Teaching Teachers WELL Progress Overview

1. Teaching Teachers WELLProgress Overview Dr. Elke Schneider (PhD) schneidere@winthrop.edu Dr. Kelly M. Costner (PhD) costnerk@winthrop.edu Project funded by a US Department of Education National Professional Development Program grant administered by the Office of English Language Acquisition

2. Add-on Certification Courses Teaching Teachers WELL Professional Development Teacher Ed Faculty Development Overview of Grant Components

3. Add-on Certification Courses • PLAN • 2 cohorts, 25 participants each • REALITY • Cohort 1 = 13 ; Cohort 2 = 31 participants • Courses • 5 courses, 15 graduate credits • One course per term over 15 months • Teaching and assessment strategies, language acquisition, grammar • Participants take TESOL Praxis test on own account • At present, we know that 5 participants took and passed the test

4. Add-on Certification Courses • Positive Outcomes • 7 of 46 participants shifted to various ELL-related positions • Increased collaboration with district TESOL staff • Skills to teach and assess phonemic awareness of ELLs became standard practice in content classrooms; requested by administration

5. Add-on Certification Courses • Challenges and Improvements: • Drop-outs curtailed by channeling tuition grants through financial aid for individual participants • Rushed recruitment for Cohort 1 was improved for Cohort 2 with expanded geographic reach, personal interviews, and snowball recruiting

6. Professional Development • PLAN • 3 groups of 25 each over 3 summers • REALITY • Group A: 21 participants, • Group B: 26 participants, • Group C: 24 participants; • Group D and E: Fall 2010 with 25-30 participants each • COURSE • 1 course, 3 graduate credit hours • Teaching and assessment strategies

7. Professional Development • Positive Outcomes: • Snowball recruitment led to highly motivated participants from a variety of content areas and levels • Group A: 3-week sprint course led to close collaboration even after end of course • Group B: weekend blocks throughout summer allowed participants to process information better • 3 participants decided to join Cohort 2

8. Professional Development • Challenges & Improvements • Intensity of term for Group A made it difficult to fully process content  Group B, C and D had/will have FRI/SAT sessions • Streamlining of assignments continues to make them appropriate for block course model

9. Faculty Development PLAN • 3 faculty workshops of 2 days each of 25 each over 3 years • Faculty mentoring during 3 years to infuse ELL content in courses REALITY • 2 workshops with 36-32 participants • 3rd workshop in process

10. Faculty Development • WORKSHOP CONTENT • Faculty Workshop 1, May 2008 • Legal issues • Language acquisition phases • Cultural issues • Guest speakers: • high school ELL student • TESOL literacy coach • adult ELL panel

11. Faculty Development • WORKSHOP CONTENT: Faculty Workshop 2, August 2009 • SIOP lesson planning • Teaching strategies (silent phase, vocabulary issues) • Cultural sensitive instruction • TESOL teacher panel: instruction & assessment accommodations • Discipline-specific group session: planning ELL-sensitive components for courses FACULTY FEEDBACK: interest in more “strategies”, have theoretical understanding but implementation assignments are missing

12. Faculty Development • WORKSHOP CONTENT: Faculty Workshop 3, May 2010 • Brainstorming with TESOL trained teachers on appropriate instruction and assessment • Discussion of appropriate strategies and assessment based on case studies and video samples • Group session: Curriculum planning • Group session: activity/task planning

13. Resources • Teaching Teachers WELL website: www.birdnest.org/ttwell • Office of English Language Acquisition: http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oela/index.html