give students feedback on language/vocabulary used in class

adapted from: 

So. . . . what’s the point????

Many of the textbooks you use will be at different levels of difficulty, and you must be prepared to use strategies to assist your students in tackling difficult texts. These strategies are good for 

all students
 that struggle, not just ESL students.

Sheltered content instruction benefits all learners because talking about, reading about, and writing about content in different subject areas challenges every student’s English. Most vocabulary, phrases, and ideas in the content are unique to the subject under study, and therefore, could be confusing to many students.  

Assignment:

  

Read the article – Making Content Comprehensible. You may want to save this document to your Canvas Tool Box Folder so you can have access once you are in the classroom.

Making Content Comprehensible.pdf

SEE ATTACHED

This article is full of techniques and strategies to implement in your classroom to help English Language Learners be successful in your classroom. The goal is for you to review all the techniques and select ones that you could implement in your classroom with ease.   

Write 3 examples/techniques for each of the 8 techniques that you could easily implement in your classroom with your content.

Then go to your
 LPG, 
6. Target Language Supports, and incorporate a Comprehensible Input technique for your lesson.  You may select a strategy that you already have listed in that section, THATS GREAT!  Go ahead and write it again to verify that you have a strategy that is specific for emergent bilingual students.

Make sure that you complete these two activities,