Challenges Teaching 6th grade ESL

Teaching 6th grade ESL is so challenging to me. I struggle to find a way to reach the students and for my own peace of mind. First, they are 6th graders. Just like 6th graders everywhere, they are going through crazy body changes in a land where such things aren’t talked about – not too far off from what it was like 30 something year’s ago in Toledo, Ohio. Second, they know everything and could give, well, a shit about learning English in a place where they only use English in the classroom. They are also used to “backpacker” taught English and not “real-school” English. Third, I don’t know what they’re talking about when they speak Chinese. They don’t know enough English to only speak English in the class and do anything else besides the text-book driven curriculum. So Chinese is necessary in the class for projects. Fourth, the English level varies widely in the class. Some can speak okay and most can write and read pretty good English while others can hardly speak and write at all. Fifth, I have a couple of students on medications. One likes to make “poo poo” jokes and I kick him out of the class regularly. He wants to remain in the class so this seems to be working. Sixth, the school has a “play it by ear” attitude towards English. Policies and guidelines are lacking. This has an advantage in that I have a lot of flexibility to teach what I want and how I want. In a way I can experiment.

So with these and many other factors in mind, I started a new project with them yesterday. I have the class of 22 broken up into 5 self-selected groups working on self-selected projects. The groups are like this: Three boys making ice cream and an instruction book. Seven girls making a large comic - cartoon mural with dialogue. Two boys are making a kite and an instruction book. Four boys are making a basketball and story about Allen Iverson. And finally, two girls and four boys are making a comic book. I had them assign themselves into responsible roles in their groups – leader, note-taker, spokesperson, artists and time-keeper.

Here are my feelings and predictions for this group project. The following projects will be successful – meaning the students will put effort into them and produce quality products and learn some practical English while having fun - Ice Cream, Kites and Mural comic – cartoon. These groups will do well working independently and with my guidance.

The two-girl and four boy comic book group and the four-boy sports group will be screwing off a lot and I’ll have to devote a lot of management time to them. I think the six-person group will be broken up into two groups by me because they will not be able to focus. The sports group may end up doing grammar text-book work because of their inability to stay focused. Okay, there it is 3 groups to 2 groups. Ten students on the down side and 12 on the up. I make this assessment of the groups because of past experience with the students. If I hadn't done prior project work with them in the past these predictions would be impossible.

I want to state one more thing. One of my motivating factors for choosing this project is to give students a chance to work on their English while not being dominated by the “screw-ups” in the class. It’s interesting that the screw-ups chose to be in the same groups while also taking a few “non-screw-ups” with them. What I’ve done is taken my class and divided it into 5 smaller classes.

Shouldn’t I be getting a Master’s Degree or something for trying this? Stay tuned for updates.