September 1, 2023 • 35 mins
In just two short years it is projected that 25 percent of all students in American schools will be English Language Learners (ELL). Are our schools prepared for that? Seasoned educator Andrea Bitner helps us understand the explosion in ELL students and how our school systems can best handle this change.
Bitner, an educator for 23 years, fills us in on the unique challenges of teachers and schools as they prepare to cater to these students' distinctive needs, illuminating the paths to progress. Communication strategies with the parents of multilingual students are critical, along with a commitment to empathy in education. She shares her groundbreaking AACE system and some of the currently available assistive technologies that can help foster a conducive learning environment for ELL students.
Bitner is also an author and speaker who travels the country providing resources to help educators better teach, connect and communicate with their ELL students and families. She is the author of "Take Me Home," in which she shares the true and inspiring stories of 11 of her former students through first-hand accounts of what it's really like to be bilingual in the American school system. (The book includes English and Spanish versions under the same cover.) Find out more about Andrea, her speaking services and other ELL resources at andreabitnerbooks.com or email her at 4andreabitner@gmail.com.
"Outliers in Education" is a project of CEE, The Center for Educational Effectiveness. Find out more at effectiveness.org.
Produced by Jamie Howell at Howell at the Moon Productions.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Intro (00:00):
Outliers in Education is brought to you by CEE, the
Center for EducationalEffectiveness.
Better data, better decisions,better schools.
To find out more, visiteffectivenessorg.
Eric Price (00:15):
Hello, how's your Spanish?
Millions of K-12 studentsacross the US speak it perfectly
.
It's actually English.
That's the hang up.
As early as 2025, it'sprojected that one quarter
that's right, one in every fourstudents in America's public
schools will be an Englishlanguage learner.
Are we really ready for that?
We'll work to translate thosestatistics on today's episode of
(00:36):
Outliers in Education.
AD (00:40):
I think we really need to change how we look at what we do
in schools.
Intro (00:44):
Everything that we do as educators, it just comes back to
people.
AD (00:48):
I love it, even when it's hard, especially when it's hard.
Andrea Bittner (00:52):
Ultimately.
I mean, this is about what'sbest for kids.
Eric Price (00:56):
Bienvenido everyone, and welcome to another episode
of Outliers in Education.
I'm Eric Price, here with myco-host, Eric Boles from CEE,
the Center for EducationalEffectiveness, and I've just
about maxed out my Spanishspeaking abilities right there.
Bolesy school was tough enoughas it was, and I can't imagine
trying to do it withoutunderstanding the language, but
that's exactly what more thanfive million students are
(01:18):
signing up for right now as wehead into this school year.
That can spill trouble for them, as well as for many of their
teachers, who haven't beenequipped to deal with
non-English speaking studentsWell.
Ep.
Erich Bolz (01:28):
I can relate.
I had the good fortune to studya couple of times as a younger
person abroad and know what itfeels like to be in a country
where you're having a hard timewith the communication, with the
culture, with the customs, andreally it becomes an issue
pretty quickly unless you haveadequate supports.
Fortunately, our positiveOutliers Study of Schools in
Washington State provides uslots and lots of avenues for
(01:49):
what actually works in thisregard, because one of the four
groups we studied specificallywere schools that had high
proportions of Latino and Latinastudents in Washington State.
Eric Price (01:57):
Yeah, and I think that's one of those big things
that Outlier Study really lookedat was how can we effectively
reach those students that Ithink we really haven't equipped
our teachers, our whole, reallyour state, to be dealing with
effectively, I think, in theclassroom.
Erich Bolz (02:14):
I would just piggyback on that and say almost
every school that's in tierthree of school improvement in
Washington State is either infor kids who are eligible under
special education or identifiedas what we say in Washington
State, multilingual learnerslots of English language learner
nomenclature across a country,so it's a huge issue for us, not
only here, but we don't see alot of great models or templates
(02:36):
across the country either interms of who's really meeting
the needs of these students in apositive way.
Eric Price (02:41):
Yeah, I 100% agree, as both a teacher and an
administrator, and even goingdown and spending time in some
of those dual immersion pieces,I don't think there's a lot of
great answers and there's just alot of well if this and if that
.
Unfortunately for us, todaywe've got someone to help us
make sense of all of this Bullsy.
Our guest has been a teacherfor 23 years and many of those
(03:02):
with specific focus on Englishlanguage learners.
She travels the countryteaching other teachers how to
teach better and how to reachand communicate with
multilingual learners and theirfamilies.
So today, please welcome.
Educator.
Author speaker Andrea Bittner.
Andrea, thanks for joining ustoday on the show.
Andrea Bittner (03:19):
Oh, thank you so much for having me.
I'm thrilled to be here.
Eric Price (03:22):
Andrea.
So I'm floored by the growth inthe number of EL students in
the US In 2019 is around 10%,and now we're expecting to see
it climb as high as, like, 25%in 2025.
Are we ready for this, or isthis a crisis in education?
Andrea Bittner (03:36):
You know, I think that it's been really
interesting to see the numbers,how they have been climbing and
in my 23 years the districts,even locally here in
Pennsylvania, have seen anextreme uptake in students who
are coming not just into thecountry, but most of the
students now who are Englishlanguage learners are born here
and they're having theexperience of being at home with
mom and dad for the first fiveyears of their life speaking the
(03:59):
language that their parents youknow.
I call it their love language,right?
You speak to your children inthe language that you speak best
and that you can show you lovethem best in, and walking into
kindergarten on that first dayhearing English for the first
time and having the experiencefor the very first time that
their language that they've beenin love with with mom and dad
for so many years now doesn'twork for them.
(04:21):
Yes, absolutely there is thisuptake in English language
learners, not just from peoplewho are moving here, but from
people who are also mostly bornhere.
Eric Price (04:30):
And are we ready for that as a system?
Andrea Bittner (04:32):
I think that that's something that we are
definitely growing with as asystem.
You know a lot of our teachers.
It's not that they don't wantto do better, they're just not
sure how, and so, depending onthe students and teachers that
you have in the building, whohave may be more of a veteran
teacher or a teacher who hasnever worked with ELS before to
a teacher who had maybe someclass back in college once you
(04:55):
know that they're trying torefer back to.
So no, I don't think we'renecessarily ready, but I do
think people are very open togrowing in this area.
Erich Bolz (05:04):
And, in your experience, what would you say
are the two or three big rocksthat would cause us to be more
ready?
What would you provide asguidance to school
administrators who said, hey, Ican only ask my teachers to do
so many things.
What are those one to threethings that we need to start
doing tomorrow?
Andrea Bittner (05:18):
You know, the first thing I think that we do
is we ask a lot of questions.
I think that there's a lot ofassumptions that happen about
English language learners whenthey come into our schools.
You know, lack of languagenever equals lack of
intelligence, and I think thatsometimes people get really
stuck on.
Well, they just can't speakEnglish, but that's not a
demonstration of their reading,writing, listening and speaking,
(05:39):
knowledge, of concepts, ofcontent.
And so what I first say islet's look at the movie of a
student and not the snapshot.
And so let's get into theschools with first asking a lot
of questions.
Well, what does that mean?
Well, have you been able toaccess their records from their
prior state?
Are they coming from down thestreet?
Are they coming from a stateover, are they coming from a
different country?
(06:00):
Let's see what knowledge theybring to the table.
You know, have you communicatedwith their parents in the
language that they prefer?
The parents are the root to thestudent.
They are going to give you themost information.
So, as a district, what piecesof information or what tools do
you have for your teachers toaccess to gain confidence in
(06:20):
communicating with thosestudents' families, some of the
kids that come in parents whoprefer English, some of the kids
that come in a parents whomight prefer Spanish, some of
them might prefer both.
So you want to start to dodigging what we say lovingly
right in terms of the studentsabilities, where they're coming
from.
Were they in a state thatassessed them previously?
(06:41):
Were we to state inPennsylvania?
Did they have access scoresthat they're already walking
into, that they've been servicedin their prior place?
Did they exit the EL program intheir prior school?
And they're just an amazingbilingual kid that no longer
needs support.
So you want to start to accessthat.
Structural wise.
You also want to equip yourwhat I call frontline workers
(07:02):
with the ability to confidentlycommunicate with the
registration piece of it.
So a lot of schools will have,you know, our office teams are
our frontline people and so whenparents come in or parents call
, they're looking to them toassist them in a whole new
system that they may not knowmuch about, and so to have you
trained your office teams withthe translation tools that are
(07:23):
so easy and so available to useto confidently communicate with
the parents immediately.
I could go on, but I think thataccessing the student
information and accessing theparent information are the first
two pieces.
From there I'd say the thirdessential piece, eric, is have
you given your teachers theability to connect and
(07:44):
collaborate with their ELteacher?
Because a lot of times there'sa disconnect between the content
teachers and EL teachers andtheir ability to access each
other, because oftentimes ELteachers are spread out.
You know, I like to say we livein the city, not on the block.
We're heading from school toschool, we're heading from grade
level to grade level, sometimesdistrict to district, and so
are you being intentional aboutgiving your teacher and EL
(08:07):
teacher time to sit down andtalk about the student strengths
, areas of need together?
Eric Price (08:12):
Andrea.
So you talked about chattingwith those parents.
You know, getting at that root,how does that typically go?
So you know, I would sayprobably 15 years ago I was an
administrator and I had probably50% of my population was
Spanish speaking and we had areal difficult communication
issue with parents, even gettinga hold of them.
(08:32):
So in your experience, how isthat relationship with like
those parents and do they feellike they're a part of the
system for our EL learners?
Andrea Bittner (08:41):
Okay, yeah, that's a great question.
So, absolutely yes.
We work with hundreds of activestudents in our districts and
we have about 25 differentlanguages, so we have to be
ready to, you know, connect withour parents in multiple
modalities all the time 25different languages At least,
super easy.
Absolutely so.
The first thing that we do waswhen we get that notification
(09:03):
that a student has registeredfor the district that may speak
another language at whom is thathome language survey?
That's step one.
When we receive notificationfrom our registration office
that hey, I just got oneyesterday.
Hey, you know, we have a newstudent coming in from the
Ukraine, they indicated withthat check mark that another
language is spoken at his home,I like to start what I lovingly
(09:24):
call going fishing, and so nowwhat I do is two things.
I send out an email via aGoogle Doc that is translatable
to the family.
I introduce myself and this iswhat I say hey, my name is Miss
B.
I'm an English language learnerteacher here in the Interboro
School District.
I was notified in our schoolsystem that your child is also
(09:46):
speaking another language atwhom.
I think that's amazing.
Thank you so much for givingthem that gift.
I'd like to send you this emailwith this attached document to
learn more about your child'sability to speak a different
language at home.
Eric Price (09:59):
So you're reaching out and finding all of that from
that parent?
Yeah, okay.
Andrea Bittner (10:03):
And that translation feature is important
so they can put it in thelanguage they prefer to answer
the information most accurately.
But here are the kinds ofquestions on that document.
Does your child speak fluentlya different language at home or
do they just use it every oncein a while when they're speaking
with a relative?
Do they just listen to you anddad speak it to each other?
Or they've always been educatedhere in English, so you want to
(10:26):
start to kind of find out frommom and dad what does that look
like in your house, and so we doget a response from that
document from the parent, fromthere.
Now if I have follow-upquestions or I just want to
introduce myself further, whichI usually do, then I'm going to
call and I'm going to use aninterpreter on the phone, a live
interpreter, which there areamazing companies out there,
(10:48):
like language-based services,which is sometimes known as
interpreter talk, where we usePropio 1, which is a 24-hour a
day, at least hundreds oflanguages available, live
interpreters at an 800 numberthat I can have Vietnamese on
the phone in 30 seconds.
Eric Price (11:04):
And you're really digging for the depth of English
when you're talking with that.
Yeah, okay.
Andrea Bittner (11:09):
Yeah, hey, tell me about your student.
What do they enjoy about school?
Where are they coming from?
What do you worry about forthem?
What do I need to know?
Do they have siblings?
You know all those familyquestions that are so helpful to
us.
To plan for instruction, weneed to gather from their
parents, and so, yes, those arethe first two pieces of
(11:30):
accessing parents.
Is that Google Doc and thatphone call home?
Erich Bolz (11:35):
Andrea, thank you for sharing all that, and in
prior conversations you'veshared pretty incredible stories
of some relationships you'vebuilt with families, even in
tragic circumstances.
Could you share one of thosestories with us and why you feel
that's such an impactful avenueof serving these children and
families?
Andrea Bittner (11:51):
I can.
So I've worked as a teacher forabout 23 years and about 17 of
them have been spent workingwith English language learners,
and about 10 years ago I workedwith about 40 different students
, like I mentioned earlier, andwith at least 25 different
languages, and they came fromall walks of life.
We had students who wereadopted.
(12:11):
We had exchange students.
We had students who were bornhere.
We had students who had crossedthe border.
We had students who had waited10 years for Avisa and came
after their parents.
We had students who had waited10 years for Avisa and came
before their parents.
We had students who had visitedtheir parents sometimes.
So there were a lot of dynamicswithin this group of students
(12:31):
and no matter where they hadcome from or what language level
they were currently coming inon right, because we have levels
one through six and reading,writing, listening and speaking.
We had this classroom banner inour classroom and it said
education is freedom, educationis opportunity.
What's your plan?
Because, as high school kidswith only four years or less
(12:53):
left in their free educationthat they're receiving at this
time, we knew that we had tohave a plan and their plan
couldn't be you're going to goback to your other state or or
their district or other countryright now, and your plan can't
be I'm going to quit school andjust not do well here, because
your parents and teachers haveworked too hard to give you this
opportunity to be freelyeducated and become bilingual.
(13:17):
I had one particular group ofstudents, the Lopez family, and
I worked with all seven of theirchildren over a period of time,
and they happened to come fromthe country of El Salvador and
so they had all boys and onegirl, and we started with Sergio
and we worked our way all theway down to Nancy, and Nancy was
the only female in the familythat I had taught.
(13:37):
So they all went through thisprogram in this mentality and
graduated from high school.
And about a year after I wasfinished teaching Nancy, I was
outside at school one day and Isaw a bunch of helicopters and I
thought, well, like I hopeeverything's all right.
There's a lot of helicoptersoutside today.
And about an hour after that myprincipal came down to get me,
(13:58):
to let me know that one of mystudents had been hit by the
train and that student was Nancy, and unfortunately she died
that day.
But one of the biggestchallenges of that day, in
addition to the trauma thatNancy's death caused our school,
our community, our family, hersiblings, all these amazing kids
I'm working with in thisprogram and their teachers, was
(14:18):
that mom and dad were stilllearning English themselves, and
so, when they got the call thatsomething had happened, no one
on the local force spoke Spanish, and so they could kind of put
together that something waswrong.
And they could kind of puttogether that something had
happened, but they didn't knowwhich one of the children it was
.
So they went up to the tracksand they stood there for hours
(14:41):
calling all the kids and waitingfor someone to come and help
them understand what hadhappened to their daughter.
And so, as we traveled throughthe coming weeks, we navigated
the immigration process to getour brother to be able to come
and back and bury his sister.
We navigated the funeralprocess to help them communicate
with the local funeral parlorsto be able to bury their
(15:02):
daughter, which we did and wereable to do that for free.
We navigated the Latinocommunity and the church.
We navigated all of that inaddition to so many other things
, to help this family supportthe language that they were
learning at that time.
Eric Price (15:16):
So so, andrea, if you could help me out.
I'm a kid and I'm going to gothrough this system.
So I'm an EL learner and I'mnow in that kid's shoes.
So what kind of challengeswould a kid like that face?
And do we start to move intosome equity issues there?
Andrea Bittner (15:34):
So there are layers of challenges that they
face when they first come intothe system.
But the first thing that we'relooking for to determine how big
that challenge is going to beis what is their language?
How close is it to English?
If it's the Spanish-speakingcommunity, that's a win, because
it's a romance language andthere are a lot of cognates
there.
And, number two, how literateare they in their first language
(15:55):
?
Because if you have a studentwho comes into your building
who's literate in their firstlanguage, that is a win-win for
everybody.
Because now all I need to do isteach them the transfer skills,
teach them the differences.
They can already read and write.
They can do it in their firstlanguage, so I just need to show
them the differences as they'retransitioning to acquire the
(16:16):
second.
We've had students who have comein who were all-star students
from schools in Guatemala, whowere their top student in their
schools, beating theEnglish-speaking students in
math and reading within weeks inthe district.
I've also had the opposite.
I've had kids who have come infrom South America and other
countries who have never steppedfoot in a school, who had the
(16:39):
option of going to school.
One of my guys from last year,I got him as a middle schooler.
He was given the option of hiscountry to go to school every
day and learn to read or go playsoccer.
So what are you going to do?
You're going to go play soccer,right?
And so he spent his daysplaying soccer.
But now here's the difference.
When Christopher came into thebuilding, now I've got to teach
(17:00):
him as a seventh grade studenthow to read, and so now I'm
starting with A-Apple-A, and soyou have two or more.
I've had students who have comein from boarding schools, who
had British English and justneeded to learn some transition,
you know.
So I've had students from allover, but really that language
and that literacy piece is goingto be the first way to design a
(17:23):
plan for a challenge that couldshow up.
Eric Price (17:25):
All right, now you're speaking my language.
We'll be right back after ashort break with more from EL
Educator Andrea Bittner.
Right here on Outliers inEducation.
AD (17:40):
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(18:01):
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Eric Price (18:18):
And we're back.
We've been exploring theexplosion in English language
learners and whether or not theUS public schools are ready to
handle it with educator, authorand speaker Andrea Bittner from
Norwood, pennsylvania, goshAndrea.
Erich Bolz (18:30):
I had one more question and then, of course,
because you're fond ofinformation, now I have two.
So I'm going to ask the firstone.
I'm working with a school rightnow that has about 12% of their
student body Most of thestudents I'm talking about
inside of that 12% are ELstudents or ML students and
they're reading.
This is a middle school.
They're reading four, five, sixyears off of grade level, so
(18:51):
they're right at thatfoundational reading level that
you're talking about.
What advice do you have formiddle and high school staff
when you know, you know as ateacher, you're not trained in
those foundational, scientific,foundational elements of reading
?
What advice do you have for, ohmy gosh, what do I do?
This is 12% of my student bodyand they're not.
They're not reading forunderstanding, they don't know
(19:12):
how to read.
Andrea Bittner (19:13):
Yeah, absolutely .
I think this is where you startto access a lot of your
supports.
Number one I would talk to myreading specialist to access
information on what their skillsare in their first language.
Number two I would ask them todo a written piece to see how
strong they are in their firstlanguage, even if you couldn't
translate it, this is what youcould say Tell me what you miss
(19:33):
most about your prior school orcountry, or just your prior
school in the state they'recoming from, the.
Watching them write in theirfirst language is very telling
for a middle, any teacher, youknow, for any teacher because
are they using the same wordsover and over?
Are they not able to writeanything?
Can they write two or threesentences?
Do they use punctuation?
(19:54):
Even if you're not able totranslate it in that moment, you
can gauge pretty quickly.
What kind of skill do we havehere?
But how do you support that?
Right, they've got this novel.
I had this question yesterdayfrom a teacher right here in
Pennsylvania.
I need to teach night by EliWazel.
I have no idea how I'm going todo this with my newcomer.
Well, here's what we do.
Number one we access audio.
(20:15):
Students can listen to books.
Number two you can reduce thepacing in the audio.
So you can.
It's awesome.
Now you can go onto any YouTubevideo.
Most of the time somebody'sread it out loud and you can
reduce the pacing of the videoso that the student can listen
to it at a shorter pace.
When it comes to language,english is full of fluff.
(20:35):
I come from Philly.
We are one of the fastestspeaking, most impatient parts
of the country.
I love what you say.
And so where in the languagecan we reduce the fluff?
They don't need to read thewhole chapter.
Could they read a summary?
Could you just take ahighlighter and highlight the
key sentences from those pagesthat you need them to focus on?
(20:55):
Reduce the language, becauseit's not that they don't have
the intelligence, they justdon't have the words for it yet.
So the listening skills hereare really going to come into
play.
Then, when it comes to thelanguage reduction, you could
also think of.
I know chat GPT is a big topicright now, but something I will
say positive about it is thereis the ability to take a piece
(21:18):
of information and say to chatGPT.
I need you to create A summaryfor me of let's go with the book
Night Chapter 1 at a let's callit Level 2, english Language
Proficiency Level.
See what it pumps out, becauseit's going to reduce it.
Eric Price (21:39):
Can the kid be using that Any of those AI pieces, or
is a teacher to translate someof those AI things?
Andrea Bittner (21:45):
I mean you could .
I mean I don't see why not theother piece too?
There's a great tool out therecalled a C-Pen reader, and what
it does is you put the pen ontothe text, you have earbuds in
for the student, you scan thetext with the reader and it
reads to the student in English,spanish, french or I believe
they're adding other languages.
Wow.
But we have C-Pen readers in mybuilding and they are
(22:08):
phenomenal because it's a verycovert way for a middle or high
school student to be listeningto text in their first language
that's being translated for themwith that pen.
So don't be afraid of reallyresearching the technology.
There's a great website or app,I think, called Diffit that's
new that a lot of middle andhigh school teachers are using
(22:28):
again for those features forstudents to help them access
content.
I could go one-in-one, butthese are just a few.
These are just a few.
Erich Bolz (22:37):
Well, I have to say you've given me a lot for my
next technical assistanceappointment, so I thank you for
that at no additional charges,it turns out.
So, as we're working towardconclusion here, can you share
with us when you walk in and doyou see a school where EL
students are really flourishing?
What are those handful ofcharacteristics that are just
(22:57):
readily obvious?
Andrea Bittner (22:58):
Yeah, I kind of came up with an acronym I was
thinking about this earlier andwhat I called is the ACE system
and I kind of created thismyself.
And when I walk into a schooland I work with schools around
the country, I'm still teaching.
My district is awesome aboutallowing me to teach and go out
and help other teachers, but inour district, as one of I like
(23:18):
to proudly say one of the modelsthat's coming up for places
around here and around thecountry, this is what I kind of
see, the ACE system.
So first is these kids havebeen assessed.
You have given them the spaceto be assessed in their first
language, if possible, or withyour what we have, a leader
screener, where we are yourscreeners that you're using to
assess their English proficiency.
You have intentionallyscheduled them into classes
(23:42):
based on their grade level andtheir proficiency level so that
they are grouped with the bestchance to have success with
their EL teacher during the day,and you have mapped out the
recommendations for how oftenthey're seen.
So, for example, our level onesand twos are seen five days a
week, 30 minutes a day, fivedays a week.
Our level threes I like to callthat the sweet spot.
(24:04):
That's the spot where they'vegathered enough in my mind,
content, knowledge and sociallanguage to expand.
You know their content language.
We're seeing them two to threedays per week and then our level
fours here in PA.
They need a 4.5 to exit theprogram or seeing them on a
console, or maybe once a week.
So are you intentional aboutthe placement of your students
(24:26):
within their grades and theirproficiency levels?
Are you offering opportunitiesfor your middle and high school
students to gain creditedclasses for their English
language learner work here in PAand EL student can take English
with their EL teacher and havea credited course for it until
they're ready to go into themainstream.
(24:48):
I won't call it mainstream, butyou know that regular education
setting without the support ofthe EL teacher for ELI.
Are you also giving students theopportunity to gain skills in
their native language?
So, for example, here in ourdistrict we had created a class
called Spanish for nativespeakers.
So at the high school level ourSpanish teacher has created a
(25:10):
course that only EL students whospeak Spanish at home can take
because they were interrupted intheir literacy of Spanish.
So what is she doing with them?
She is teaching them thereading and writing of Spanish
in that course as nativespeakers at home.
From that they then take atranslation certification, if
(25:31):
they would like to, during theirsenior year, so that they're
walking out into the world as acertified translator, and so
that's motivation for them, youknow they can use it if they
want to, you know.
So that's the first piece assess, right.
And then during the year, areyou progress monitoring your
students?
Are your teachers continuallymeeting with each other, etc.
And adjusting their languagelevels as they go?
(25:52):
Because, remember, where anEnglish language learner starts
is not where they're going toend up.
You know, all theseaccommodations and things that
we're doing in place in thebeginning will fade over time
and so it's important to kind ofassess all of that in the
beginning.
The second piece accommodatethat second A of A accommodate.
Have you given your teachersthe ability to meet with their
(26:13):
EL teacher to learn theaccommodations that are required
in order to show that thatstudent is demonstrating
progress with the accommodationsin place?
Because in where I am, astudent cannot fail a class
without the teacher and the ELteacher together being able to
demonstrate that we put thesesupports in place and they still
(26:33):
failed.
And so that accommodation piece, again that will fade over time
with those conversations isimportant and giving your
teachers the confidence to knowwhat to do.
You know, and that's part ofthe role that we play.
The final two pieces arecommunicate and elevate.
So communicate We've talkedabout that a little bit today.
Are you communicating with yourEL students parents confidently
(26:54):
?
Are you communicating as a teamabout your EL student in the
building confidently?
And finally, are you givingyour EL students the ability to
communicate with each other andhave access to each other?
We do that a lot in our district.
We connect our kidsbuilding-wide, district-wide and
county-wide.
We've written some grants andwhat these grants have allowed
(27:14):
us to do are have K to 12community experiences four times
a year, and so we are takingour kids and letting them meet
with other kids within ourdistrict who are speaking the
first-same languages as them.
And I can't tell you howmotivating it is for me as a
teacher to see my little guysthat are in elementary school
speaking Arabic and French andRussian and Pashto and Tui and
(27:39):
beyond light up when they see amiddle schooler who speaks the
first-same language as them.
And I love seeing my highschool kids be the leaders to
mentor those middle andelementary kids when we have
these community experiences,because it gives them a sense of
pride and it reduces theirfeelings of isolation.
We bring our alumni back everyyear to communicate with our
(28:02):
high school kids.
Hey, here's what's waiting foryou.
Hey, here's why being bilingualis a gift.
Here's why you should betelling everybody that you're
bilingual.
Don't hide that.
That's your secret party trick.
That's what they tell them.
Eric Price (28:15):
You can switch it on and off whenever you want.
Andrea Bittner (28:18):
You know it's the truth, so I get very
passionate about it.
Eric Price (28:21):
It sounds like this really is an MTSS for language
and you've got an IEP.
Really, when your dosing timeis kind of appropriate to
student need, does that, doesthat something I would agree?
Yeah, okay, yeah, I would agree.
I mean that structure in place.
Andrea Bittner (28:37):
Absolutely, and then that last place is just
elevate.
You know elevate comes down toare you giving your students
opportunity to showcase theirpride, not only within the EL
classroom but within thebuilding?
So, taking a look at thephysical space of your building,
are you celebrating thestudents diversity that is
occurring there?
Are you recognizing what'simportant to them, what they
(28:59):
celebrate, what they don'tcelebrate?
Are you acknowledging you knowthe parent input that's coming
from the outside?
Are you taking a minute tothrow out all your assumptions
and taking a look at a studentwho's coming in to see if their
classes need to be elevated interms of academic challenges?
Because a lot of times studentsare placed in lower level
(29:20):
classes.
I had a student from Rwanda.
He spoke three differentlanguages.
He was in culture shock.
For the first six months theydidn't think he could read.
He could.
He just was going through themotions of whole to shock as he
assimilated into a new place.
Within six months he was in anhonors level ELA class and
exited.
You know.
So you want to be thinkingabout how can you elevate these
(29:42):
students to increase theiropportunities for what they're
headed to in the future.
So I know I get reallypassionate about it, but that's
where I'm at.
Eric Price (29:50):
But we shouldn't limit them just because they
have a language issue.
We shouldn't limit them becausethey can be accessing some much
more challenging instruction.
Andrea Bittner (29:58):
Yeah, Absolutely , you know.
I say it's time to flip thescript.
Instead of looking at an ELstudent and saying I want
English right now, look at thatstudent and say you're learning
English, wow, wow, and just givetheir parents that same respect
, that same respect.
Eric Price (30:15):
Andry.
There is a ton here and thisreally is a masterclass for both
teachers and administrators.
So thank you for just really agood gillian, great ideas, and
this is the time in the showwhen we really lean on our
master of wrapping up, which isMr Bolsey.
What do you got for ournutshell today?
Oh, was I supposed to?
Erich Bolz (30:35):
take notes and summarize this.
Is that part of the podcastformula?
So actually I have a lot and Iagree.
I think this is somethingeveryone should absolutely
listen to in the teachingadministrative profession,
because you're going to get alot out of this 30 minutes.
So really, where I went firstwas you know it's interesting to
think that most of our ELstudents are born here.
(30:57):
I think just helping kind ofimbue that knowledge might
change some dialogue in ourcountry around how we feel about
the immigration issues ingeneral Questions, really
starting with you got to be adetective to find out everything
you can about the family, thekids, the backgrounds and really
important, like with any otherstudents that we serve, really
no to EL students or EL familiesare exactly alike.
(31:18):
Love the idea of whatadministrators can do.
They can set up systems so thatthey're.
It ensures collaborationbetween a regular education
teacher and an EL specialist.
So you know what are we doing?
Intentionally put those systemsin place.
I love the entire discoursearound assistive technology and
all the things that we can do.
Familiar with many of thoseinterventions, but really hadn't
(31:39):
thought about chat.
Gpt is a teacher's best friendand one of the things that I
always try to do when I'mworking out in the field is
teachers don't want to go to onemore conference.
They don't want 10 more hoursof work at night or on the
weekends.
They're justifiably overwhelmedin the profession right now.
So to have access to somethinglike chat GPT and to ask a
really well structured query andget something that's kicked out
(32:00):
inside of just a handful ofseconds for those of you who
have used chat GPT that then canturn around and be a resource.
What a what a brilliant exampleof assistive technology.
And obviously Andrea gave us awhole lot more than that Love
how she really broke it down.
You know I'm always interestedin one of those characteristics
that you can kind of see, youcan tangibly get your hands
around inside of an effectiveschool, and that a system was
(32:23):
just great.
So big takeaway for me was liketo get our heads around what we
can tangibly see in successfulschools and when.
What we see in those schools,according to Andrea, was assess,
accommodate, communicate andelevate.
So quick recap there, and thengoing back to two big points
that she made.
First one I love the signeducation is freedom, education
is opportunity.
(32:43):
What's your plan?
All of these things that Andreatalked about.
Do they just help EL students?
Oh my gosh, if you're a teacherand you have these strategies
and skills in your bag, you'regoing to be able to better reach
all your students.
So again, EL teaching is justreally, really great teaching
and after 25 years in publiceducation, I live in awe of
educators and your storyresonated with me so much and we
(33:05):
think about what educators doin general.
I can think of a millionexamples in my career of
donations and food and timespent and time given.
But wow, orchestrating afuneral, helping a family with a
different language based access, a funeral process, is just one
of those many readily acceptedother duties as a sign that we
see in our public educationsystem.
(33:26):
So again, Andrea, thank you forreminding us that we should all
stand in awe of the incrediblework that educators do, and
thank you for the gift of yourknowledge.
What you shared today is goingto make a huge impact across the
audience that none of us wouldhave previously reached.
So props to you.
Eric Price (33:42):
How we do EP.
I think fantastic.
Andrea, is there anything you'dlike to add to that amazing
wrap up?
Andrea Bittner (33:47):
You know, I just want to say thank you.
You know I'm proud to standalongside all of you and teach
these amazing students.
I'm enjoying the time that I'mhaving teaching and getting to
travel the country and work witheducators.
I did write a book about theexperience that I referenced
earlier.
It's called Take Me Home.
Take Me Home is a true story of11 of my former bilingual
(34:08):
students, who give a firsthandaccount of what it's really like
to become bilingual in America,and we weave Nancy's story
through it, and so that is oneproud piece that took a tragedy
and turned it into somethingthat's been helpful to educators
all across the country, andpeople can also reach out to me
anytime I have educators emailme.
Hey, I just need an idea.
Can you hop on a zoom for 20minutes?
(34:28):
My school's really strugglingbecause we're better together,
and so people can find me atAndrea Bitner books dot com.
You can send me a directmessage and reach out anytime.
Eric Price (34:38):
Well, thank you for that reference.
That was my next question, sothat's perfect, because I'm
people are I'm sure people arejust like smokes.
How do I get ahold of you?
Because so many of us areneeding some of those resources,
how to reach out.
So, andrea, thank you again forbeing on the show.
That was amazing, somethingthat we absolutely need to hear,
and it's going to be a growingissue as we move forward in the
future.
(34:58):
So thanks again for being onthe show, andrea, anytime.
Erich Bolz (35:01):
And thanks to all of you for joining us today on
Outliers in Education.
You can find this episode andmore, anywhere you listen to
your favorite podcasts or youcan visit us online at
effectivenessorg.
Until next time, this has beenOutliers in Education.
Intro (35:21):
If you'd like to find out how to gather the data you need
to help drive positive changein your school or district, take
a moment to visit CEE, theCenter for Educational
Effectiveness, ateffectivenessorg.
Better data, better decisions,better schools
wwweffectivenessorg.
Outliers in Education is brought to you by CEE, the
Center for EducationalEffectiveness.
Better data, better decisions,better schools.
To find out more, visiteffectivenessorg.
Eric Price (00:15):
Hello, how's your Spanish?
Millions of K-12 studentsacross the US speak it perfectly
.
It's actually English.
That's the hang up.
As early as 2025, it'sprojected that one quarter
that's right, one in every fourstudents in America's public
schools will be an Englishlanguage learner.
Are we really ready for that?
We'll work to translate thosestatistics on today's episode of
(00:36):
Outliers in Education.
AD (00:40):
I think we really need to change how we look at what we do
in schools.
Intro (00:44):
Everything that we do as educators, it just comes back to
people.
AD (00:48):
I love it, even when it's hard, especially when it's hard.
Andrea Bittner (00:52):
Ultimately.
I mean, this is about what'sbest for kids.
Eric Price (00:56):
Bienvenido everyone, and welcome to another episode
of Outliers in Education.
I'm Eric Price, here with myco-host, Eric Boles from CEE,
the Center for EducationalEffectiveness, and I've just
about maxed out my Spanishspeaking abilities right there.
Bolesy school was tough enoughas it was, and I can't imagine
trying to do it withoutunderstanding the language, but
that's exactly what more thanfive million students are
(01:18):
signing up for right now as wehead into this school year.
That can spill trouble for them, as well as for many of their
teachers, who haven't beenequipped to deal with
non-English speaking studentsWell.
Ep.
Erich Bolz (01:28):
I can relate.
I had the good fortune to studya couple of times as a younger
person abroad and know what itfeels like to be in a country
where you're having a hard timewith the communication, with the
culture, with the customs, andreally it becomes an issue
pretty quickly unless you haveadequate supports.
Fortunately, our positiveOutliers Study of Schools in
Washington State provides uslots and lots of avenues for
(01:49):
what actually works in thisregard, because one of the four
groups we studied specificallywere schools that had high
proportions of Latino and Latinastudents in Washington State.
Eric Price (01:57):
Yeah, and I think that's one of those big things
that Outlier Study really lookedat was how can we effectively
reach those students that Ithink we really haven't equipped
our teachers, our whole, reallyour state, to be dealing with
effectively, I think, in theclassroom.
Erich Bolz (02:14):
I would just piggyback on that and say almost
every school that's in tierthree of school improvement in
Washington State is either infor kids who are eligible under
special education or identifiedas what we say in Washington
State, multilingual learnerslots of English language learner
nomenclature across a country,so it's a huge issue for us, not
only here, but we don't see alot of great models or templates
(02:36):
across the country either interms of who's really meeting
the needs of these students in apositive way.
Eric Price (02:41):
Yeah, I 100% agree, as both a teacher and an
administrator, and even goingdown and spending time in some
of those dual immersion pieces,I don't think there's a lot of
great answers and there's just alot of well if this and if that
.
Unfortunately for us, todaywe've got someone to help us
make sense of all of this Bullsy.
Our guest has been a teacherfor 23 years and many of those
(03:02):
with specific focus on Englishlanguage learners.
She travels the countryteaching other teachers how to
teach better and how to reachand communicate with
multilingual learners and theirfamilies.
So today, please welcome.
Educator.
Author speaker Andrea Bittner.
Andrea, thanks for joining ustoday on the show.
Andrea Bittner (03:19):
Oh, thank you so much for having me.
I'm thrilled to be here.
Eric Price (03:22):
Andrea.
So I'm floored by the growth inthe number of EL students in
the US In 2019 is around 10%,and now we're expecting to see
it climb as high as, like, 25%in 2025.
Are we ready for this, or isthis a crisis in education?
Andrea Bittner (03:36):
You know, I think that it's been really
interesting to see the numbers,how they have been climbing and
in my 23 years the districts,even locally here in
Pennsylvania, have seen anextreme uptake in students who
are coming not just into thecountry, but most of the
students now who are Englishlanguage learners are born here
and they're having theexperience of being at home with
mom and dad for the first fiveyears of their life speaking the
(03:59):
language that their parents youknow.
I call it their love language,right?
You speak to your children inthe language that you speak best
and that you can show you lovethem best in, and walking into
kindergarten on that first dayhearing English for the first
time and having the experiencefor the very first time that
their language that they've beenin love with with mom and dad
for so many years now doesn'twork for them.
(04:21):
Yes, absolutely there is thisuptake in English language
learners, not just from peoplewho are moving here, but from
people who are also mostly bornhere.
Eric Price (04:30):
And are we ready for that as a system?
Andrea Bittner (04:32):
I think that that's something that we are
definitely growing with as asystem.
You know a lot of our teachers.
It's not that they don't wantto do better, they're just not
sure how, and so, depending onthe students and teachers that
you have in the building, whohave may be more of a veteran
teacher or a teacher who hasnever worked with ELS before to
a teacher who had maybe someclass back in college once you
(04:55):
know that they're trying torefer back to.
So no, I don't think we'renecessarily ready, but I do
think people are very open togrowing in this area.
Erich Bolz (05:04):
And, in your experience, what would you say
are the two or three big rocksthat would cause us to be more
ready?
What would you provide asguidance to school
administrators who said, hey, Ican only ask my teachers to do
so many things.
What are those one to threethings that we need to start
doing tomorrow?
Andrea Bittner (05:18):
You know, the first thing I think that we do
is we ask a lot of questions.
I think that there's a lot ofassumptions that happen about
English language learners whenthey come into our schools.
You know, lack of languagenever equals lack of
intelligence, and I think thatsometimes people get really
stuck on.
Well, they just can't speakEnglish, but that's not a
demonstration of their reading,writing, listening and speaking,
(05:39):
knowledge, of concepts, ofcontent.
And so what I first say islet's look at the movie of a
student and not the snapshot.
And so let's get into theschools with first asking a lot
of questions.
Well, what does that mean?
Well, have you been able toaccess their records from their
prior state?
Are they coming from down thestreet?
Are they coming from a stateover, are they coming from a
different country?
(06:00):
Let's see what knowledge theybring to the table.
You know, have you communicatedwith their parents in the
language that they prefer?
The parents are the root to thestudent.
They are going to give you themost information.
So, as a district, what piecesof information or what tools do
you have for your teachers toaccess to gain confidence in
(06:20):
communicating with thosestudents' families, some of the
kids that come in parents whoprefer English, some of the kids
that come in a parents whomight prefer Spanish, some of
them might prefer both.
So you want to start to dodigging what we say lovingly
right in terms of the studentsabilities, where they're coming
from.
Were they in a state thatassessed them previously?
(06:41):
Were we to state inPennsylvania?
Did they have access scoresthat they're already walking
into, that they've been servicedin their prior place?
Did they exit the EL program intheir prior school?
And they're just an amazingbilingual kid that no longer
needs support.
So you want to start to accessthat.
Structural wise.
You also want to equip yourwhat I call frontline workers
(07:02):
with the ability to confidentlycommunicate with the
registration piece of it.
So a lot of schools will have,you know, our office teams are
our frontline people and so whenparents come in or parents call
, they're looking to them toassist them in a whole new
system that they may not knowmuch about, and so to have you
trained your office teams withthe translation tools that are
(07:23):
so easy and so available to useto confidently communicate with
the parents immediately.
I could go on, but I think thataccessing the student
information and accessing theparent information are the first
two pieces.
From there I'd say the thirdessential piece, eric, is have
you given your teachers theability to connect and
(07:44):
collaborate with their ELteacher?
Because a lot of times there'sa disconnect between the content
teachers and EL teachers andtheir ability to access each
other, because oftentimes ELteachers are spread out.
You know, I like to say we livein the city, not on the block.
We're heading from school toschool, we're heading from grade
level to grade level, sometimesdistrict to district, and so
are you being intentional aboutgiving your teacher and EL
(08:07):
teacher time to sit down andtalk about the student strengths
, areas of need together?
Eric Price (08:12):
Andrea.
So you talked about chattingwith those parents.
You know, getting at that root,how does that typically go?
So you know, I would sayprobably 15 years ago I was an
administrator and I had probably50% of my population was
Spanish speaking and we had areal difficult communication
issue with parents, even gettinga hold of them.
(08:32):
So in your experience, how isthat relationship with like
those parents and do they feellike they're a part of the
system for our EL learners?
Andrea Bittner (08:41):
Okay, yeah, that's a great question.
So, absolutely yes.
We work with hundreds of activestudents in our districts and
we have about 25 differentlanguages, so we have to be
ready to, you know, connect withour parents in multiple
modalities all the time 25different languages At least,
super easy.
Absolutely so.
The first thing that we do waswhen we get that notification
(09:03):
that a student has registeredfor the district that may speak
another language at whom is thathome language survey?
That's step one.
When we receive notificationfrom our registration office
that hey, I just got oneyesterday.
Hey, you know, we have a newstudent coming in from the
Ukraine, they indicated withthat check mark that another
language is spoken at his home,I like to start what I lovingly
(09:24):
call going fishing, and so nowwhat I do is two things.
I send out an email via aGoogle Doc that is translatable
to the family.
I introduce myself and this iswhat I say hey, my name is Miss
B.
I'm an English language learnerteacher here in the Interboro
School District.
I was notified in our schoolsystem that your child is also
(09:46):
speaking another language atwhom.
I think that's amazing.
Thank you so much for givingthem that gift.
I'd like to send you this emailwith this attached document to
learn more about your child'sability to speak a different
language at home.
Eric Price (09:59):
So you're reaching out and finding all of that from
that parent?
Yeah, okay.
Andrea Bittner (10:03):
And that translation feature is important
so they can put it in thelanguage they prefer to answer
the information most accurately.
But here are the kinds ofquestions on that document.
Does your child speak fluentlya different language at home or
do they just use it every oncein a while when they're speaking
with a relative?
Do they just listen to you anddad speak it to each other?
Or they've always been educatedhere in English, so you want to
(10:26):
start to kind of find out frommom and dad what does that look
like in your house, and so we doget a response from that
document from the parent, fromthere.
Now if I have follow-upquestions or I just want to
introduce myself further, whichI usually do, then I'm going to
call and I'm going to use aninterpreter on the phone, a live
interpreter, which there areamazing companies out there,
(10:48):
like language-based services,which is sometimes known as
interpreter talk, where we usePropio 1, which is a 24-hour a
day, at least hundreds oflanguages available, live
interpreters at an 800 numberthat I can have Vietnamese on
the phone in 30 seconds.
Eric Price (11:04):
And you're really digging for the depth of English
when you're talking with that.
Yeah, okay.
Andrea Bittner (11:09):
Yeah, hey, tell me about your student.
What do they enjoy about school?
Where are they coming from?
What do you worry about forthem?
What do I need to know?
Do they have siblings?
You know all those familyquestions that are so helpful to
us.
To plan for instruction, weneed to gather from their
parents, and so, yes, those arethe first two pieces of
(11:30):
accessing parents.
Is that Google Doc and thatphone call home?
Erich Bolz (11:35):
Andrea, thank you for sharing all that, and in
prior conversations you'veshared pretty incredible stories
of some relationships you'vebuilt with families, even in
tragic circumstances.
Could you share one of thosestories with us and why you feel
that's such an impactful avenueof serving these children and
families?
Andrea Bittner (11:51):
I can.
So I've worked as a teacher forabout 23 years and about 17 of
them have been spent workingwith English language learners,
and about 10 years ago I workedwith about 40 different students
, like I mentioned earlier, andwith at least 25 different
languages, and they came fromall walks of life.
We had students who wereadopted.
(12:11):
We had exchange students.
We had students who were bornhere.
We had students who had crossedthe border.
We had students who had waited10 years for Avisa and came
after their parents.
We had students who had waited10 years for Avisa and came
before their parents.
We had students who had visitedtheir parents sometimes.
So there were a lot of dynamicswithin this group of students
(12:31):
and no matter where they hadcome from or what language level
they were currently coming inon right, because we have levels
one through six and reading,writing, listening and speaking.
We had this classroom banner inour classroom and it said
education is freedom, educationis opportunity.
What's your plan?
Because, as high school kidswith only four years or less
(12:53):
left in their free educationthat they're receiving at this
time, we knew that we had tohave a plan and their plan
couldn't be you're going to goback to your other state or or
their district or other countryright now, and your plan can't
be I'm going to quit school andjust not do well here, because
your parents and teachers haveworked too hard to give you this
opportunity to be freelyeducated and become bilingual.
(13:17):
I had one particular group ofstudents, the Lopez family, and
I worked with all seven of theirchildren over a period of time,
and they happened to come fromthe country of El Salvador and
so they had all boys and onegirl, and we started with Sergio
and we worked our way all theway down to Nancy, and Nancy was
the only female in the familythat I had taught.
(13:37):
So they all went through thisprogram in this mentality and
graduated from high school.
And about a year after I wasfinished teaching Nancy, I was
outside at school one day and Isaw a bunch of helicopters and I
thought, well, like I hopeeverything's all right.
There's a lot of helicoptersoutside today.
And about an hour after that myprincipal came down to get me,
(13:58):
to let me know that one of mystudents had been hit by the
train and that student was Nancy, and unfortunately she died
that day.
But one of the biggestchallenges of that day, in
addition to the trauma thatNancy's death caused our school,
our community, our family, hersiblings, all these amazing kids
I'm working with in thisprogram and their teachers, was
(14:18):
that mom and dad were stilllearning English themselves, and
so, when they got the call thatsomething had happened, no one
on the local force spoke Spanish, and so they could kind of put
together that something waswrong.
And they could kind of puttogether that something had
happened, but they didn't knowwhich one of the children it was
.
So they went up to the tracksand they stood there for hours
(14:41):
calling all the kids and waitingfor someone to come and help
them understand what hadhappened to their daughter.
And so, as we traveled throughthe coming weeks, we navigated
the immigration process to getour brother to be able to come
and back and bury his sister.
We navigated the funeralprocess to help them communicate
with the local funeral parlorsto be able to bury their
(15:02):
daughter, which we did and wereable to do that for free.
We navigated the Latinocommunity and the church.
We navigated all of that inaddition to so many other things
, to help this family supportthe language that they were
learning at that time.
Eric Price (15:16):
So so, andrea, if you could help me out.
I'm a kid and I'm going to gothrough this system.
So I'm an EL learner and I'mnow in that kid's shoes.
So what kind of challengeswould a kid like that face?
And do we start to move intosome equity issues there?
Andrea Bittner (15:34):
So there are layers of challenges that they
face when they first come intothe system.
But the first thing that we'relooking for to determine how big
that challenge is going to beis what is their language?
How close is it to English?
If it's the Spanish-speakingcommunity, that's a win, because
it's a romance language andthere are a lot of cognates
there.
And, number two, how literateare they in their first language
(15:55):
?
Because if you have a studentwho comes into your building
who's literate in their firstlanguage, that is a win-win for
everybody.
Because now all I need to do isteach them the transfer skills,
teach them the differences.
They can already read and write.
They can do it in their firstlanguage, so I just need to show
them the differences as they'retransitioning to acquire the
(16:16):
second.
We've had students who have comein who were all-star students
from schools in Guatemala, whowere their top student in their
schools, beating theEnglish-speaking students in
math and reading within weeks inthe district.
I've also had the opposite.
I've had kids who have come infrom South America and other
countries who have never steppedfoot in a school, who had the
(16:39):
option of going to school.
One of my guys from last year,I got him as a middle schooler.
He was given the option of hiscountry to go to school every
day and learn to read or go playsoccer.
So what are you going to do?
You're going to go play soccer,right?
And so he spent his daysplaying soccer.
But now here's the difference.
When Christopher came into thebuilding, now I've got to teach
(17:00):
him as a seventh grade studenthow to read, and so now I'm
starting with A-Apple-A, and soyou have two or more.
I've had students who have comein from boarding schools, who
had British English and justneeded to learn some transition,
you know.
So I've had students from allover, but really that language
and that literacy piece is goingto be the first way to design a
(17:23):
plan for a challenge that couldshow up.
Eric Price (17:25):
All right, now you're speaking my language.
We'll be right back after ashort break with more from EL
Educator Andrea Bittner.
Right here on Outliers inEducation.
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Eric Price (18:18):
And we're back.
We've been exploring theexplosion in English language
learners and whether or not theUS public schools are ready to
handle it with educator, authorand speaker Andrea Bittner from
Norwood, pennsylvania, goshAndrea.
Erich Bolz (18:30):
I had one more question and then, of course,
because you're fond ofinformation, now I have two.
So I'm going to ask the firstone.
I'm working with a school rightnow that has about 12% of their
student body Most of thestudents I'm talking about
inside of that 12% are ELstudents or ML students and
they're reading.
This is a middle school.
They're reading four, five, sixyears off of grade level, so
(18:51):
they're right at thatfoundational reading level that
you're talking about.
What advice do you have formiddle and high school staff
when you know, you know as ateacher, you're not trained in
those foundational, scientific,foundational elements of reading
?
What advice do you have for, ohmy gosh, what do I do?
This is 12% of my student bodyand they're not.
They're not reading forunderstanding, they don't know
(19:12):
how to read.
Andrea Bittner (19:13):
Yeah, absolutely .
I think this is where you startto access a lot of your
supports.
Number one I would talk to myreading specialist to access
information on what their skillsare in their first language.
Number two I would ask them todo a written piece to see how
strong they are in their firstlanguage, even if you couldn't
translate it, this is what youcould say Tell me what you miss
(19:33):
most about your prior school orcountry, or just your prior
school in the state they'recoming from, the.
Watching them write in theirfirst language is very telling
for a middle, any teacher, youknow, for any teacher because
are they using the same wordsover and over?
Are they not able to writeanything?
Can they write two or threesentences?
Do they use punctuation?
(19:54):
Even if you're not able totranslate it in that moment, you
can gauge pretty quickly.
What kind of skill do we havehere?
But how do you support that?
Right, they've got this novel.
I had this question yesterdayfrom a teacher right here in
Pennsylvania.
I need to teach night by EliWazel.
I have no idea how I'm going todo this with my newcomer.
Well, here's what we do.
Number one we access audio.
(20:15):
Students can listen to books.
Number two you can reduce thepacing in the audio.
So you can.
It's awesome.
Now you can go onto any YouTubevideo.
Most of the time somebody'sread it out loud and you can
reduce the pacing of the videoso that the student can listen
to it at a shorter pace.
When it comes to language,english is full of fluff.
(20:35):
I come from Philly.
We are one of the fastestspeaking, most impatient parts
of the country.
I love what you say.
And so where in the languagecan we reduce the fluff?
They don't need to read thewhole chapter.
Could they read a summary?
Could you just take ahighlighter and highlight the
key sentences from those pagesthat you need them to focus on?
(20:55):
Reduce the language, becauseit's not that they don't have
the intelligence, they justdon't have the words for it yet.
So the listening skills hereare really going to come into
play.
Then, when it comes to thelanguage reduction, you could
also think of.
I know chat GPT is a big topicright now, but something I will
say positive about it is thereis the ability to take a piece
(21:18):
of information and say to chatGPT.
I need you to create A summaryfor me of let's go with the book
Night Chapter 1 at a let's callit Level 2, english Language
Proficiency Level.
See what it pumps out, becauseit's going to reduce it.
Eric Price (21:39):
Can the kid be using that Any of those AI pieces, or
is a teacher to translate someof those AI things?
Andrea Bittner (21:45):
I mean you could .
I mean I don't see why not theother piece too?
There's a great tool out therecalled a C-Pen reader, and what
it does is you put the pen ontothe text, you have earbuds in
for the student, you scan thetext with the reader and it
reads to the student in English,spanish, french or I believe
they're adding other languages.
Wow.
But we have C-Pen readers in mybuilding and they are
(22:08):
phenomenal because it's a verycovert way for a middle or high
school student to be listeningto text in their first language
that's being translated for themwith that pen.
So don't be afraid of reallyresearching the technology.
There's a great website or app,I think, called Diffit that's
new that a lot of middle andhigh school teachers are using
(22:28):
again for those features forstudents to help them access
content.
I could go one-in-one, butthese are just a few.
These are just a few.
Erich Bolz (22:37):
Well, I have to say you've given me a lot for my
next technical assistanceappointment, so I thank you for
that at no additional charges,it turns out.
So, as we're working towardconclusion here, can you share
with us when you walk in and doyou see a school where EL
students are really flourishing?
What are those handful ofcharacteristics that are just
(22:57):
readily obvious?
Andrea Bittner (22:58):
Yeah, I kind of came up with an acronym I was
thinking about this earlier andwhat I called is the ACE system
and I kind of created thismyself.
And when I walk into a schooland I work with schools around
the country, I'm still teaching.
My district is awesome aboutallowing me to teach and go out
and help other teachers, but inour district, as one of I like
(23:18):
to proudly say one of the modelsthat's coming up for places
around here and around thecountry, this is what I kind of
see, the ACE system.
So first is these kids havebeen assessed.
You have given them the spaceto be assessed in their first
language, if possible, or withyour what we have, a leader
screener, where we are yourscreeners that you're using to
assess their English proficiency.
You have intentionallyscheduled them into classes
(23:42):
based on their grade level andtheir proficiency level so that
they are grouped with the bestchance to have success with
their EL teacher during the day,and you have mapped out the
recommendations for how oftenthey're seen.
So, for example, our level onesand twos are seen five days a
week, 30 minutes a day, fivedays a week.
Our level threes I like to callthat the sweet spot.
(24:04):
That's the spot where they'vegathered enough in my mind,
content, knowledge and sociallanguage to expand.
You know their content language.
We're seeing them two to threedays per week and then our level
fours here in PA.
They need a 4.5 to exit theprogram or seeing them on a
console, or maybe once a week.
So are you intentional aboutthe placement of your students
(24:26):
within their grades and theirproficiency levels?
Are you offering opportunitiesfor your middle and high school
students to gain creditedclasses for their English
language learner work here in PAand EL student can take English
with their EL teacher and havea credited course for it until
they're ready to go into themainstream.
(24:48):
I won't call it mainstream, butyou know that regular education
setting without the support ofthe EL teacher for ELI.
Are you also giving students theopportunity to gain skills in
their native language?
So, for example, here in ourdistrict we had created a class
called Spanish for nativespeakers.
So at the high school level ourSpanish teacher has created a
(25:10):
course that only EL students whospeak Spanish at home can take
because they were interrupted intheir literacy of Spanish.
So what is she doing with them?
She is teaching them thereading and writing of Spanish
in that course as nativespeakers at home.
From that they then take atranslation certification, if
(25:31):
they would like to, during theirsenior year, so that they're
walking out into the world as acertified translator, and so
that's motivation for them, youknow they can use it if they
want to, you know.
So that's the first piece assess, right.
And then during the year, areyou progress monitoring your
students?
Are your teachers continuallymeeting with each other, etc.
And adjusting their languagelevels as they go?
(25:52):
Because, remember, where anEnglish language learner starts
is not where they're going toend up.
You know, all theseaccommodations and things that
we're doing in place in thebeginning will fade over time
and so it's important to kind ofassess all of that in the
beginning.
The second piece accommodatethat second A of A accommodate.
Have you given your teachersthe ability to meet with their
(26:13):
EL teacher to learn theaccommodations that are required
in order to show that thatstudent is demonstrating
progress with the accommodationsin place?
Because in where I am, astudent cannot fail a class
without the teacher and the ELteacher together being able to
demonstrate that we put thesesupports in place and they still
(26:33):
failed.
And so that accommodation piece, again that will fade over time
with those conversations isimportant and giving your
teachers the confidence to knowwhat to do.
You know, and that's part ofthe role that we play.
The final two pieces arecommunicate and elevate.
So communicate We've talkedabout that a little bit today.
Are you communicating with yourEL students parents confidently
(26:54):
?
Are you communicating as a teamabout your EL student in the
building confidently?
And finally, are you givingyour EL students the ability to
communicate with each other andhave access to each other?
We do that a lot in our district.
We connect our kidsbuilding-wide, district-wide and
county-wide.
We've written some grants andwhat these grants have allowed
(27:14):
us to do are have K to 12community experiences four times
a year, and so we are takingour kids and letting them meet
with other kids within ourdistrict who are speaking the
first-same languages as them.
And I can't tell you howmotivating it is for me as a
teacher to see my little guysthat are in elementary school
speaking Arabic and French andRussian and Pashto and Tui and
(27:39):
beyond light up when they see amiddle schooler who speaks the
first-same language as them.
And I love seeing my highschool kids be the leaders to
mentor those middle andelementary kids when we have
these community experiences,because it gives them a sense of
pride and it reduces theirfeelings of isolation.
We bring our alumni back everyyear to communicate with our
(28:02):
high school kids.
Hey, here's what's waiting foryou.
Hey, here's why being bilingualis a gift.
Here's why you should betelling everybody that you're
bilingual.
Don't hide that.
That's your secret party trick.
That's what they tell them.
Eric Price (28:15):
You can switch it on and off whenever you want.
Andrea Bittner (28:18):
You know it's the truth, so I get very
passionate about it.
Eric Price (28:21):
It sounds like this really is an MTSS for language
and you've got an IEP.
Really, when your dosing timeis kind of appropriate to
student need, does that, doesthat something I would agree?
Yeah, okay, yeah, I would agree.
I mean that structure in place.
Andrea Bittner (28:37):
Absolutely, and then that last place is just
elevate.
You know elevate comes down toare you giving your students
opportunity to showcase theirpride, not only within the EL
classroom but within thebuilding?
So, taking a look at thephysical space of your building,
are you celebrating thestudents diversity that is
occurring there?
Are you recognizing what'simportant to them, what they
(28:59):
celebrate, what they don'tcelebrate?
Are you acknowledging you knowthe parent input that's coming
from the outside?
Are you taking a minute tothrow out all your assumptions
and taking a look at a studentwho's coming in to see if their
classes need to be elevated interms of academic challenges?
Because a lot of times studentsare placed in lower level
(29:20):
classes.
I had a student from Rwanda.
He spoke three differentlanguages.
He was in culture shock.
For the first six months theydidn't think he could read.
He could.
He just was going through themotions of whole to shock as he
assimilated into a new place.
Within six months he was in anhonors level ELA class and
exited.
You know.
So you want to be thinkingabout how can you elevate these
(29:42):
students to increase theiropportunities for what they're
headed to in the future.
So I know I get reallypassionate about it, but that's
where I'm at.
Eric Price (29:50):
But we shouldn't limit them just because they
have a language issue.
We shouldn't limit them becausethey can be accessing some much
more challenging instruction.
Andrea Bittner (29:58):
Yeah, Absolutely , you know.
I say it's time to flip thescript.
Instead of looking at an ELstudent and saying I want
English right now, look at thatstudent and say you're learning
English, wow, wow, and just givetheir parents that same respect
, that same respect.
Eric Price (30:15):
Andry.
There is a ton here and thisreally is a masterclass for both
teachers and administrators.
So thank you for just really agood gillian, great ideas, and
this is the time in the showwhen we really lean on our
master of wrapping up, which isMr Bolsey.
What do you got for ournutshell today?
Oh, was I supposed to?
Erich Bolz (30:35):
take notes and summarize this.
Is that part of the podcastformula?
So actually I have a lot and Iagree.
I think this is somethingeveryone should absolutely
listen to in the teachingadministrative profession,
because you're going to get alot out of this 30 minutes.
So really, where I went firstwas you know it's interesting to
think that most of our ELstudents are born here.
(30:57):
I think just helping kind ofimbue that knowledge might
change some dialogue in ourcountry around how we feel about
the immigration issues ingeneral Questions, really
starting with you got to be adetective to find out everything
you can about the family, thekids, the backgrounds and really
important, like with any otherstudents that we serve, really
no to EL students or EL familiesare exactly alike.
(31:18):
Love the idea of whatadministrators can do.
They can set up systems so thatthey're.
It ensures collaborationbetween a regular education
teacher and an EL specialist.
So you know what are we doing?
Intentionally put those systemsin place.
I love the entire discoursearound assistive technology and
all the things that we can do.
Familiar with many of thoseinterventions, but really hadn't
(31:39):
thought about chat.
Gpt is a teacher's best friendand one of the things that I
always try to do when I'mworking out in the field is
teachers don't want to go to onemore conference.
They don't want 10 more hoursof work at night or on the
weekends.
They're justifiably overwhelmedin the profession right now.
So to have access to somethinglike chat GPT and to ask a
really well structured query andget something that's kicked out
(32:00):
inside of just a handful ofseconds for those of you who
have used chat GPT that then canturn around and be a resource.
What a what a brilliant exampleof assistive technology.
And obviously Andrea gave us awhole lot more than that Love
how she really broke it down.
You know I'm always interestedin one of those characteristics
that you can kind of see, youcan tangibly get your hands
around inside of an effectiveschool, and that a system was
(32:23):
just great.
So big takeaway for me was liketo get our heads around what we
can tangibly see in successfulschools and when.
What we see in those schools,according to Andrea, was assess,
accommodate, communicate andelevate.
So quick recap there, and thengoing back to two big points
that she made.
First one I love the signeducation is freedom, education
is opportunity.
(32:43):
What's your plan?
All of these things that Andreatalked about.
Do they just help EL students?
Oh my gosh, if you're a teacherand you have these strategies
and skills in your bag, you'regoing to be able to better reach
all your students.
So again, EL teaching is justreally, really great teaching
and after 25 years in publiceducation, I live in awe of
educators and your storyresonated with me so much and we
(33:05):
think about what educators doin general.
I can think of a millionexamples in my career of
donations and food and timespent and time given.
But wow, orchestrating afuneral, helping a family with a
different language based access, a funeral process, is just one
of those many readily acceptedother duties as a sign that we
see in our public educationsystem.
(33:26):
So again, Andrea, thank you forreminding us that we should all
stand in awe of the incrediblework that educators do, and
thank you for the gift of yourknowledge.
What you shared today is goingto make a huge impact across the
audience that none of us wouldhave previously reached.
So props to you.
Eric Price (33:42):
How we do EP.
I think fantastic.
Andrea, is there anything you'dlike to add to that amazing
wrap up?
Andrea Bittner (33:47):
You know, I just want to say thank you.
You know I'm proud to standalongside all of you and teach
these amazing students.
I'm enjoying the time that I'mhaving teaching and getting to
travel the country and work witheducators.
I did write a book about theexperience that I referenced
earlier.
It's called Take Me Home.
Take Me Home is a true story of11 of my former bilingual
(34:08):
students, who give a firsthandaccount of what it's really like
to become bilingual in America,and we weave Nancy's story
through it, and so that is oneproud piece that took a tragedy
and turned it into somethingthat's been helpful to educators
all across the country, andpeople can also reach out to me
anytime I have educators emailme.
Hey, I just need an idea.
Can you hop on a zoom for 20minutes?
(34:28):
My school's really strugglingbecause we're better together,
and so people can find me atAndrea Bitner books dot com.
You can send me a directmessage and reach out anytime.
Eric Price (34:38):
Well, thank you for that reference.
That was my next question, sothat's perfect, because I'm
people are I'm sure people arejust like smokes.
How do I get ahold of you?
Because so many of us areneeding some of those resources,
how to reach out.
So, andrea, thank you again forbeing on the show.
That was amazing, somethingthat we absolutely need to hear,
and it's going to be a growingissue as we move forward in the
future.
(34:58):
So thanks again for being onthe show, andrea, anytime.
Erich Bolz (35:01):
And thanks to all of you for joining us today on
Outliers in Education.
You can find this episode andmore, anywhere you listen to
your favorite podcasts or youcan visit us online at
effectivenessorg.
Until next time, this has beenOutliers in Education.
Intro (35:21):
If you'd like to find out how to gather the data you need
to help drive positive changein your school or district, take
a moment to visit CEE, theCenter for Educational
Effectiveness, ateffectivenessorg.
Better data, better decisions,better schools
wwweffectivenessorg.
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