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Bilingual TransliteracyIn a Spanish dual Immersion program, students face reading comprehension challenges not only in English, but in Spanish as well. I have noticed that some of the students are struggling with the weekly comprehension tests and believe it’s because they are not interested in reading the stories. If they are English-Only speaker (EOs) and it’s Spanish week, they don’t seem as interested in the story. Conversely, if it’s English week then some of the English Learners (ELs) struggled to make connections. Thus, there was a need to find multi-modal strategies that could help students improve transliteracy skills in both languages.This project uses OCDE Project GLAD (Guided Language Acquisition Development) strategies as well as technology to help bilingual students achieve transliteracy improvement.
What is Transliteracy?Transliteracy was a concept I had not really heard of before joining this master's program. I came to learn that transliteracy means brining reading, writing, math, science, and technology together and giving all students equal access. I find myself constantly thinking about transliteracy when I plan my lessons, like how can I include a little bit of science and technology with the current reading piece. When I incorporate transliteracy methods in my class I see more student engagement. I am using a lot of GLAD strategies that has transliteracy methods embedded in them. For example I like to start the new reading unit with a pictorial of the main character and the visual of drawing the character in-front of them really gets their attention. As the days go by I go back to the pictorial and start adding student input of specific character traits. The visuals help those visual learners better understand the reading lesson. GLAD strategies really help all students better understand the content. The CCD chart is a graphic organizer that I like to use for my vocabulary and really helps students. It's more than just the word and definition. It includes prediction, picture, actual definition, and oral sentence. I also use chants that include new vocabulary and the chant helps those audio learners. GLAD strategies include a variety of different modalities in which children are exposed to new information in all different subject areas. Thus using strategies such as GLAD strategies is helping all my students across the subject areas. Transliteracy is essential in 21st century teaching because as educators we must try to help all of our students understand and connect to our lessons and we must use various modalities to get them there.
Why GLAD?Guided Language Acquisition Development (GLAD) is not something new. It has been around since the 80's and now it's making a comeback. Throughout my district all the schools are being GLAD trained once again. GLAD offers a variety of hands on and multi-tired lessons and strategies that help English Learners. GLAD is not a curriculum it's simply a set of strategies that help support student learning. Project GLAD has created numerous units for all grade levels and can be accessed through their official website and by requesting training. There are so many visuals and strategies that help scaffold in any subject area. Students are working together to produce work and are earning prizes such as literacy awards when they stay on task. Project GLAD includes a variety of modalities to scaffold information for all types of learners. My bilingual students were struggling in both English and Spanish reading comprehension so using GLAD strategies to scaffold in both languages was the best choice I could make. Throughout my units students were engaged, collaborated, and created projects using technology as well.
BlogsPlease check out the blogs I have done throughout my year with Touro. Click on the word blogs to visit my blog site.
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