Reaching All Students: accommodations in the world Ianguage classroom

All teachers know that we like a good alphabet soup: IEP, 504's, ELL, ESL, TAG... and the list goes on. While each student has their own learning needs, some students require additional help and receive help navigating school and preparing for adulthood. These students can receive help for anything from fine motor skills, to dyslexia, to brain injury. Additionally, students may only be eligible to receive these services in a math goal, or only a reading accommodation. While many core subject teachers receive help from a Special Education department, it seems that word language teachers either lack these students in the classroom or do not receive the same support as core subjects.

My experiences

Having worked in a variety of district sizes, this is what I experienced:

Large district 1

In this district I taught high school with block scheduling teaching Spanish 1. I had large classes in an urban setting. My most notable class was a class of 29, I had 4 students that were very gifted and left the last 20 minutes of every class to attend the local high school for only gifted students (they attend for the classes they need to and then are bused back to their regular high schools, they can take 1 or all 8 classes there based on performance, teacher recommendations, and testing scores). Depending on lectures and guest speakers, they would also come in late by half an hour. These students always made-up missed work and were never a problem, just early finishers (read my post about fast finishers here). This school did a nice job of not placing advanced native speakers in the lower levels unless needed for spelling, reading, grammar help. In this same class I also had two students with ankle tracking devices and 17 special education students with IEPs.

I had no Para Educators in my room, I didn't know any of them were identified as having IEP's until I noticed patterns in their work and behavior (3 weeks!!), and went over lunch to track down the head Special Education teacher and force him to tell me their accommodations. He then realized I had 17 students in one class and asked me why I was wasting his lunch if I could just ask the Para... I told him I didn't have on in my room and his response was "Yeah, I guess none of our Paras speak Spanish anyway."

Large district 2

I worked in a middle school in an affluent neighborhood (a stark contract from the last district). I taught Spanish Exploratory and Spanish 1. My classes were around 25 kids. At this age, I had a few TAG (talented and gifted) students stand out in each class but for the most part I did not have any Special Education students in my classes since they would have many more opportunities to take a world language at high school for four years, these students were often in reading skills or math skills classes instead of WL classes (I actually agreed with this). However, I did have several students in the same class that received Special Education services with 1:1 Para Educators as the students were either nonverbal or had other severely limiting needs. I loved these kiddos, and I made accommodations for them so they felt included and valued (one girl even started to say "hola" to me in the halls and would give me a high five; best high five's ever).

Medium district 1

I was with levels 2-4 and in all my classes about 50%, or more, of my students were native speakers. Most all could not write in Spanish, some could read, so we gave them a super informal placement test to determine where their needs were so the were either placed in Spanish 2 or 3 (4 was for college credit and they have to have a high school credit course completed before taking the college credit).

Medium district 2 and current small district

Students with accommodations are placed on whether or not it fits in their schedule or encouraged not to take a WL.

Making accommodations in a TPRS/CI class

Spanish 1

I truly believe that Spanish 1 is a special class that is pretty much an equal opportunity employer. Because the language is so basic, the playing field is equalized to some extent for student with specific IEP goals (math, language, etc).

If you teach in a traditional classroom with a textbook and workbook, I would suggest you keep any eye on student with both language and math goals. Many texts treat grammar as "formulas" and where students can apply these as a basic level and "plug and chug" with familiar vocabulary. This formulaic approach to language is very easy for some students to excel (they also tend to excel at math from my experience) and can let other struggle.

In the TPRS classroom and the traditional classroom, it is hard to go a day without reading. Most students with language goals struggle with reading comprehension and/or writing. Especially thinking about quizzes, some students struggle reading questions in English, making it difficult to answer without knowing what the question is asking for. Now asking comprehension questions in Spanish, where the word order is different and key helping questions words don't exist; "Do you have a hat?" "Tienes un gorro?". Spanish 1 students, especially in TPRS classroom, learn sentence by sentence which is helpful but can still be overwhelming.

I suggest asking for a para educator (special ed helper) if you have more than 3 students with IEPs and a large class. It is easier to work with them and support them in a smaller class. Either way, ask their special education teacher for accommodations that help the students in their English and math courses. Apply them in the same way or alter them to fit your class. At one school I had 17 kids with IEPs and the school wouldn't give me a para educator because they don't speak Spanish: it is not their job to teach, it is their job to support the student.

Native speakers in a Spanish 1 class, in a class with a majority of non-speakers, can make it feel like they are not going to benefit from class, and depending on their personalities it can become a classroom distraction. First, give a short written placement test (see mine here). You can see their reading comprehension and their spelling. Then I would recommend moving them to Spanish 2 or 3 depending on their literacy level. Spanish 1 is basically vocab building, if they have the vocab they can start right away on grammar and reading help in level 2 and fine-tune existing skills in Spanish 3.

If your school says no, I talk to my Spanish-speakers before or after school or during lunch. I ask them what they want to gain from this class besides the easy A. Sometime my speakers wanted grouped together and they did lots of novel/story reading and writing. I did much more traditional grammar work with them. I had one girl who wanted to be a teacher so she became my teacher aid and loved helping with acting, clarifying vocabulary, etc.

Spanish 2-4

If you were fortunate enough to have your students at the lower levels, you likely know their needs by the time they get to upper level classes. If not, ask the previous teacher what work and be cognizant that their scores may be reflecting a learning need, rather than their proficiency. The same suggestions I listed above apply at this level. BE EXTRA CAREFUL that you are meeting needs of all your learners.

My number one suggestion for upper-level teaching for students with accommodations in high school: Ask the student what they need after establishing a relationship with him/her, and continually follow-up. Many students at this level can self-reflect and tell you what does and doesn't work. Also be careful not to "cave into" giving them easier work that doesn't apply to their learning goals; that is cheating.

Students with severe delays/needs

I really only had this happen at my middle school exploratory or Spanish 1 classes. These students had their own 1:1 para educators (who were phenomenal) and there was obviously no way they could "learn Spanish". However, they brought joy to the classroom and had supportive peers, luckily for me. It broke my heart when it became obvious that there was no expectation for them to participate or enjoy class.

My number one suggestion is to ask their main teacher what skills the students are working on in the classroom and try to help out. Here is what I did:

My student with Downs Syndrome could write her name and could speak. Her goal at the end of the semester was to be able to use "hola" and "adios" correctly plus maybe recognize a few other vocab words. I took our vocab words and wrote them on the lined paper for preschoolers. The word were written with dashes so she could trace them. There were also clipart pictures to the side to color. She loved them. She was also working on counting money in her classroom so we worked on "Cuanto cuesta" and money names. At the end of the semester she mastered: hola, adios, bueno, uno, tres, cuatro, and could match a few colors. Her para educator cried when I left and thanked me.

My nonverbal student also had some physical limitations but loved music. So we started class every day with the same song so she could dance and the other kids sang along. They were working on fine motor skills in her classroom so I printed connected the dots pictures of "Mexican things" and let her para educator hep point out the next dots. I also did current vocabulary color images she could try to color in. She was able to match her head movements to "si" and "no" by the end of semester.

My students that could kind of read and write could also speak. We focused on introductions (he was working on manners and social skills in his room) and manner basics. He could memorize anything but not apply it appropriately. I focused on sequencing a conversation like a typical introduction conversation would go and he memorized that. He was able to us "por favor" and "gracias" appropriately by the end of the semester.

Key take aways

Ask, ask, ask, ask, ask for help. These student have someone assigned to help monitor progress and to help teachers make meaningful accommodations. Don't worry about bothering someone, worry about severing your students to the best of your ability!