Parent Workshop in March

Dear Parents,

Please mark your calendars for Mr. Gurecki’s ESL Talk “Preventing Summer Brain Drain.” He will be presenting to parents of ESL students in Grades 3-5 on Tuesday March 27 at 2:50 in 4A14 (Mr. Martin’s room). Mr. Gurecki will address the way to create a strong summer plan to help your child consolidate and further enhance his/her English level gains over the summer. We hope to see you there.

Parent Newsletter: February

Dear Parents,

Third Grade is just at the beginning of field trip season and we are about to embark on a trip to the Puppet Theater, and soon thereafter, we are off to Taipei’s famous Aboriginal Museum. It’s an exciting time for the students and a rich source of new experiences and vocabulary for them. When we are on our trips, we always have the students write down some observations. As is the nature of learning, these words are often new, and students can sometimes write the word down without discovering the meaning. While we have been trying to pre-teach a number of vocabulary items and also follow up on meanings when we get back, there are many, many new words for the ESL students to absorb. For this reason, we’d like to introduce you to a vocabulary workshop that we have available on the blog. It can be found on a link at the right and also right here.

We will leave this link on the blog so that you can re-visit it as often as you like, to get ideas on how to consolidate new vocabulary items that your children are learning. You will find that many of these activities and games have been designed to be played and practiced at home, with a minimal amount of props or extras: you should be able to use all the activities straight away. We hope you do take the opportunity to use some of them, as they will be a way to consolidate all those new words and experiences that your children are having.

Apart from that, we must report that we are all really pleased with the progress of the ESL students and we’ll have another chance to discuss their progress soon at the quarter three conferences just around the corner. Mr. Braggett and Mr. Gurecki would also like to recommend their article, “The Power of Reading Transcends the Trends”. It looks at reading as an enduring and powerful catalyst for learning, the use of TAS 21st century libraries and how Sustained Silent Reading continues to deliver results in 2012. You can read it here, or find it on the link lists on the right.

Mr. Braggett and Mrs. Chen

Parent Newsletter: January

Dear Parents,

Amongst all the color and spectacle of the approaching Chinese New Year, the 3^rd grade ESL students are continuing to work hard on their language skills. Our reading and writing workshop is moving into top gear again and we have been doing lots of new and interesting work in class.

One of the things that we are concentrating on at the moment is essay writing. In all classes we’re just beginning this important genre (at a developmentally appropriate level). Our aim is that students will begin to embrace this critical genre and begin to learn persuasive skills. They will generate ideas and from these ideas formulate solid and sensible reasons to back up their arguments. They will learn how to write their very first 5 paragraph essay, a skill they will hone and develop all the way through middle school and high skill. Our aim is to introduce the genre and encourage kids to really love this persuasive art. So far, so good!

We know that you, as parents, are doing all you can to assist your children at home. One thing that we’d like to remind you about is pressure. Students don’t respond well to undue pressure at this age and developmental level. If you have concerns about your child’s progress in the program, by all means, make an appointment to see us to discuss things further, but try to keep your concerns from your children. By encouraging, supporting and spending as much time as you can reading with your child and being actively involved in their learning, you will help their progress so much more. We would also like to draw your attention to an article that Mr. Gurecki and I have written. I’m sure you will find it interesting as it draws a comparison between the great language learners and how we do things here at Taipei American School; here is the link, or you can find it on the right under, “Articles written by Braggett and Gurecki.”

Happy New Year!

November/December Newsletter

Dear Parents,

Recently, as you know, we conducted a series of assessments for the Grade 3 ESL students. The results of these assessments indicate that all students are progressing very well and making steady improvements in their reading comprehension and their vocabulary knowledge. This semester, we have been working in class, during writers’ workshop, on various skills to improve students’ writing. We are delighted to report that these skills were displayed in the writing component of these assessments. Every student was able to draw up an excellent plan, web, brainstorm list, character and setting summary etc. before they used this plan to help them write their short story. Many of the students showed an awareness of character development and used some description skills such as the use of similes.

While many of the students have performed very well, and many above our expectations, we still need to see their skills develop further before we would be confident that they would achieve success without support. To help your child, may we ask that you continue to provide excellent home support, including reading with your son or daughter as often as possible?  When you read, please continue to ask comprehension questions and clarifying questions and make comments, either in English, or your home language. It is this reading input which will result in even greater comprehension skills and eventually, in a richer vocabulary and enhanced story telling ability in their writing.

Mr. Braggett and Mrs. Chen

Parent Information Session

Dear Parents,

Please mark your calendars for the next ESL presentation for parents of ESL students in grades 3,4,5 on Thursday November 10, from 3:00 to 4:00 P.M. in the Lower School in room 3A11 (Mr. Jones’ room). As the year goes along and the students learn new reading strategies, it becomes increasingly important that the students can practice those strategies with their independent reading books. Thus, the topic will be ‘The Importance of Reading Just Right Books’.

We hope to see you there.

Sincerely, Mrs. Chen and Mr. Braggett

October Newsletter

First quarter has flown by and conferences were an unqualified success and a real triumph for your children. In all classes the main focus in language arts has been on skills in producing a writing piece and tactics and strategies used when reading to improve comprehension.

In writing, we have talked about “seed” stories compared to “watermelon” ones (ask your child!) and how to zoom in and focus on a smaller idea that can then be improved by adding interesting and varied vocabulary. We have also emphasized the need for revision, and you saw this at conference time when your child showed you a piece of writing that has been developed and revised and edited before publishing.

Often, when reading, people have a tendency to “wander off” and lose concentration. During the last month we have been talking about ways to improve our focus during reading as well as ways that we can improve our recall of facts in a book or our understanding of unknown vocabulary. We have also done some reading assessments this month which give us some excellent baseline data which will help us when assisting your child to select “just right” books. I am delighted to see that nearly all the ESL students are now selecting books more suitable for their level: to quote international school’s reading specialist, Carrie Ekey, “Hard books hurt readers”. 

By the time of our next monthly newsletter, we will have conducted the first semester ESL assessments, so we’ll make a few comments now. These assessments will be held from November 14^th, and will include vocabulary, reading comprehension and writing assessments. Some students may also do an oral language test to help us re-confirm their current ability level. 

After this, we will closely examine the results and then consult with the classroom teacher, whereupon we will make any decisions about release or retention. There is no special preparation needed for the assessments other than to get a good night’s sleep beforehand. Thank you for your continuing support of our program as we seek to improve your child’s language skills.

All our kids attended the Grade 8 Bio Fair yesterday: what a great opportunity to learn more science vocabulary with hands-on learning from Grade 8 student-teachers!

Parent Information Session

Dear Parents,

Next Wednesday, October 12^th at 2.50pm till 3.40pm, we will be holding an informal workshop in ESL classroom, 3A04, on the 3^rd  floor of the Lower School.

This workshop will be hands on (literally), as we will be issuing netbooks to explain all the resources available on the TAS website and the features of the Grade 3 ESL blog. We will explain how to use various sections of the blog, then give you time to explore on your own. We will be joined by some 4^th and 5^th grade parents as well.

We will be there during this exploration phase to answer any questions you may have about how to use these resources with your children. Please feel free to join us.

Kind regards, David Braggett and Susan Chen