Grade 1In Class Support

All this week we continued to assess our Grade 1 students in reading. It was a valuable experience for me as a support teacher and I learned more about each child.

It is necessary to design literacy instruction to meet the individual needs of each student. We carried out the reading assessment to identify skills that need review, to monitor our students' progress and determine their individual needs. The assessment results will guide our instruction and placement of our students within reading groups.

Samnang reads very well!

Grade 3 In Class Support

Our Grade 3 students are practicing the ISA test this week. The ISA assessment program is designed specifically for students in international schools in Grades 3–10. It is based on the internationally endorsed reading, mathematical literacy and scientific literacy frameworks of the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). 

Our students practice the ISA test to prepare themselves and show their best thinking abilities during the final assessment at the end of September.

All my EAL students will be tested and our teachers and parents will receive lots of data that will help us to better meet our students' individual needs and further improve our instruction.

As part of the unit studies and preparation for the ISA assessment the Grade 3 children practiced debates and giving reasons for their opinions.

Maly and Haily in Miss Lisa's class enjoyed debating and were very creative when thinking about the support reasons.

We had a heated debate about cats and dogs in Miss Michelle's room

Grade 3 EFL Class

Persuasive argument is our genre of the current unit and it is also part of preparation for the ISA test. My G3 ELLs were enthusiastically involved in various activities and carried out several writing tasks related to persuasive arguments. The tasks supported my students in constructing their understanding of what persuasive argument is and how to create one in writing.

First we practiced giving reasons to support opinions. We played oral language games and completed writing worksheets. At the beginning of each class we developed our ability to come up with several reasons and think quickly. Here is the worksheet that I chose for this activity.

In the middle of the week we were ready to write a paragraph supporting our opinion with one introductory sentence and three good reasons (template). To scaffold this task for my ELLs, I introduced the opinion sentence starters, transition phrases and a checklist.

On Friday I wanted to get my students up and moving around while practicing supporting opinions. Using the Sort Out activity I prepared three sets of opinions and supporting reasons.

My students collaborated in three small groups matching the opinions and the reasons. Each group presented their poster at the end of the class and we had a discussion.

Samir was leading the sorting out activity.

Lots of learning and thinking took place.