I have been thinking a lot about bilingual education since being at LEAP. I was reading in the 1st chapter of the Herrera book that "bilingual instruction has positive outcomes for ELL students". As I reflect back on my study of French at St. Olaf, I realize that I would struggle to learn without bilingual instruction. (Granted I am horrible at learning languages and I would probably struggle even with all the best practices in place. In fact, you might be interested to know that when I was still babbling at the age of 3, my parents took me to a speech therapist who told my parents that it seemed like I was following my own language rules, just not English. I was in Speech Therapy until I was 13 when I finally learned how to say my last sound.) Anyway, I can definitely see how bilingual instruction would be vital for students. Yet it just isn't possible at a school like LEAP. There would either have to be a person who knew at least 150 languages/dialects or 150 teachers in the classroom. Both of those solutions are obviously not possible. I do not believe that bilingual solutions should be tossed out the window though. I would allow my students to use bilingual dictionaries to assist them, especially in the lower levels. I have asked other students to translate for a student in the 1c class I am in. Honestly I couldn't explain what "draw" meant without someone explaining. Poor Tri looked at me as if I was explaining geometry when I told him to draw a tree. I asked his friend to tell him what I meant and then Tri started to draw a tree immediately. I wouldn't want to rely on this method, but I agree with Herrera that bilingual instruction can be a positive asset to a SIOP program.

I thought it was interesting that the authors of the SIOP book suggest that teachers do cut and paste timelines rather than writing directly on a timeline. I can definitely see the purpose of this activity in cementing knowledge in one's brain. At the same time, I feel as if this activity could lose its meaning in an ELL classroom. Could this activity develop into the lower functioning students being assigned to cutting and the high functioning ELL students figuring out the actual time line? I think it could also be too childish for some "grown up" high schoolers. As with any activity, I would have to think about exactly how I would introduce the activity and what roles each member would play in a group.

I am having a hard time figuring out how to incorporate SIOP feature 26. How can I possibly make sure all students understand? For example, in the 27 student 1C class, there are many students who are not possibly on the same page as the teacher. Mali can read and write complete sentences and Xia is not literate in her L1 or L2. I just dont understand how all students will understand my lesson when there is such a wide variation of students.

I like the idea of picture walks, referenced in chapter 10 of the SIOP book. I actually just did a picture walk today with the students in my "reading club". I think it really helped a lot to describe different items before we even began reading the story. Xia was in my group and I think she was even involved in the story as she pointed out flowers, snow, ice, and rain. Maybe this is one way I could help students to access the lesson at their own ability levels. Although all students won't be at the highest level, my students will all reach the minimum threshold of my objectives (i.e. Xia) but some students can go even higher than that (i.e. Mali). This must be why offering so many different methods of instruction is so important in the SIOP method. The more ways a student can access the material the better.