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Pupils Meet Eye To Eye In English Program

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By MEGAN HUSSEY, Tribune correspondent

Published: September 30, 2007

WESLEY CHAPEL - 'Want to go exploring with me?' Shearly Dejesus-Rivas read aloud from the book 'Baby Duck.' The 17-year-old 11th-grader from Wiregrass High School was reading Thursday morning to 5-year-old kindergarten students Geseil De Oliveira and Misty Hill at Sand Pine Elementary School.

These students are part of the English Language Learners program, which pairs English as a Second Language students from Wiregrass High with primary ESOL students from Sand Pine Elementary.

A total of 16 students - eight from the high school level and eight from the elementary school level - are involved in this program, representing Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and Korean cultures.

At Thursday's session, students gathered in pairs and small groups to share easy-to-read books, as well as handmade alphabet books created in class by the Wiregrass students.

'In these books, students wrote out the capital and lowercase versions of each letter, wrote out a word that begins with the letter, then drew a picture of the word,' said Wiregrass developmental language arts teacher Ariana Leonard. 'This gives them a bigger vocabulary.'

One ELL participant, 16-year-old Adanlit Herrera, shared his alphabet book with Joseph Medina, 6, a first-grader at Sand Pine, and 5-year-old Alesei Soco, a kindergartner at the school.

'I stands for iPod,' Adanlit recited, pointing to the 'I' page of his self-made book.

'I-pod means music!' Alesei said enthusiastically. 'You put your headphones on your ears, and you play it.'

The trio also read the book 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar,' taking turns to read the pages and to count and identify the food items and animals found in the book.

Reading is not the sole focus of the ELL program, especially in the case of the older students. In class they learn storytelling techniques to entertain the younger kids, and soon will learn about the ins and outs of multimedia production.

'The high school students will do podcasts for our morning show,' said Chris Schmiph, reading coach at Wiregrass High School.

'In one instance, they'll go to the cafeteria to learn the titles of the people who work there and the names of the objects found there. Then they'll record interviews with the cafeteria workers and take still photos of them. The resulting podcasts will air on our morning news show.'

ELL students at all levels learn how to relate to others. This sense of camaraderie is what ESOL resource teacher Jill Scott - based at Wiregrass High School, John Long Middle School and Sand Pine Elementary School - hoped for when she instigated the program this school year, at the suggestion of the schools' ESOL teachers and reading coaches. Aside from Schmiph and Leonard, these include Diana Niles, ESOL instructor at Sand Pine.

'We believe in having peer tutors in our school environment,' she said. 'When they read with peers, it gives them more of an opportunity to succeed. It gets them more excited about reading.'

Moreover, when older students are paired with younger ones, Scott said it can ease the peer pressure and potential embarrassment experienced by older students who are learning English reading skills.

'It's hard to come into high school not knowing how to speak English,' she said. 'In this situation, everybody's on the same level.'

In sharing this bond, the students in this program find a comfort level that facilitates their reading and learning experience.

'The more comfortable they feel, the more successful they will be at reading,' Scott said. 'Once they feel comfortable, they immerse themselves and soak the information up like a sponge.'

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