One of the most frequently asked questions that I hear from ESL teachers in lower-incidence districts is that related to a curriculum, especially a newcomer curriculum. What materials do you recommend? How do you find an affordable program that would meet the needs of our newcomers?
As an ESL teacher, who works with students in multiple schools/grade-levels, you may not have a plan for teaching ESL students to follow. In many cases, they are supposed to be following the general curriculum of your school/district. While it leaves a lot of room for creativity, what do you do when a newcomer arrives?
Surely, to expect someone who has no basic grasp of the English language to understand, follow and perform in a regular classroom would be simply naive (if not absurd).
If you have read my blog posts on what to teach absolute beginners and the 7 strategies for newcomer teaching, you already have a pretty good idea of what to cover on your ESL teaching journey.
That said, while those tips alone may be helpful, they do not give you a clear plan on where to start and what to include in your lessons.
Trust me, I’ve been there myself. For the past few years, our district (which does not have a large population of English learners compared to some but it is substantial) has been getting at least one or two newcomers from various countries who speak absolutely no English. They are all in different grades, with varied backgrounds and schooling experiences.
Knowing what to teach is always great. But I realized that having a clear strategy, a roadmap of sorts, on what I teach first, what grammar and phonics points I include, etc. as well as what comes next would be absolutely invaluable.
The challenge
I started looking around on the internet to see if I could find something that would help me out in this department. My search rendered a few results such as a Newcomer Toolkit from the U.S. Department of Education and a fantastic resource from Minneapolis Public Schools also called a Newcomer Toolkit.
As many teachers do, I also looked on Teachers Pay Teachers and have found this newcomer curriculum outline that lists topics to cover by the week. I myself have found it useful for my elementary newcomers.
At the same time, as great as these resources are, they lacked the specificity I was looking for. The goals are clear: I want my students to learn the basics of English and be able to begin communicating in it. But what are my objectives? And how do I get to them?
Update: I have finished the ESL Beginner Curriculum Guide – read a blog post about it first OR click the button below to see if this is something you could use!
Do you have a way to plan out what you are going to teach newcomers? Share in the comments below!
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