VISUALS! The more visuals you use, the better! Use visuals, pictures, gestures, and quick sketches.

Sentence Frames! When ELL students have sentence frames, they feel more able to show what they know.

Graphic Organizers!

I Have, Who Has game - You can pair your ELL with a partner. This is great for learning vocabulary and definitions. Include a visual on the card and it's even better. You teach more language, use "Do you have__?" because "do" is especially difficult for English Learners.

Have students create pictures or actions to illustrate new vocabulary, especially academic vocabulary.

Use word walls or illustrated word walls so that students have access to new vocabulary.

Create word maps so students can see how words relate to each other.

If appropriate for their English Language Development level, encourage students to speak in complete sentences.

Walk and Talk - pair students up and have them discuss while giving them the freedom to walk around.

Backwards Book Walk - scan a book's pictures, charts, and graphs, especially nonfiction, prior to reading and make a prediction about what they will learn.

Carousel Writing - To activate prior knowledge, place students in small groups to brainstorm about topics. Rotate the paper and have the last student summarize what all students have written.

Choose the Words - allow students to choose the words they need from a word wall for conversation or writing.

Discussion Starter Cards - Give students sentence frames on cards that they can use to join in on classroom discussions. "I think...", "In my opinion..."

Four Corners (or Two Corners) - Ask a question and have students move based on their response (yes/no, strongly agree/agree/disagree/strongly disagree)

Gallery Walk - Use with visuals and have students write or discuss what they see in the pictures.

Peer Editing - train all students on how to peer edit and partner students up.

Posted Phrases and Stems - Have sentences stems posted in various areas of the room for each content area.

Quick Writes - Let students demonstrate what they know, whether through sentences, phrases, or even just pictures.

​Repeated Reading - reading a text multiple times gives students a chance to become familiar with a text and its vocabulary.

Label visuals and objects with target vocabulary.

Use physical gestures or pictures when giving oral directions.

Use cognates (if possible).

Use charts with illustrated academic vocabulary.

Use chants, poems, songs.

Preview content using pictures, video, charts, etc.

Pre-teach key vocabulary terms.

Use props and realia during instruction.

Pair readers to read text with each other.

Require other students to label visuals.

Ask questions that have students create a list of words.

Have students create pictures, symbols, and non-linguistic representations for vocabulary.

Use adequate wait time (5-10 seconds, or give ELs the questions at the beginning of the lesson so they can formulate their response).

Use sentence frames in partner discussions.

Use word sorts.

Provide a list of important concepts and/or terms on a graphic organizer.

Use Cloze sentences with a word or picture bank.

Teach note-taking on a graphic organizer.

Provide practice of key grammatical structures in context of the lesson.

Use student-created books.

Provide graphics or objects to sequence steps in a process.

Use anticipation guides to preview content.

Model using academic language.

Provide graphic organizers or notes to scaffold retelling.

Encourage use of basic content area words.

Explain text features (headings, charts, etc.)

Model prediction for a text.

Teach and use signal words.

Provide practice for irregular grammatical structures in context of the lesson.

Use graphic organizers to structure listening activities.

Structure group discussions.

Use Jigsaw Reading to scaffold independent reading.

Provide rubrics and examples to scaffold writing assignments.

Model and use the writing process.

Provide multiple examples and non-examples of content vocabulary and topics.