CALLA Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach

CALLA Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach

1. Model designed to meet the academic needs of ELLs in elementary and secondary schools

2. focuses on strengthening curriculum, instruction, and teacher expertise throughout the entire period that ELLS are developing academic competence in English

3. Includes Three Major Components

   • Content- determines academic language objectives and the types of learning strategies that are appropriate
     • Why teach content?
       • Helps students learn procedures in content area
       • knowledge base provided in content areas helps prepare for subjects learned throughout school
       • Motivating to students to learn more than language only
       • Appropriate strategies help ELLs learn both content and academic language
     • How to Select Content
       • The CALLA ESL teacher carefully selects the high-priority topics and skills from the curriculum for native English speakers and integrates them into lessons that develop both academic language proficiency and learning strategies.
         • The purpose of the CALLA content based curriculum is not to replace the general education curriculum for content subjects but rather to prepare ELLs for success in the grade-level classroom.
           • Resources for providing effective content-based ESL curriculum
             • Curriculum Analysis
             • Informational Texts
             • Content Standards
             • Content Teachers
             • Students' Interests and Cultural Background
       • Selection is the key, and depth rather than breadth is the objective.
     • How to Teach Content
       • Identify Content Objectives aligned to state and local curriculum standards
         • CALLA teachers provide students with advance organizers or an overview of the content topic to be studied.
       • Link new information to students' relevant prior knowledge
       • Experiential and thoughtful learning so that content is taught as experiences rather than as merely facts.
       • Multiple Intelligences- vary the learning approaches (reading, listening, manipulative, etc)
       • Technical Vocabulary- important in representing an important concept or relationship
       • Questioning- Higher Level Questions
         • Speculate
         • predict
         • Synthesize
         • Make judgements bout the material
       • Teacher Monitoring- monitor students' comprehension
       • Student Monitoring- help students monitor their own comprehension
       • Graphic Organizers
       • Teach Learning Strategies
   • Academic Language Development- in each content subject
     • Two Factors affect and Individual's ability to comprehend and use language
       • Context Complexity
       • Cognitive Complexity
     • Academic Language is composed of all four language modalities or skills- listening, reading, speaking and writing
       • requires both lower-order and higher-order thinking skills
     • Why Teach Academic Language?
       • For ELLs this is a key to success in the content areas
       • Academic language is not usually learned outside of the classroom setting
       • Content teachers may assume that all of their students already know appropriate academic language but actually only have social language skils
       • Academic language provides students with practice in using English as a medium of thought.
       • English learners may need assistance using learning strategies with academic language, just as they do with content knowledge and skills.
       • How to Select Academic Language
         • Content Classroom Observations
         • Content Textbooks
         • Authentic Academic Language Tasks
         • Student Input
       • How to Teach Academic Language
         • Provide Academic Language Models
         • Encourage Language Awareness
         • Academic Listening
         • Academic Speaking
         • Academic Reading and Writing
         • Thinking Skills
         • Learning Strategies
   • Instructional Learning Strategies

4. Based on a cognitive-social model of learning that focuses on what is going on in students' minds rather than in their overt responses to stimuli.

5. Instruction should be guided by how students think, learn and interact influences the choice of classroom activities.

6. Related Instructional Concepts

   • Literacy Across the Curriculum
     • Focuses on the language demands of content subjects and seeks to integrate literacy and content instruction
       • all teachers, including science, math, and history teachers, carry out language development activities associated with their individual content areas
   • Language Experience Approach
     • Encompasses many of the same principles that underlie CALLA's approach to literacy development and is beneficial to beginning level and preliterate ELLs. Relies heavily on students' personal experiences
       • bridges students' prior experiences to new ideas and concepts
       • vocabulary and grammatical structures are experienced first within the language knowledge base known by students
   • Balanced Reading Approach
     • combines phonics instruction with reading authentic texts that include both stories and informational writing.
   • Process Writing
     • Teachers help student use effective learning strategies for planning, accessing prior knowledge, composing, revising and editing. This helps students develop both confidence and increased skill in their writing.
   • Cooperative Learning
     • Students of varying degrees of linguistic proficiency and content knowledge work in a group setting that fosters mutual learning rather than competitiveness.
     • For ELLs the benefits of cooperative learning include additional practice with academic English, the use of first language to draw on prior knowledge, the incorporation of content into ESL classes, and the opportunity for students to become more independent learners.
   • Inquiry Approaches
     • lessons planned with activities that move students through an inquiry cycle designed to help them learn from experiences rather than solely from the teacher and textbooks
       • Identifying a worthwhile question or problem of real interest to students and then providing scaffolding to help them find the information needed to investigate the problem
   • Standards Based Instruction
     • TESOL content standards are organized by grade level clusters in major subject areas and also by levels of language proficiency and by language domains

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