LTEL Essential Component:
Focus on Oral Language 

A Focus on Oral Language

Oral language is the foundation for literacy.  A course designed for Long Term English Learners must be in a classroom in which students are talking.   If they are not using the language, if they are not engaged in talking about what they are learning, they are not actually learning it.  Structured oral language practice, institutional conversations, and multiple opportunities for speaking are a means of practicing academic language, actively participating in authentic academic discussion, and processing the language prior to writing.  The building of oracy lays the foundation for writing.  Teachers employ various approaches to cooperative grouping to maximize opportunities for oral language.  Public speaking is a skill that is cultivated.  Typically, Long Term English Learners have little opportunity to talk in other classes, and so teachers of these Long Term English learners courses utilize improvisation, theater arts, sentence frames, thinking maps, games, debates, and specific procedures to maximize oral communication.  They may use laminated cards for sentence starters or equity cards for calling on students.  Teachers learn to limit "yes" and "no" questions, and they work on higher-level prompts and high-quality questioning that elicit complex language from students.  To make all of this work, teachers need to build a supportive classroom culture in which students feel safe to talk.