Slide Deck: https://drive.google.com/file/d/13AMUFNC5EC367o49huVQbc24InDyUL8k/view?usp=sharing 

Over the years, I have been asked how to start teaching ESOL students many times by many teachers.  Thomas Johnston had an excellent answer to this question that I turned into a slide deck: https://drive.google.com/file/d/170Y9LXHxcvW-M8tC08Vic-0YMQlXRTSd/view?usp=sharing

I also have a page on this site that does something similar: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/help 

• Learned Helplessness

  • Some of our students have discouraging experiences as an immigrant or refugee to the US.  These experiences can can cause students to give up on puting effort into their education.  Overcoming this is serious and difficult work.

  • For more information, check out this article: "Overcoming Learned Helplessness in ESL: A Seligman-Inspired Approach for Teachers"

    • TL;DR 

      • The article explains how “learned helplessness” can lower ESL students’ motivation and confidence. Using Seligman’s research, it recommends teachers:

        • Give students control with small goals, feedback, and progress tracking.

        • Praise effort, normalize mistakes, and offer challenge by choice.

        • Build community through collaboration and peer support.

        • Connect learning to personal goals and show success stories to inspire hope.

      • The goal is a supportive classroom that boosts resilience, self-belief, and motivation.

• Trauma and Refugee Status

A deep article that might help understand the context our students come from and how other teachers are dealing with it is "Practicing Self-Advocacy for Displaced People in the English Language Learner Classroom" by Payton Persinger.

TL;DR - This thesis explores how to teach self-advocacy to displaced English Language Learners (ELLs) through literature review and interviews. Using Gaventa’s power framework, it shows self-advocacy as key for navigating cultural tensions, expressing needs, directing learning, gaining independence, and understanding legal rights. Learning English is central to this empowerment. Best practices include avoiding deficit thinking, using trauma-informed approaches, offering flexible and student-led learning, incorporating activities like role-plays and functional writing, and linking language instruction to real-world social justice and advocacy skills.

The production or oral language is a later step in the process of English language acquisition.  Many students get embarrassed about how much they can say in English.  This raises the affective filter.  To encourage more discussion with your ESOL students, you need to provide aids to production and start with low stakes tasks.

• Affective Filter: https://seidlitzblog.org/2020/09/22/what-is-the-affective-filter-and-why-is-it-important-in-the-classroom/ 

  • TL;DR - The affective filter, a concept from Stephen Krashen, describes how motivation, self-confidence, and anxiety impact students' ability to acquire a new language: when negative emotions are high, learning is blocked; when students feel safe, confident, and motivated, learning thrives. Creating supportive, relevant, and inclusive classrooms lowers the affective filter, making language acquisition easier, while error correction, isolation, and embarrassment raise it and impede learning.

• Levels of English Language Development: https://www.hmhco.com/blog/levels-of-english-language-proficiency-for-ell-students

  • TL;DR -The article explains the six WIDA English language proficiency levels used for multilingual learners (ELLs) in U.S. schools, describing the skills students show at each stage: Level 1 (Entering) uses minimal words/phrases, Level 2 (Beginning) develops basic sentences, Level 3 (Developing) expands to paragraphs, Level 4 (Expanding) uses more complex and technical academic language, Level 5 (Bridging) approaches proficiency of native peers in academic work, and Level 6 (Reaching) matches grade-level performance and complexity. It emphasizes the importance of knowing students' unique backgrounds and offers practical details to help teachers support learners at every proficiency stage.

Aids to Production in Discussion

• ESOL students need stems, thinking time, and low stakes tasks to do well in discussion in English.

  • Stems and Models:

    • Ideally, you should model the kinds of comments and observations that your discussion contains in front of the class.  You should be giving stems and you should use them during your modeling.

    • You might consider creating the stems on the board Infront of your students and asking your stronger students to help.  Mr. Fister does this all the time in his classes and it is a very strong strategy.

    • You should be providing stems.  I really like the COCA stems for general and ELA content: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/sentence-stemsframes/coca-stems 

      • However, other disciplines may benefit from other stems that can be found here: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/sentence-stemsframes 

        • Specifically, this is a great place to look: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/sentence-stemsframes#h.fx38g53il0l 

• Wait Time or Thinking Time:

  • When I teach ESOL students, I try to think about how I would preform in Spanish.  When I need to produce Spanish language, I am translating from English to Spanish in my head.  I know my students need time to make that happen.  You must give students time before they produce spoken language or everyone will be frusterated.

    • Article: https://www.colorincolorado.org/teaching-ells/ell-classroom-strategy-library/wait-time 

    • TL;DR: “Wait time” means giving students extra seconds to think before answering questions, which is especially helpful for English Language Learners. Research shows that increasing wait time boosts participation, response length and accuracy, and student confidence while reducing “I don’t know” answers. Teachers can add 3–5 extra seconds, use signals, visuals, sentence frames, and small-group discussions to support students. This strategy creates a more patient, inclusive classroom where all students can engage more deeply. 

• Low-stakes Tasks

  • High-stakes tasks raise the affective filter (see above).  Some examples of high-stakes tasks might be whole class discussion or individual presentations to the class.

  • Low-stakes Speaking tasks include:

    • Turn and talk and other Kagan strategies.

      • Kagan Structures for English Language Learners

        • TL;DR - Kagan Structures are highly structured cooperative learning strategies that boost both content mastery and English acquisition for ELLs far more effectively than traditional teaching or unstructured group work. They apply four principles—Positive Interdependence, Individual Accountability, Equal Participation, and Simultaneous Interaction (PIES)—to ensure every student actively participates and practices language. These structures can be adapted for all stages of language development and include activities like RallyRobin, Timed Pair Share, and Numbered Heads Together. Research shows that using Kagan Structures leads to dramatic gains in student achievement, motivation, and language use, especially for English learners. 

    • Building Thinking Classrooms Activities: https://sites.google.com/view/mccoy-teaching-resources/building-thinking-classrooms 

    • Small group discussion

    • Small group recorded discussion

      • I do this in my literature circles: https://sites.google.com/view/mccoy-teaching-resources/reading/literature-circles 

    • Recorded Oral responses

      • Flip recordings in Teams assignments

        • How to record with Flip: https://go.screenpal.com/watch/cZjvFFVRDNR 

        • How to record a podcast with Flip: https://go.screenpal.com/watch/cZle2Tnni1K 

      • Speaker Progress in Teams assignments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzwwCD0bfOc 

      • Video and Audio Recording Tasks

      • Podcasts: https://sites.google.com/view/mccoy-teaching-resources/speaking/podcast-projects 

• If you are going to have a high-speaking task in your class, it should be proceeded by some low stakes tasks and some time for practice.

Roo Languages Google Translate Sheet: This Google Sheet allows you to translate your vocabulary into  many different languages quickly - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E2erNvtwD-vkfeXwIPThx3XxVEFXF_zKbuDLjwo1SJ4/edit?usp=sharing 

Multilingual Dictionary Google Translate Sheet: This Google Sheet allows you to get definitions and pictures of your vocabulary words and translate it into many languages - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1LaQJ3u40sPYnOwSc4b8eUte9jjclzXswOlzu6EXmKq0/edit?usp=sharing 

• Video on using it: https://youtu.be/ZGuF8d3daNs?si=SCsxyWvOxombXCOx 

• Website for Language Codes: ISO 639-2 Language Code List - Codes for the representation of names of languages (Library of Congress) (loc.gov)  

Visual Vocabulary: This website provides photos of words for students but it is fairly  limited - https://visual-vocab.com/visual_vocabulary/public/visual_vocab.php?id=5300&letter=

I use two kinds of student selected differentiation:

• Task Level Differentiation: https://sites.google.com/view/mccoy-teaching-resources/writing/spicy-writing 

  • When I have a test or project, I will provide that project at three different levels: mild, medium, and spicy.  Students select the level they are ready for.  This avoids the teacher forcing expectations on students; they self-select.

  • To avoid students taking the easiest route, the assignments earn different amounts of points:

    • Mild gets 80% of the points.

    • Medium gets 90% of the points.

    • Spicy gets 100% of the points.

• Unit Level Differentiation: https://www.modernclassrooms.org/blog/ask-mcp-lesson-classifications-are-causing-confusion 

  • On a unit level, I have three classifications.  Students self select the levels they are ready for.  Students get additional points for the must and aspire to do assignments.

    • Should do: Any assignment that must be completed to read the learning objective.

    • Must do: Any assignment that practices and expands knowledge of the learning objective.

    • Aspire to do: Assignments for high level students to build much higher knowledge of the learning objective.

• You should explicitly tell your students that copying directly from the internet is not allowed.  

• You should do make sure to do some kind of comprehension check to ensure that students understand. 

• Then, reject work that is directly copies.

• Realize that some culture don't have the same ideas about authorship, the ownership of ideas and words, copyright, and plagiarism that Americans do.

  • "Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Source Referencing and Plagiarism" by Noelle Vance

    • TL;DR:  Plagiarism is viewed differently across cultures. In Western academia, citing sources is essential to protect individual ownership of ideas, while in other cultures—especially those with collective traditions—knowledge may be seen as communal, making attribution less emphasized. This creates challenges for international students who may unintentionally break Western citation rules. Practices like patchwriting (copying with minor changes) are often used as learning strategies but can be misread as plagiarism. Collaboration, common in some cultures, can also blur the lines of authorship. Educators should address these differences directly, teaching not only citation mechanics but also the philosophy behind academic integrity. A culturally sensitive approach can reduce misunderstandings, support ethical scholarship, and help students adjust to Western standards without stereotyping.

• These are my plagiarism materials.

  • Webpage: https://sites.google.com/view/mccoy23-24/units/0-5-plagiarism

  • Video: https://go.screenpal.com/watch/c0jQYCVk8Ux  

  • Branching Form: https://forms.gle/rFqQ2Jtrvy1kjbkQ8 

Plagiarism and AI

• Generally, actually trying to confirm that something is AI is a bad idea.  I would just ask the student to define all of the words used in the suspected piece.  This is knowledge that took me a long time to take seriously.  Do not go down the rabbit hole of trying to "prove" AI.  It will make you crazy.

Translation Methods:

• If you are struggling with ESOL students, please email jason.mccoy@slps.org

• If you need some resources right now, try this: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/help 

• If you are not able to provide English instruction to an ESOL student, translation might be the best way to get the material to the student.  You should do this carefully.  You should also know that some of our learners don't read in their first language, so leveling texts might be better than translating them.

  • Leveling Texts

    • Diffit does this for you: https://web.diffit.me/ 

    • It is possible to level texts with AI, but your results will vary.  I suggest asking the bot to: "Rewrite this text in simple English.  Where tier 2 words are used, define them in parentheses".

    • Common Lit will give you leveled texts:https://www.commonlit.org/ 

    • Newsela will give you leveled texts: https://newsela.com/ 

    • Providing Sentence Stems is helpful: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/sentence-stemsframes 

    • Providing wordbanks, terms, and definitions is helpful.

    • Explicitly covering vocabulary is helpful.

  • Translating Texts

    • Google Documents will translate the texts you have already created: https://support.google.com/docs/answer/187189?hl=en&co=GENIE.Platform%3DDesktop 

    • Google Translate will translate PDFs and whatever else you want to translate: https://translate.google.com/?sl=en&tl=ar&op=translate 

    • Chrome will translate webpages: https://go.screenpal.com/watch/cZQTlQVSzUH 

    • AI can do translation and translate for multiple languages: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/reduce-the-linguistic-load/rapid-ai-translation-with-multiple-languages 

    • Many popular stories are already translated and sometimes, you can find them through a google search.

GSTEM Live Spoken Translation Cheat Sheet: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xYpFKV7fbZllwm5z0yIawcpJsRhK3KWM/view?usp=sharing 

• • Leveling Texts

    • Diffit does this for you: https://web.diffit.me/ 

    • It is possible to level texts with AI, but your results will vary.  I suggest asking the bot to: "Rewrite this text in simple English.  Where tier 2 words are used, define them in parentheses".

    • Common Lit will give you leveled texts:https://www.commonlit.org/ 

    • Newsela will give you leveled texts: https://newsela.com/ 

    • Providing Sentence Stems is helpful: https://sites.google.com/view/mlltoolbox/sentence-stemsframes 

    • Providing wordbanks, terms, and definitions is helpful.

    • Explicitly covering vocabulary is helpful.