Do you want motivated students?
Bad news is that you can’t motivate them. The GREAT news is that we know how to help them motivate themselves. This week we have some audio from my 2nd year students as they offer advice to newcomers. I reflect on their ideas and what I am doing to support their motivation.
The week 3 book study questions are at the bottom of this post!
You can listen to this week’s show here
I mention that I strongly suggest you watch this video by Larry Ferlazzo to get a clear explanation of how we can help students motivate themselves. Larry breaks down Autonomy, Competence, Relatedness and Relevance as they relate to what we can do in our classrooms:
In the podcast I promise to link to this QSSSA article by Valentina Gonzalez You’ll LOVE this questioning strategy!
I was thrilled to see a picture of Gerson Bermudez in the newcomer center at Cardiff Jr. High. Their newcomer students had so many questions about him were very clear about their connections to this student. I offer you the video as well:
Hat’s off to Sergio Lemus, Michelle Cooper and the other newcomer teachers at Cardiff. You’re doing great things with these young people! I was only with them about 20 minutes and I was overwhelmed with their positive mindset!
Using what we learned yesterday at Boosting Achievement with @MsSalvac @yates_lopez @CardiffColts @KatyOOL #growthmindset#grit#gerson#nothingisimpossible pic.twitter.com/mh8Qb7Pj7k
— Sergio Lemus (@MrLemoose) October 12, 2017
Thanks to Cardiff Jr High in Katy ISD for having me this week! I talk about their amazing teachers and scholars on the show.
Pam Broussard is the teacher in CyFair ISD who has English Learners who are putting on THEIR OWN conference for other English Learner students. You can join her facebook group here: https://www.facebook.com/LELLsEd/
BIG THANKS to these teachers who connected with us for #MysterySkypes this week!
Jennifer Hernandez from Indiana
Lindsey Fortgang from California
Where Can We Connect?
- #BoostingAchievement slow twitter chat book study Nov 6 – Dec 9. Jump in any time. Repeaters welcome. Find all the questions here: bit.ly/BAstudy17. Answer one or just give us your reflections, connections, booksnaps, etc!
- Attending Pathways to Greatness training to Support Newcomers by my mentor Dr. Michelle Yzquierdo, Dec 1, 2017
- Presenting at Region 4 Bilingual/ESL Conference (the students are presenting again!) Dec 15, 2017
- Attending The What’s Working in Texas Conference Jan 25, 2018 #SeidlitzConf
- Presenting at NABE 2018
- Presenting at the Abydos Literacy Conference in April 2018
- March 21 SAVE THE DATE – Using Tech with ELLs Conference in Houston. John Seidlitz and I will present this popular training again!
WEEK 3 BOOK STUDY
Boosting Achievement Week Three Questions (Part II in the book)
A GREAT post for this part of the book is this one that I wrote last summer. There are many folks in education who feel that we should not focus on grit narratives. And they have some good points. I defend my recommendations in this post about grit for SIFE: http://bit.ly/WeekThreeSIFE
3Q1) p. 33 Watch the video with the QR Code or at bit.ly/Coding4Newcomers. Hamsa taught his teacher a lot that day. Did he teach you or reinforce anything for you?
3Q2) p. 34 references Angela Duckworth’s TED Talk on “grit”. In her talk, Duckworth describes grit as passion and perseverance for very long-term goals. Most SIFE have persevered through something. How can we help them realize the strength, the perspective and the advantages they already possess?
3Q3) p. 33-34 Passion. Persistence. Motivation: many of us have activities that put us in “flow” just like Hamsa from the video. We can all lose track of time working toward a goal when we have a passion for it. Maybe it is running, or crafting, or blogging about education. If you can relate to this, reflect on it. Share your “flow” activity and why you think you show so much grit when working toward the goals of it.
3Q4) p. 38 & 39: We often say that every child brings gifts. These pages outline a few specific advantages of having newcomers in your classroom. How can you share this message with your staff, with your parents, with the world?
3Q5) How are you planning to leverage growth mindset? Do you have ideas for your students with limited education? How can we leverage all of this to build the growth mindset of the rest of the class, school or community?
3Q6) p. 40 -44: Breaking down the walls of your classroom: Our SIFE need more than grit and skill building if we want to grow leaders. How do global learning experiences level the playing field for SIFE? How do they propel them beyond grade level expectations?
3Q7) p. 45-47 The idea of a Social Contract (vs. “Rules for my Classroom”) is included in this part of the book. How does your classroom culture impact the mindset of the students.
3Q8) If we are trying to encourage a growth mindset, real SIFE, migrant or newcomer success stories are perfect resources. We can use them as mentor text, read-alouds or for units of study. Examples are bit.ly/FJimenez & bit.ly/EmilyFrancis. Please share other success stories you know about to our padlet here: bit.ly/SuccessPadlet