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"Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day…" - 5 new articles
Sentences Of The Week geralt / Pixabay
I thought readers might, or might not, find this new regular post useful. Each week, I highlight several sentences, with links to their sources, that I find interesting/concerning/useful. And they may, or may not, be directly connected to education. I may also include my own comments or related links. This regular post will join my other regular ones on teaching ELLs, education policy, Artificial Intelligence, infographics, and Pinterest highlights, not to mention sharing of my regular Education Week posts. Here are this week’s sentences: Before asking, “What’s wrong with this student?” try asking: “What might this student be communicating, and what can I change?” Schools need to make sure they’re not so focused on compliance that “we lose the joy of learning,” Tos said. “Students need structure and accountability, absolutely. But they also need opportunities to lead, to make decisions, to take risks, to fail safely, and to discover what they are good at.” If it feels like all discourse has become unhinged and flooded with hate, full of provocations that once would have been shamed out of public life, this is probably because social media allows us the cover of anonymity and physical distance. Most people communicate digitally now, so most interactions are less mediated by shame. In person, you are much less likely to insult someone’s wife, for instance, because you would have to calculate the very real possibility that you would get punched in the face. Do we all have a what-if version of ourselves? What I’d learned in the disorder was to recognize good moments. Gen Z students who felt more connected at school were 5x more likely to look forward to class and feel prepared for the future. Compared with the 2022 results, almost every country saw a drop in families’ support for their kids’ education, especially for boys, as measured by questions about how often parents talk to their kids about their schoolwork or take an interest in their learning. Overall, less than half of students (48%) look forward to going to school every day or most days, the Gallup/Walton report found. “When you see people and recognize them and make them understand they matter, we’re halfway home,” he said. By the time I got home, I had concluded, based on a multitude of examples, that the two great pillars of American culture are church and self-storage. Neiman cites research showing that “the longer people study economics, the more selfish they become.” The reason, as she interprets it, is that they grow convinced that maximizing self-interest is normal, and that to do otherwise makes you a sucker. Not having to think is one of the most attractive and delicious things we can offer to the human brain. Oliver Stone dramatized the moment in his 1995 film, Nixon: The defeated, haggard president focuses on a painting of John F. Kennedy and says, with startling self-awareness, “When they look at you, they see what they want to be. When they look at me, they see what they are.”
     The “Little Rock Nine” Entered School On This Day In 1957 – Here Are Teaching & Learning Resources Alexandra_Koch / Pixabay
Today is an important day to remember. You might be interested in The Best Resources For Learning About The “Little Rock 9”
 The Best Research Out There On Using AI With English Language Learners TheDigitalArtist / Pixabay
For the life of me, I really can’t see AI providing any real learning benefit to English-proficient “mainstream” students, and I’m not seeing any research that suggests otherwise. It can, however, help all teachers in selective ways, including in material preparation, writing letters of recommendation, and in data analysis. There’s a slight caveat to what I said about student use, however. Though I haven’t seen any research on it for non-ELL students, I think AI can be helpful to students and teachers alike when it’s used in low-or-no-stakes adaptive learning practice platforms like Quill, or in playing games like Wayground, Booket or Kahoot. I think those are excellent formative assessment tools. AI with English Language Learners, however, is an entirely different story. In addition to their using those low-stakes activities I just mentioned, AI tools can be extremely useful in providing opportunities for ELLs to practice speaking – especially at home where there are often no other English speakers. Where there are no peer tutors present (even though I really don’t understand why any school wouldn’t use them), these same AI speaking tools can be helpful in class. AI tools like Google Translate can be essential for Newcomers as communication tools, and something like Google Storybook can be helpful in creating high-interest reading materials. And when a Newcomer is parachuted into an English-proficient class, AI-powered simultaneous translation tools can be a lifeline. Here is a list of research backing-up my perspective on using AI with ELLs (you might also be interested in THE BEST POSTS ABOUT USING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE WITH ELLS): Using AI to practice and assess real-world speaking tasks Though AI can help in ELL classes, studies like this new one show that ELLs will misuse ChatGPT just as much as everybody else when it comes to writing. Exploring the impact of artificial intelligence on English language teaching: A meta-analysis Employing AI in ESL Classrooms: Assumptions, Development, and the Use of AI-Integrated Writing Tasks MITIGATING PUBLIC SPEAKING ANXIETY IN ESL LEARNERS THROUGH TECHNOLOGY ENHANCED LANGUAGE LEARNING
AI or teacher feedback: which helps students speak better and feel less anxious?
Using ChatGPT to improve second language pronunciation USING GEMINI AI FOR ESL WRITING FEEDBACK AMONG FORM 4 STUDENTS AI feedback supported language learners’ writing confidence Chatbots for oral proficiency in English language learning: A systematic review  Six Ways To Help Students Motivate Themselves(Editor’s note: Today’s post is the latest of a few excerpts from our new book, The Better Teacher’s Toolbox, that I’ll be publishing here over the next two months. You can order the book here, and access more free resources from it here).
RELEVANCELinking Lessons to Personal GoalsRegularly asking students to identify how what they are learning might be able to help them in their lives or future careers has been found to increase motivation and academic achievement. There are two ways to facilitate this kind of self-generation of relevance. One is being more direct in asking students to connect a specific lesson to their lives, and the other is having them choose any school content and describe how it is relevant to them. We do the former pretty simply—periodically, we just ask students to write a short paragraph explaining how they think what they learned that day in our class or in the recent unit can be helpful to them in their lives. After they write about this kind of learning transfer, we have them share through a “speed-dating” system. Many get even more ideas after they hear from their classmates. The second version—where students can choose any school content and describe its relevance—we use for a more extended lesson. Character Lab created a specific “Build Connections” lesson that we like a lot and is freely available online. Students make one list of their interests and goals, then right next to it a list of topics they have learned about in class. They are then asked to make lines connecting as many of the two different lists as possible. Finally, they choose one from each column and explain in a short paragraph how they are connected. Again, students share in a “speed-dating” style. As opposed to students self-generating how class content is connected to their lives, direct communication simply means teachers explaining how it’s relevant. Some researchers have found that, though this method might be effective with students who perceive themselves as well-skilled academically, it may actually be de-motivating for others for various reasons. Some contributing factors could be because it may be viewed as a condescending message and/or they may want to reassert autonomy. Other research, however, suggests that teachers pointing out connections is better than not discussing them at all, especially if those connections are more near term (the math we’re learning will help you figure out how to get the best car loan) than far term (the math we’re learning will help you purchase a house). We previously discussed the value of a student goal-setting process that focused on “process goals” rather than their ultimate goals. This kind of prioritization is important, but it doesn’t mean we should completely ignore discussing ultimate/long-term goals. Having students identify their longer-term goals, and then having them identify process goals—or steps they can take—to achieve them can be an important strategy for identifying the relevance to them of what is happening in the classroom. For example, “Luis,” one of Larry’s English Language Learner students, showed no interest in learning English. He said he was planning to return to Mexico and join the military. Larry asked if he was planning on being a private or if he wanted to be an officer. Luis replied that he wanted to be an officer. Larry then asked him where he thought they sent their best officers for training. Comprehension dawned on Luis’ face—the United States, he answered. Though he did not become super-engaged after that interaction, Luis certainly showed much more interest than before in class. Piquing CuriosityPiquing students’ curiosity, sometimes called the “curiosity gap,” can make content relevant because students are eager to scratch that itch. Inductive learning is an instructional strategy puts students in the role of a detective using clues to solve the case—in effect, creating a curiosity gap to fill. And, boy oh boy, reactance lessons can spark a curiosity gap on steroids. The levels of student outrage increase after they learn each new way corporations try to manipulate them to bet, smoke, or buy junk food! In fact, just about any potential controversial topic—and which school subject doesn‘t have a long list of topics that could fit under that description—could serve a similar purpose, though you probably want to take care, talk to your administrator, and consider the political situation of your local school community before deciding on which ones to introduce to the class—no one benefits from your getting fired! Connecting Lessons to Student InterestsInstead of pushing students to connect what you want to teach, another option is to consider what they want you to teach. Putting this into action could range from inviting students to bring in texts (written or otherwise) that they like—music lyrics, TikTok videos, comics, TV shoes, fan fiction, and, yes, books—that the class could use for analysis (requiring, of course, that their language be classroom appropriate) to teachers taking into consideration what they know of their students’ interests into their lesson planning. For example, if you have many football fans in class, there’s no reason why in January you couldn’t use Super Bowl ads as a centerpiece of a unit on argument and persuasion.
 The Best Research On How Having Books In The Home Helps Students
Matt Barnum recently wrote in Chalkbeat about studying showing giving books to students to help build their home libraries helps academic achievement. I’ve written about previous studies, and different projects we did with the Davis Friends of the Library to help students at my old school to get books into their homes. Here are some of those posts: “Home Libraries Provide Huge Educational Advantage” Very Accessible Report On The Importance Of Home Libraries A Book in Every Home, and Then Some is a useful article in the New York Times about efforts to get books to low-income families. It contains links to some useful studies. Books in the Home Are Strongly Linked to Academic Achievement is from Pacific Standard. Statistic Of The Day: It’s Good To Have Books At Home STUDY: BOOKS AROUND THE HOUSE HELP KIDS, EVEN IF THEY DON’T READ THEM New Research Reveals the Power of a Large Home Library (Even If You Don’t Read Every Book) is from Inc.
You might also be interested in Best Posts On Books: Why They’re Important & How To Help Students Select, Read, Write & Discuss Them.  More Recent Articles
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