Taalsteun bieden

The language competent teacher, a podcast about language competencies of teachers in Holland and Flanders, with Charlotte Kruhl and Shaak Hartog. Welcome. Teachers are the key figures in education. As a teacher and an inspirator, you bring your teachers knowledge, skills and attitudes with you. But that can only be done if you have the right language competencies. What are those language competencies? They are attached to the language union. We try to explain them in a concrete way, with examples and tips, together with the experts who have provided the language competencies. This episode is about language support. We are talking about Tineke van Bergen and Monika Weijers. Monika, you are a teacher and a teacher assistant at Utrecht University. How do you bring your teachers love for assistants? Yes, that's a good question, because a lot of people do have it. It is important that teachers realize that they can think about it themselves, and that you can talk about it with each other. And that it is actually everywhere around you. So you don't have to learn everything from outside, but you can also discover things yourself and think about it. Tineke, you work as a teacher, didactic, Dutch and multi-talented at Artevelde Hogeshoeghent. Which teacher will you always stick with? That is Juf Dian from the fourth year of school. Yes, she will stick with me, because she did not compare me to my sister who was a year ahead of me. And also because she knew how to value my creativity, and also very explicitly mentioned that I was able to discover and experiment more myself. We come to learn through language, and that can cause problems with reading, writing, writing. Monika, how do you discover that with students or teachers? Well, it is very important that you let them talk about it, also with the teachers. That may not be what you think right away, but that they can work together. Of course, you also have a lot of formulas and abbreviations for teachers. So I can give you an example, as a teacher, you read a text from the book, and then you say meter 2 or m2, then I know that something is not good, because it has to be four-centimeter. And you hear that, so that the letters and the numbers speak out, but it does not mean anything. So that is one of the ways in which you can discover it. And how do you take it? Most of the time I would in that case repeat it and then say four-centimeter. Maybe first ask questions, you can also say meter 2 differently. So first try it, if such a teacher comes along with it. And otherwise, of course, in a class also sometimes play through to other teachers. Tineke, you can also tell us something about it, the problems that are caused by reading, writing. How do you take it? Actually, to learn is very important that the teachers, in a good way, read and write and talk about various teaching content, and that, for example, can be done as a teacher by teaching. So that means that you are actually going to look at the beginning of the teaching, not only at what the teacher's content of knowledge or musical form is called, but also at the beginning of the teaching situation. What can a teacher explain with his language, words, concepts? And besides that, he also keeps in mind, of course, with his own insight into the development of language of children, to be able to play into it and to put the level just a little higher than what the teacher can already do, but by showing small steps in it. For example, to demonstrate how you can discuss something with each other, by making a test of knowledge, for example, or by showing a letter by writing a letter, where the structure of that letter is already clear and, in fact, a question is asked, where the teachers then answer and so the letter forms. Are there also broken blocks? Yes, certainly. If you, for example, notice that teachers still do not have enough steps, it is important to play into the situation during the lesson itself. So it is not enough to include a number of those things in your lesson, but also to really observe how the teachers are not going to fight. And to intervene in between. If you notice that teachers, for example, understand something wrong under a certain concept. And then it is important to play into it very quickly. Monika, how is that for you? How do you manage language support in practice? At Wiskunde you also have a lot of vocabulary, and that are sometimes common words that we also know from the daily language, but there is a very Wiskundish understanding behind it. It is for example a function. If you are not from the Wiskunde, then you probably think that it is someone, their job, or maybe it is something from an apparatus that has a certain function, the printer or something like that. But the function is within the Wiskunde, a very specific concept, which is a very large, rich concept, in which it is about relationships, between big names, we then say those variations together. And yes, as a teacher, so that concept does not have enough wealth. And always just thinks that it is someone's work or it is an apparatus, then it develops that Wiskundish understanding. So that word must have a Wiskundish meaning is to get. And also there the understanding forms are very important to play into. So you can, for example, with each other a concept map, a little English word, a understanding structure, wherein that word function is in. And where you look together with the class, of which other concepts are hanging here together. And what is then the relationship? It is not just about those words, but also how they hang together. And so there are actually a lot of words in the Wiskunde. There are also strange words that we don't know yet. That's sometimes easier, I think. But there are also very common words that have a different meaning. They have a corner, a triangle, yes. It sounds so easy. Monika then stands for a teacher to say, and now we are going to do Wiskunde or does he have to do something to get everyone in the class in the right mindset, to be able to understand that Wiskundega-Jagoon. Well, I think it all has to do with it. So the explicit part of it is, what do you think about the word function or the word corner? You go around the corner. And then you have to think about it. Then in the Wiskunde, we mean something very specific under a corner. It looks like this. It has a corner point, two legs, of course also strange words, other types of legs, degrees. And sometimes you do it a little less explicitly. And then, yes, then you actually support the word use, the daily word use of the children and the students. And you slowly make Wiskunde of it. So that's also a bit of a problem. You say explicit, that also brings us to explicit and implicit support. What is the difference? Explicit is when you really emphasize that a word in the Wiskunde, in the actual language and other meanings, has in our daily language. And then you explicitly emphasize it very specifically. And implicit is more if you improve it in the conversation or let several words arise that together ensure that it goes the right way. So that's a bit less noticeable and less pressure. For example, a teacher says I walked very quickly. And then you ask, why did you walk so quickly? And so the teacher hears the right form of that word. But without you saying, yes, it's not walked, it's walked. So in that way, you can also actually implement lessons to new insights. The teachers or students so positively approach and not immediately break off, or in the right way. Absolutely. And also give confirmation when a teacher expresses himself very well, because that too, yes, implicit or explicit confirmation, that can be just by clicking, by making it clear that you understand the lesson, by playing it in there, or that can be very explicit, by saying, what did you hear that beautiful? Or the word that you think is so beautiful. We are going to listen to the class of Juf Julli. She just told the children of nine years that she let us listen to the song "Latons en Bloem" by Louis Neefs and discuss it in the class. One of the teachers knows that song from the young generation "Like Me". And in that generation, old songs are played in a new jacket. It's a song that also sounds healthy. This song? Yes, it's a series, but it's sad. Yes, it's all made by old people, but I can also say it. Do you know which series? "Like Me". "Like Me"? Yes, it's all old songs that are put in a new jacket. And that song. Do you know what it's called? "Latons en Bloem". That they take an old song and make something new out of it. Or that they put it in a new jacket, what is it called? Or what do we call it? A cover. A cover. Have you ever heard of that? No. A cover? And what do you think when you hear the word cover? "Latons en Bloem". Anne? "Latons en Bloem". Do you listen to it? "Latons en Bloem". The cover of? "Latons en Bloem". Of a magazine, indeed. The front page of a magazine, that's a cover. Tineke, is this a good example of "Latons en Bloem"? Yes, actually in that sense that from a concrete context can give an approach from daily use and the own experiences of learning. And from there, you will know the difficult concept of cover with the learning. And the various possible meanings they also discover in how far they already know the word cover. And they also deal with the meaning of the word cover. They go after what children understand under a certain concept, why they associate it, from which context they know it, to then actually expand on it and make sure that they understand the word in the right way, as it fits into this context. That brings us to the meaning of the word cover. How is that in the wisdom, Monika? I think I can give an example, where you play a role in graphics. You often have to tell what the story is behind a graphic, but also what you see in the graphic. And there you can of course talk about what it means when the graphic goes up. How do we say that about the graphic? Usually you say that the graphic rises. And then you can say, what does that mean in the story? Is there something more, is there something less? And in that way, I think you can also deal with the meaning, both about the wisdom, the meaning of a graphic, as well as about the language that fits best. Does the graphic go up? Does someone go up? No, that doesn't have to, it can mean that someone goes faster, or in the other case, that someone gets thicker. So there is a lot of context-bound meaning, that also has to do with the wisdom that you use there. Not everyone is allowed to openly talk to a group. Does the climate class play a role in that? Yes, that is very important to create that safety, to ensure that teachers are allowed to speak guidefully. And that you, for example, give teachers time to think about it, then, for example, to let students speak, then they follow a group, and then it is classical to go into the subject. In that way, they already pick up a lot of each other, but at the same time, they also develop that speech. Another possibility is to offer a lot of context, by telling a story about a class that goes to a museum, and from there, actually, to talk about art and museum, but to ensure that each teacher has something to tell about it, because he has heard the story, the story has gone on, and from that context, it feels safe to talk about it. Well, I can also give you an example from the wisdom lesson, because it is not often useful that you talk to each other. So in any case, it is very important that I also say something, to sometimes talk to the class, to teach them the time, to think about it yourself, and to count the whole class, so that is also important to the wisdom class. But what we also often use is a kind of game form, and then you can think of a normal game as, yes, where you have to understand, try to advise, without being able to use it. And then you have to talk to each other in a certain way, with certain rules. If they are able to understand that wisdom, then you are actually dealing with the building up of that understanding, and the advice from that also arises that conversation, or you can, for example, which we also do, make cards, where, for example, there is a table with numbers, a graphic, a picture, a story, and then you can, for example, ask a student group to look for that with each other, and therefore explain why that picture of that graphic belongs to that table, or not. And that actually happens in the game itself. So, therefore, the students also have to talk to each other about that wisdom, and that usually happens in a small group. And then you can, if you talk to the class, also ask questions or someone from the group wants to explain why those cards belong to each other. So forms of games often take care of a natural way of talking about wisdom. And then it also works to connect personal anecdotes, or if the children come up with stories themselves that appeal to that. Yes, of course. The connection with the own experiences of the students, their own interests and living world, ensures that they, even in a constant and also in a timely manner, are continuously being beaten up, just like those who are familiar and the high goals. So the more students leave those know-how, and also take anecdotes and go forward with your own experiences, the more they actually go in search of the language to say that. And from there, from that daily language, they can evolve to that more abstract language. And on the other hand, of course, to make sustainable associations, they can really imagine something there. And that can then be filled further, refined and sent in a certain direction. Monika, how do you do that? How do you personally make your wisdom? Yes, in any case, this is done through the use of context. That is one of the ways you can do it. But that is still a kind of bridge that is needed to be able to get out of the wisdom. And you can sometimes also make the wisdom yourself a little more personal, by challenging students to talk about it as well. How they approach a problem and, for example, their own approach. So they say, you can do it in your own way. And they tell you what your way is to tackle this issue. And then they feel at least that they are also recognized as someone who can do and discover wisdom, or you can give an open problem in the wisdom. And we also have, for example, wisdom activities for students' teams, in which they actually model a problem from reality, in order to find a solution, for example, a simple problem, like how do you throw your teams into a tunnel? That is not a simple problem at all, of course. But when you work with each other, that wisdom is then your means to solve such a problem. Is there a whole discovery that can be very interesting? Yes, students find that also difficult, because they are often only asked if this is the rule, or this is the step plan, and they do it like this. And that seems very effective, but that is of course not effective at all for the understanding. And for understanding, you really need that language, then they get the content and then it becomes a concept instead of a step plan. That means entertainment, language support, their vocabularies that already came to mind, but we haven't talked about scaffolding yet. I think it's an English term, but what do we understand under that? Literally, the meaning is that students build. So in education, that means that you actually want to further teach, make sure that they stick to it, and that they can actually reach high because of the students you are going to build. It is very important that they are temporary and only so long needed. So at the moment that the teacher can do it themselves, then it is built at home, and then you build the stairs again, or you make them a little lower because the teacher can already go higher. If you teach in a language-developing way, you are going to do the scaffolding, for example, by introducing certain concepts, then you are going to use them yourself to talk about the subject, or you can also do scaffolding by creating different contexts where they keep a self-discipline and have to adapt to it again, as well as writing as a pattern. If you read about that in the theory, it is a very complex whole with a phase of understanding. The teacher has really understood it and with certain forms of questions. What kind of questions do you use for that? You can, for example, approach scaffolding as far as a teacher understands it all, and then you start on a sort of middle level, you ask an open question, and if the teacher does not understand that, you can make the question more closed. For example, I can say, is a graphic a picture, or are there all numbers in it, if a teacher can't explain that, and if it is not yet possible, you go a little lower, then you might give an answer to a question to the teacher. You recognize it now, look, this is a graphic, you see a line or a shape in an ancestor, we call that the graphic, do you know what the table is now? So you can vary the level of that question depending on where the teacher is. That is one of the ways you can do that. It can also be that you are going to model something, so just think about what you are going to do as a guide for the teachers, for example, to adapt to certain reading strategies, which can also be used in a scientific lesson in reading questions. For example, can it be very important that you think about what you are going to do, how you are actually going to divide the main points of the assignments, and what information is relevant to the essence, and how it will then be explained in a certain way. Yes, very nice. That was it for this episode, thank you Tineke and Monika. Please, with pleasure. Next time we will talk about language-based lesson materials, see you then.