Basic English Language Learning

 

B.E.L.L. was the name given to the program that Marlene and I developed for teaching a Basic English Language Learning. It was a ministry of LifeQuest Church to Vietnamese, Cambodian, Bhutanese, Hispanic and other employees of a company in Zeeland, Michigan called Integrated Fabric Resources. We have been asked to provide an overview of BELL for a group from another church. This blog is a summary of my part of the presentation.  

Most of the resources that we developed are available on the BELL web site and its companion site Bells and Whistles. https://sites.google.com/view/english-language-learning/home, https://sites.google.com/view/bellsandwhistles/supplemental-resources

The goal of BELL was to provide training, supervision, and resources for mentors who are helping beginning English language learners. BELL mentors established relationships and support, conducted informal assessments, and provided beginning English tutoring. It was not a formal English learning program. The amount of one-on-one time spent was about an hour a week; most participants did not do homework and outcomes were not measured.  

The remainder of this page summarizes resources that I (Burt Braunius) found especially helpful as an educator who is not a literacy specialist.

ABC English: Books One and Two: The abc English books can be used as primary textbooks in teaching basic English. The goal of these books is to have teachers and students systematically, page by page, work their way through the books at a comfortable pace. The Teacher’s Activity Guide: abc English gives creative ideas for teaching each page in the student book. The abc English books can also be used as a basis for assessing progress. https://www.teachabcenglish.com/book-1-activities.html

Relational Conversation discussion sheets: We used these along with questions and sentence completions to help connect with the lives of students. The idea is to learn about one another and find topics that mentors and students can enjoy discussing together.

These are examples of relational sentence stems regarding background and free time. (The discussion sheet is available through the provided link.)

 1. I am from...

 2. I work at...

 3. My family is made up of...

 4. I spend weekends... 

 5. My favorite TV program...

https://sites.google.com/view/english-language-learning/processes/planning

Southwest Adult Basic Education Project: This is an online program of Minnesota Adult Basic Education. It aims “to provide adults with educational opportunities to acquire and improve their literacy skills necessary to be self-sufficient and to participate effectively as productive workers, family members, and citizens.” The activities on this site provide multi-leveled stories to read together, along with pre-reading questions, definitions, and post-reading questions.  https://www.readingskills4today.com/level1

Two other areas seem especially important; i.e., developing a student’s personal dictionary and having a relevant way to document lessons (journaling or record keeping). The following links give examples of each of these. https://sites.google.com/view/english-language-learning/processes/planning

https://sites.google.com/view/bellsandwhistles/supplemental-resources

Additional support: Feel free to contact me. bbraunius@yahoo.com