Scaffolding Approaches for CLD Learners
Karen A. McCay
28 July 2017
Scaffolds are temporary support from an instructor or fellow student, which help struggling learners to successfully navigate new content; the scaffolding person intentionally removes support gradually to ensure students develop independence in their new skills. For CLD learners, scaffolding is often required to ensure students can work in their Zone of Proximal Development at grade level tasks even if they need linguistic support to do so, which can incrementally be removed as students become more comfortable during the progression of a new unit of instruction. While many scaffolds help CLD learners success academically, the following strategies work well within many CLD models of instruction, and they also work for grade-level students, providing support for every learner.
BEGIN WITH RECALL OF PRIOR KNOWLEDGE
Helping students to recall their prior knowledge of a concept through brainstorming, listing, or other strategies can engage them at the beginning of a lesson, which prevents misbehavior and time-off-task. Doing so also prepares students for learning and primes their memories to connect old information with new information into a meaningful schema (Alber, 2014). Prepared learners mastery new content more successfully and therefore show growth with higher levels of success than students, who have not been prepared to learn with a successful teaching strategy.
FRONT-LOAD VOCABULARY
Students’ mastery of new content will increase if they receive direct instruction on new academic vocabulary as part of the initial lesson (Alber, 2014). Teaching the essential vocabulary before students are expected to master all of the content helps them to practice using the vocabulary as they navigate the content and take risks considering how to integrate their new learning into the existing framework of mastered concepts (Williams, 2015).
USE GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS
Graphic organizers are visual, so they help students, who are in differing levels of target language development to comprehend the lesson, and they also help develop essential learning strategies (Haynes, 2015). Instructors can use KWL charts to pre-assess student knowledge and lower the affective filter at the beginning of a lesson and then return to the organizer later to add what students have learned as a reflection activity (Herrera & Murry, 2016, p. 87).
DEVELOP VARIED COLLABORATION TIME
Students, who interact with their peers and their teacher in the target language, develop fluency, and they need a variety of opportunities to take risks and experiment in the academic setting with their developing language skills in heterogenous groups (Levine, Lukens, & Smallwood, 2013, p. 15). The more authentic the social interaction is, the more successful the scaffolding will be (Herrera & Murry, 2016, p. 225). Instructors should give time to talk, perhaps in a think-pair-share, to ensure students have enough variation and reflection during learning (Alber, 2014).
CONCLUSION
Many more strategies for supporting CLD learners and grade-level students can be used as scaffolds. Any support provided by a teacher or peer, which helps students work in their Zone of Proximal Development, and which is gradually removed as students develop independence, is a scaffold. Using these supports to help students grow into independent thinkers and learners is one of the skills--and arts--of masterful teaching.
Other Scaffolding Pages:
Cornell Notes
Performance Rubrics
Scaffolds and Tools for Independent Learners
More Resources:
A Video Demonstrating Scaffolding Strategies for CLD Learners
References
Alber, R. (2014, January 24). 6 Scaffolding strategies to use with your students: Support every student by breaking learning up into chunks and providing a concrete structure for each (Edutopia). Retrieved July 25, 2017, from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/scaffolding-lessons-six-strategies-rebecca-alber
Haynes, J. (2015, 12 March). 4 strategies for scaffolding instruction for ELs. Retrieved July 25, 2017, from http://blog.tesol.org/4-strategies-for-scaffolding-instruction-for-els/
Herrera, S. G., & Murry, K. G. (2016). Mastering ESL/EFL methods: Differentiated instruction for culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students, 3rd edition. Boston: Pearson.
Levine, L. N., Lukens, L., & Smallwood, B. A. (2013). The GO TO strategies: Scaffolding options for teachers of English language learners, K-12. For Project EXCELL, a partnership between the University of Missouri- Kansas City and North Kansas City Schools, funded by the US Department of Education, PR Number T195N070316. Available online at www.cal.org/excell.
Williams, V. J. (2015, May 21). 7 Ways to scaffold instruction for English language learners. Retreaved July 25, 2017, from https://www.nwea.org/blog/2015/7-ways-to-scaffold-instruction-for-english-language-learners/
Karen A. McCay
28 July 2017
Scaffolds are temporary support from an instructor or fellow student, which help struggling learners to successfully navigate new content; the scaffolding person intentionally removes support gradually to ensure students develop independence in their new skills. For CLD learners, scaffolding is often required to ensure students can work in their Zone of Proximal Development at grade level tasks even if they need linguistic support to do so, which can incrementally be removed as students become more comfortable during the progression of a new unit of instruction. While many scaffolds help CLD learners success academically, the following strategies work well within many CLD models of instruction, and they also work for grade-level students, providing support for every learner.
BEGIN WITH RECALL OF PRIOR KNOWLEDGE
Helping students to recall their prior knowledge of a concept through brainstorming, listing, or other strategies can engage them at the beginning of a lesson, which prevents misbehavior and time-off-task. Doing so also prepares students for learning and primes their memories to connect old information with new information into a meaningful schema (Alber, 2014). Prepared learners mastery new content more successfully and therefore show growth with higher levels of success than students, who have not been prepared to learn with a successful teaching strategy.
FRONT-LOAD VOCABULARY
Students’ mastery of new content will increase if they receive direct instruction on new academic vocabulary as part of the initial lesson (Alber, 2014). Teaching the essential vocabulary before students are expected to master all of the content helps them to practice using the vocabulary as they navigate the content and take risks considering how to integrate their new learning into the existing framework of mastered concepts (Williams, 2015).
USE GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS
Graphic organizers are visual, so they help students, who are in differing levels of target language development to comprehend the lesson, and they also help develop essential learning strategies (Haynes, 2015). Instructors can use KWL charts to pre-assess student knowledge and lower the affective filter at the beginning of a lesson and then return to the organizer later to add what students have learned as a reflection activity (Herrera & Murry, 2016, p. 87).
DEVELOP VARIED COLLABORATION TIME
Students, who interact with their peers and their teacher in the target language, develop fluency, and they need a variety of opportunities to take risks and experiment in the academic setting with their developing language skills in heterogenous groups (Levine, Lukens, & Smallwood, 2013, p. 15). The more authentic the social interaction is, the more successful the scaffolding will be (Herrera & Murry, 2016, p. 225). Instructors should give time to talk, perhaps in a think-pair-share, to ensure students have enough variation and reflection during learning (Alber, 2014).
CONCLUSION
Many more strategies for supporting CLD learners and grade-level students can be used as scaffolds. Any support provided by a teacher or peer, which helps students work in their Zone of Proximal Development, and which is gradually removed as students develop independence, is a scaffold. Using these supports to help students grow into independent thinkers and learners is one of the skills--and arts--of masterful teaching.
Other Scaffolding Pages:
Cornell Notes
Performance Rubrics
Scaffolds and Tools for Independent Learners
More Resources:
A Video Demonstrating Scaffolding Strategies for CLD Learners
References
Alber, R. (2014, January 24). 6 Scaffolding strategies to use with your students: Support every student by breaking learning up into chunks and providing a concrete structure for each (Edutopia). Retrieved July 25, 2017, from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/scaffolding-lessons-six-strategies-rebecca-alber
Haynes, J. (2015, 12 March). 4 strategies for scaffolding instruction for ELs. Retrieved July 25, 2017, from http://blog.tesol.org/4-strategies-for-scaffolding-instruction-for-els/
Herrera, S. G., & Murry, K. G. (2016). Mastering ESL/EFL methods: Differentiated instruction for culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students, 3rd edition. Boston: Pearson.
Levine, L. N., Lukens, L., & Smallwood, B. A. (2013). The GO TO strategies: Scaffolding options for teachers of English language learners, K-12. For Project EXCELL, a partnership between the University of Missouri- Kansas City and North Kansas City Schools, funded by the US Department of Education, PR Number T195N070316. Available online at www.cal.org/excell.
Williams, V. J. (2015, May 21). 7 Ways to scaffold instruction for English language learners. Retreaved July 25, 2017, from https://www.nwea.org/blog/2015/7-ways-to-scaffold-instruction-for-english-language-learners/