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Reading Support for Primary Immersion Students
The ACIE Newsletter, May 2004, Vol. 7, No. 3
Terri Fisher, Assistant Professor, Teacher Education Department,
Lancaster Bible College, Lancaster, PA
Priscilla Stoner, Assistant Principal, Nitrauer Elementary School, Lancaster, PA
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| First-grade immersion students from
Nitrauer Elementary School work on making syllables from letter
combinations. |
“Niños, miramos la cubierta de este libro que vamos a
leer. ¿De qué piensan que van a leer en este
libro?” Thesmall group of average first grade readers huddled
around the table, looking at their new guided reading book.
Sra. Hall, the first grade immersion teacher, encouraged
predictions about the book, translating student responses in English
to Spanish, modeling new vocabulary and proper syntax. This
group of students was reading a leveled book equivalent to a Reading
Recovery level 8 around mid-January. The goal was for all
students in first grade immersion to reach the benchmark of level
16 by the end of the year. Much remained to be accomplished.
LEARNING TO READ IN L1 VS L2
By mid-year, average to above average first grade immersion students
have learned many reading strategies. In kindergarten, the
Spanish phonetic foundation is established, in part through a
sequential writing program, which helps develop phonics, vocabulary,
and the rudiments of Spanish syntax. In first grade, the teacher
builds upon this foundation with a comprehensive review of phonics
at the beginning of the year. The students also review concepts
about print, such as reading left to right and top to bottom, use of
punctuation, and the difference between sounds, letters, words, and
sentences.
In learning how to read, English-speaking students draw on three cueing
systems: semantics, syntax, and phonics. For them,
semantics and syntax have been developing since birth. While the
English first grade students are concentrating on learning how to decode
(sounding out) through the use of English syntax and meaning, the
immersion students must learn the three main cueing systems
simultaneously. For example, when reading a book about a horse,
an English-speaking student can look at the picture and immediately offer
the word “horse” and can use the word horse in a
syntactically correct sentence. TheEnglish-speaking child is
learning to listen to the initial sound of the word horse (/h/) and match
that sound with the written word horse on the page. As the student
becomes more skilled, he will be able to match ending, and then medial,
sounds. Through this process, he cross-checks himself, using the cues
of syntax and semantics. In contrast, a Spanish immersion student
looks at the picture of a horse and can offer the English word
“horse.” However, this will not help him decode the
word “caballo” on the written page. Unlike his
English-speaking counterpart, as the immersion student is learning how
to decode the word “caballo,” he is also learning the meaning
of the word. In addition, he is still learning about Spanish
sentence structure and syntax. Fortunately for Spanish language
learners, Spanish is very phonetically consistent. Most Spanish
immersion students acquire the decoding aspect of learning to read
without much difficulty. Nevertheless, there are students who
struggle.
STRATEGIES FOR READING REMEDIATION
In our Spanish immersion program we see and remediate many types of
reading difficulties with our early readers. Often students confuse
the two languages, by reading Spanish words with English sounds.
This is especially true with students who are still in the letter naming
stage, and have not internalized the sounds that letters make.
Additionally, students may know the sounds of letters in isolation, but
have a difficult time combining the sounds into syllables and the
syllables into words. Also, many of our second language learners
have difficulty retaining the meaning of Spanish words, once they have
been introduced. Even with repeated usage, some students cannot
remember what words mean when they come to them in a sentence, thus
impairing the comprehension of the text. Diminished fluency is
often a result of these difficulties, which, in turn, also impedes
comprehension.
To remediate these reading challenges, we use many different
strategies. The strategies are not new or unique to immersion.
However, we have found that we may implement the strategies in a
slightly different way to meet the unique challenges of learning to
read in a second language.
Guided reading for ms the core of both our first grade immersion
reading program and our remediation program. In the classroom,
small, flexible groups of students meet three to four times a week
with the teacher to read and interact with a specifically chosen
text. The text is matched with the level of the readers in that
group. Additionally, the teacher selects a teaching point
based on the text. Examples of teaching points are the use of
punctuation, sentence structure, grammar usage, and vocabulary.
The text is usually a small, leveled book with pictures on most pages,
and somewhat controlled vocabulary and sentence structure.
Most of the texts are translations of English guided reading sets.
At times, this poses some difficulty, as translated words can be much
more difficult than what was originally intended for that level of
text. However, we have found them to be generally useful for
developing basic vocabulary and semantics.
For students who need reading remediation, guided reading is also
used. This allows the students three to four more exposures
to Spanish text at their reading level every week. This increase
in exposure does a lot to aid some struggling readers. In
addition, the reading specialist can review letters, sounds, and
vocabulary on a more individualized level with each student.
Much emphasis is placed on reading completely through the word, and
fluently re-reading words and sentences once they have been decoded
successfully. There is a lot of repetitive practice.
Another strategy that we use in our first grade immersion classroom
is “Making Words.” This strategy is very helpful in
reinforcing sound blending which leads to fluency. While this
strategy can be done with the whole class, we find it to be more
manageable and productive with a small guided group. The teacher
gives each student a predetermined set of letter cards. The
teacher then guides the students to make smaller words or syllables
with their letters. These chunks are then combined to make
longer, multi-syllabic words. For example, the teacher
distributes the letter cards c, m, s, i, a, a to the students.
First, she asks the students to make the word mi and then asks the
students to form the syllable sa. This is followed by having
the students combine the two chunks to make the word misa.
Finally, the students are asked to take the remaining letters and
combine them with misa to make camisa, the Spanish word for
shirt. Other words that could be made from these letters
include casa, saca, and cima.
For students needing additional reading remediation, the reading
specialist uses the Making Words strategy to reinforce patterns and
vocabulary taught in the classroom, as well as text used for guided
reading in the reading support classroom. The same procedure
is followed as in the classroom, but with different words and
syllables. This helps struggling readers to generalize and
to develop fluency. The reading specialist often sends home
letter cards for specific words in a guided reading text with the
first graders. This allows the students to practice their
skills at home and helps parents learn an easy way to support their
young readers.
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| First-grade teacher Jodie Hall works with an emerging reader at
Nitrauer Elementary. |
A “tried but true” recipe that we find successful to
implant vocabulary is the use of flashcards, matching word with
picture. Games such as Concentration and Bingo are effective
and fun for first graders. For students needing additional
remediation, the reading specialist initially focuses on high
frequency words such as the days of the week, months of the year,
colors, shapes, etc. Patterned writing is also effective for
solidifying frequent patterns in Spanish such as me gusta for which
students often use the horrifying yo me gusta.
For a percentage of all students, early literacy learning can be
challenging in the first language. For immersion students,
this challenge is even more complex and demanding. With
the use of the practices outlined above, the majority of our
Spanish immersion students acquire the skills to transition into
reading authentic literature.
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