In Mrs. Cragun's class there are three students who speak Spanish as their first language and in their homes.  Two of the girls have lived in Utah long enough that they speak and understand conversation English.  The third girl recently moved here from Peru.  She doesn't speak much English and understands very little as well.  I felt sorry for her in a US history class.  She looked completely lost during the lecture portion of class.

After the lecture, Mrs. Cragun provided everyone in class with a packet.  The room was divided into 7 stations.  At each station was some information which the students used to fill in their packet.  After she passed out the packets, she brought one to the Peruvian student.  She had translated the packet, and station information, into Spanish.  Mrs. Cragun received a certificate in ELL teaching as part of her Masters of Education from UVU.  She did the translation and then had the Spanish teacher take a look to make sure it made sense.  This was a 7 page packet with about 14 pages of information to go along with it.  I am sure it was so helpful for the student to be able to do the activity in her first language.  

Mrs. Cragun told me that the school just started it's first ELD class in the school.  They also have two Ukranian girls.  I will be observing that class as well.  I'm sure I will learn additional strategies because I want to help these students feel comfortable in the school.  It must be an enormous culture shock to them coming to Utah, and not just because of the language differences.