Games make the learning process more fun
Virginia teachers adapt and innovate to help both student and adult English learners
ROANOKE, Va. – Spanish language filled the Salem High School hallways as baseball players and students teamed up for a schoolwide scavenger hunt.
About 15 Salem Red Sox team members joined more than 30 English language learners in early May as they searched for sticky notes with clues that sent them to their next objective. Written in English in black marker on a yellow note were the words: “Where do you go to eat lunch?”
Two pitchers on the minor league baseball team, Miguel Suero and Reidis Sena, towered over the trio of high school students who led them around the school. They hustled to the cafeteria and found the next clue. Tossing Spanish words back and forth as if playing catch, the players moved cautiously between English and Spanish.
The scavenger hunt, developed by Salem High English learner teacher Nolan Shigley, was a way for students to practice their English while working alongside the young ballplayers, many of whom were also learning English. After taking a while to warm up, players and students were soon laughing and high-fiving each other as they searched for clues.
“They’re learning the value of learning a new language and adapting to a new culture, but also embracing their own culture and that it’s okay to be Latino in a new country,” Shigley said. “It’s OK to speak Spanish and English, you know, learning to support each other and understanding that adults have the same experiences.”
Teachers have been at the forefront of finding innovative ways to help this growing population of English learners in the Roanoke County, Salem and Roanoke school systems.
Salem’s school division since 2014 has seen a 7% growth in students eligible for English learner services. The city schools serve 142 EL students among 3,800 students enrolled.
School systems are expanding their services not only to align with state regulations, but also to implement ideas from teachers and faculty to better meet the needs of their English learners.
Katie Hedrick, bilingual support specialist for the city of Roanoke, said there are multiple reasons for the rise in refugees coming to the region.
“We’re one of only (three) cities in Virginia with refugee resettlement organizations,” Hedrick wrote in an email. “And the number of refugees admitted has grown with both the upheaval in Afghanistan and the change in federal administration.”
When one cultural or language group settles in a specific area, she added, other family members are attracted to move near their family, giving them familiarity and a sense of community.
In Roanoke City Public Schools, the number of EL students has grown by 50% over the past nine years, with more than 1,630 English learners comprising nearly 12% of an enrollment of about 14,000 students.
An alphabet soup of acronyms describes people learning English who are coming from other language backgrounds. Federal, state and local programs use either English learner (EL), English Language Learner (ELL) or English as a Second Language (ESL). Virginia localities employ EL, which is the term used predominantly in this story.
Sharon Francisco saw a need and she acted on it. Years ago, she started an after-school club to help EL students in Roanoke County, where their population was climbing. Students she worked with since kindergarten see her in
Mount Pleasant Elementary School hallways and say excitedly: “See you this afternoon in homework club!”
Francisco, an EL teacher in Roanoke County, said her students do not get the help they need with homework because many of their family members are nonenglish speakers or speak very little English.
“This was the one school where pretty much all of my parents spoke Spanish, and spoke very little English, so they were really not able to help my kids with homework,” Francisco said. “The teachers understand that. But at the same time, the kids really needed help with homework.”
She started Homework Help Club so that her English learners could keep up in school.
Even children who were born in the United States need help with Englishspeaking skills, Francisco said.
“They’re still living in two worlds, basically, because they still have that Spanish influence at home,” she said. “And then they hear only English at school. So they’re still processing everything twice.”
Spanish is the most frequently spoken non-english language in Roanoke County schools, followed by high numbers of Arabic, Vietnamese and Mandarin, according to Cammie Williams, supervisor of English Language Learner and World Language programs with Roanoke County Public Schools.
The division has 27 schools serving grades K-12, which means English learners in the district are spread out across the county, requiring EL teachers to travel from school to school. Williams explains that navigating the teacher’s travel time and time with students is a challenge.
“Because our population is so spread out, not all teachers have had the experience of having an EL (student) in their class,” Williams said. “And I think that that is something that I just wish for every instructor, because you see a student through a different lens.
“I think some of the strategies that we use with our students ended up being good for all students, and learning about different cultures, I think, just enriches classroom experience, again, for all students.”