It’s that time again teachers, back to school! It’s always an exciting and hectic time for you and your students. There is a lot to plan and prepare for. It’s a busy time, I know!
However, it is important to not forget these top 7 suggestions listed below for your newcomers to feel welcome and to meet their needs. The suggestions below will get you into the groove of a new school year. By focusing on building positive and respectful relationships you will start off right with your newcomers.
1. Display Cultural Diversity.
Make students feel welcome by having a welcome board with their home language and flags. Students love to see something familiar in the classroom about their culture. Another way to honor their culture is to ask for pictures or items from their country to display in the classroom.
2. Cultural Sensitivity Awareness
Developing a positive teacher-student relationship is the best way to make your students feel welcome and accepted. Research has shown that students learn better and most likely work harder when they feel that their teacher cares about them and has made the effort to get to know them. One factor to build a positive relationship with your students is to be aware of cultural sensitivity. Here you can read more about this topic.
3. Resources that reflect students cultural background
When selecting books make sure that you choose multicultural characters where all students can relate too. The book All Are Welcome, by Alexandra Penfold, illustrated by Suzanne Kaufman has a good representation of how diverse a classroom would look like.
4. Visual Daily Schedule / Visual Directions
You might have a newcomer that doesn’t understand English. Needless to say how clarifying images can be. Have an image representing the activity that is planned for that moment. This lowers stress and will allow students to listen more to what your directions are.
5. Survival Vocabulary Wall
Have pictures of places in school, and word cards of school supplies. I call this “school survival vocabulary”. This will allow students, who don’t speak English, to point out what they need or where they want to go.
6. Play Games
On the first day of school, a fun thing to do is of course playing games. Games are highly engaging and fun for all students. Playing games will allow ELLs to get comfortable, and it will help to get to know their new classmates and develop relationships.
7. Language-Free Activities
To ease the stress, have students do activities that don’t require the English language. The best activity is to draw whatever they like, or you can offer them these back-to-school-themed directed drawing worksheets.
I hope these ideas help you to feel ready to welcome your newcomers.
What strategies do you use to welcome your English language learners?
You have fabulous ideas for English Language Learners on the first day of school. I used to be a teacher and had children from different cultures who spoke another language in the home. I always made sure to include multicultural activities and books. I love that you include ideas for teaching diversity!