Please Don't Tell Me That I Have To Create All My Own Materials!

By Dr. Suzanne Irujo, ELL Outlook™ Contributing Writer

This is the third in a series of articles that explore classroom implications of some of the findings of a study done by Gándara, Maxwell-Jolly, and Driscoll (2005). These researchers interviewed teachers of English language learners (ELLs) in California and identified nine challenges that they face. Previous articles explored what teachers can do about not having enough time to teach everything and the lack of professional development opportunities. This article looks at the lack of materials for teaching and assessing ELLs.

Thirty years ago, almost to the day as I write this, I walked into the classroom where I had my first full-time teaching assignment: 24 third- and fourth-grade bilingual children, and no materials. Well, maybe it's not quite true to say "no materials." I had Janet and Mark pre-primers and primers so I could teach my English language learning students to read "See Spot run." And I had a set of totally nonverbal programmed math books that would supposedly teach them to add, subtract, multiply, and divide-that is, if they didn't give up from boredom before they ever got to multiplication, or didn't just peek at the answers that were supposed to be covered until after they had done the problems. Actually, I should say "after they had done the calculations," because there were no real problems or problem solving, and no explanations of why the calculations were done the way they were.

Needless to say, I got very good at begging and borrowing (I don't think I ever actually stole anything), and learned a lot about adapting and creating. Now, when I walk into a bilingual, ESL, or mainstream classroom and look at the materials teachers have at their fingertips, it seems like a superabundance: leveled readers in two languages that support themes from the content areas that students are studying, appealing texts that reflect the latest knowledge about how children learn, computers and software to address varied learning styles.

But does this superabundance of materials actually meet the needs of the ELLs in these classrooms? Are the materials designed with the special needs of language learners in mind? ELLs will find it very difficult to master grade-level content unless they have materials that make that content accessible. Materials designed for native speakers of English, including those meant to be used with struggling readers, are usually too linguistically complex to be accessible to most ELLs. Materials designed for students with learning disabilities are often too cognitively simplified to be appropriate for most ELLs. The few materials that do provide appropriate content-based instruction for ELLs may not be standards based, or grade appropriate. Adequate tools for assessing ELLs' content knowledge, without confounding the assessment with language proficiency, are almost nonexistent.

It is not surprising that a lack of materials to teach and assess ELLs' language development and content knowledge was one of the findings of a study that asked California teachers of ELLs what their needs were. As reported in the study done by Gándara and her colleagues (2005), "Teachers were challenged by the lack of tools to teach, including appropriate assessment materials and instruments" (p. 13). Teachers reported using the same textbooks with ELLs that they used with their native-speaking students, even though the ELLs could often not understand them. They wanted better language development materials and more guidance from publishers about how to use their programs successfully with ELLs. They asked for tests or other assessments that would provide diagnostic information on students' language development. They especially needed assessment materials that would help determine ELLs' content knowledge, and said that current state tests cannot adequately assess their students' academic achievement. Some teachers even commented that "the tests of academic achievement . . . could actually be harmful to students" (p. 13) when students are told they are "far below basic" simply because they have not yet learned English.

Adapting, Simplifying, and Creating Materials

So teachers of ELLs today find themselves in much the same situation I was in 30 years ago-without appropriate materials for teaching and assessing the knowledge and skills that their students need for academic success. There is one huge difference, however, between my situation then and that of teachers of ELLs now: standards-based instruction and high-stakes accountability tests. Given the constraints that teachers now work under, suggesting to them that they create and adapt most of their own teaching and assessment materials, as I did 30 years ago, is almost laughable.

So I am not going to provide suggestions for how to "do it yourself." Adapting or creating our own materials requires time, training, experience, and inclination, and the number of teachers of ELLs who have all of these must be quite small. For those who want to try, there are excellent suggestions in the sections on adapting materials and assessing language and content in Short (1991) and in Echevarria, Vogt, and Short (2004). The article "Using Portfolios with English Language Learners" in this issue of The ELL Outlook can also be useful, as can Dr. Kuhlman's articles on assessment in previous issues (Kuhlman, 2005, March/April and 2005, September/October).

Begging, Borrowing, and Sharing Materials

For those of you who can't or don't want to create or adapt your own materials, begging, borrowing, and sharing may provide a solution. Here are some of the ways it can be done:

• Libraries: You may think that libraries would be less likely to have materials that are appropriate for ELLs than schools are, and in general that is probably true. There are, however, two kinds of materials often available in libraries that can be very valuable for use with ELLs. The first are predictable books, those books that are easily read by beginning readers because they contain repetitive word patterns, familiar concepts, simple story lines, and visual support. Although they are written for native speakers, the characteristics of predictable books provide support for both language development and reading comprehension. 
   
  The second are materials in the students' native language, which libraries usually have where there are large numbers of residents who speak a language other than English. These are, of course, useful only in bilingual classrooms or when students have had previous schooling in their native language. When this is the case, native-language materials are extremely useful for providing the background knowledge that students need in order to comprehend what they are reading in English. The materials could be translations of literature, or they could be content related; in either case, reading them before students attempt to read in English will increase students' knowledge of the content of the readings, and thus improve their reading comprehension in English.
• Freebies: There are innumerable educational materials available free to teachers who know how to access them. Some have been developed especially for ELLs; others have not, but might be suitable for use with some classes. Many of these resources are available on the Web, some meant to be downloaded, others meant to be used directly on the Web. For example, there are links to excellent materials developed in conjunction with various federal agencies at the government's FREE Web site (see resource list). Many valuable Web sites can be difficult for some ELLs to navigate and understand, so you might have to use heterogeneous grouping or other scaffolding techniques to make them accessible. Beware of the temptation to use a translation engine such as Babel Fish to translate a Web site to your students' native language. The translations are often so bad as to be incomprehensible. Babel Fish can be useful for printed translations, however, if you know the language. Let the computer do the bulk of the difficult work, and correct it yourself before using it. To find materials developed specifically for ELLs, start with a K-12 ESL Web site, such as Everything ESL, where you will find thematic units developed by Judie Haynes, plus links to other resources. 
   
  There are also non-Web-based sources of free materials. Go to conferences, visit every publisher's booth, and ask for free sample copies of their materials. Check to see if your library has a copy of the Teachers Guides to FREE Curriculum Materials (see Educators Progress Service in the resource list below). Watch for ads in teacher magazines or announcements on teacher discussion lists for free materials. I have found several excellent materials in both Spanish and English in this way, most of them developed through grant-funded programs in which part of the grant was for disseminating the materials.
• Teacher Sharing: Teachers often have materials that they no longer use, or materials they have created that they are willing to share. Sharing can be facilitated by setting up a place in your school or district where teachers can leave materials they no longer need or copies of things they have developed. It need be nothing fancier than a file cabinet in the corner of the teachers' room, or a box in somebody's office with an easily accessible sign-out sheet.  
   
  Other ways of sharing are to join a teacher's Web site or a discussion list. On the Ima Teacher site (see resource list), the "price of admission" is sharing three items you have created (rubrics, assessment tools, hand-outs, outlines, etc), in exchange for access to everything on the site. This site is not ELL-specific, however. On a discussion list, teachers can share their ideas about materials that work well, find out other teachers' experiences with a particular set of materials before purchasing them, share ideas for classroom-based assessment, and so forth. Teachers of ELLs can join TESLK-12 by following the directions in the resource section.

Lobbying

Finally, don't forget that education is, unfortunately, a political process, and creating change in a political process requires political action. Here are ways to create some of the noise that is needed when lobbying for anything, including the essential requirements of good teaching:

• Publishers: When you go to conferences and visit all the publishers' booths to get free sample materials, take a few minutes to talk to the publishers' representatives about the materials you need to teach ELLs more effectively. Publishers are responsive to market needs, but teachers need to tell them explicitly what those needs are. 
   
  Another way to influence publishers is to write to them. When you see something that is potentially useful for ELLs but needs just a little modification, write to the publisher, suggesting what modifications to make and how to do it. Encourage them to provide more ELL support with their mainstream materials, and tell them exactly what kind of support you need.
• District and State Education Boards: Getting publishers to produce better materials for ELLs doesn't help unless districts and states are willing and able to buy those materials. Teachers need to make it clear to the appropriate political bodies that it is virtually impossible to close the achievement gap between native speakers of English and ELLs without appropriate teaching and assessment materials. Remember that the more people who are involved, the more effective your lobbying will be. Work through your TESOL affiliate, enlist the help of your union, set up political action committees, recruit parents to help.

Conclusion

Soon after that memorable day thirty years ago when I walked into a classroom of elementary bilingual students and no appropriate materials, I attended a state TESOL affiliate conference, where most of the sessions were aimed at teachers in adult and higher education. On the conference evaluation form, I commented that they should have more presentations for elementary teachers. A couple of months later, I got a call from a member of the executive board of the affiliate. She suggested that I shouldn't complain unless I was willing to do something about it and asked me to submit a proposal for the next year's conference.

I've always remembered that, and have tried not to complain about a problem unless I'm willing to work towards a solution. I don't try to do everything, however. Lobbying makes me uncomfortable; I am not by nature a political activist. But I love adapting and creating materials, so that's what I do. People are more effective when they are doing something they enjoy and are good at. So if you don't have the materials you need to teach ELLs effectively, choose your thing, and do it. Then you can complain.

References

Echevarria, J., Vogt, M. E,. & Short, D. (2004). Making content Comprehensible to English language learners:

Gándara, P., Maxwell-Jolly, J., & Driscoll, A. (2005).

Kuhlman, N. (2005, March/April). The language assessment conundrum:

Kuhlman, N. (2005, September/October). Using performance-based

Short, D. J. (1991). How to integrate language and content

Resources

Altavista. (2004). Babel Fish Translation. Overture Services,

Educators Progress Service, Inc. (2005). Free Teaching Aids.

Everything ESL. (1998-2006). Available:

FREE (Federal Resources for Educational Excellence). (2006). Available:

ImaTeacher (n.d.) Available:

TESLK-12 (n.d.) E-mail discussion list. To become a member,

If you have any comments about this article or questions for for the author, please send them to: alex@coursecrafters.com.