In all of our education classes, I am sure you have heard about ESL students. In our area we have many ethnic groups and so our schools are being overloaded with children that can't speak English. In many studies I have heard of children that can't speak English being put in special ed classes. These children are very bright, but behind because of the language they speak. I am terrified that I might have a student that I can't help. However, I think it takes away from their education if they are being pushed back and forth to classes just to learn English. This results in them falling behind when they were on level in the first place.
So the question is...what do you do??? And what do you think????

If they dont know English, and are in a school where classes are taught in English, the first thing to do is help them learn English. However, once they know the basics, I think schools should move quickly into regular classrooms. Several school have classes where spanish speakers have an ESL teacher that helps them understand classwork from their regular classes as well as teaches them English. This does put a huge burden on the one teacher, though.

I have recently observed ESL students in a high school classroom setting for one of my classes. I asked the teacher what she did to teach the ESL student in her classroom. She informed me that she has only been teaching five years and was very lucky that every semester she had a student who could translate for the ESL student. She allowed the two students to work together on everything, including exams. I think that this approach has a positive and a negative aspect to it. I believe that it is awesome that she has some one to translate for the ESL student but I don't think that she should allow them to work together on everything especially tests. I just believe that is the easy way out for the teacher. The ESL student isn't always going to have a translator in life.

I know in my county they have classes for ESL students that aren't taught in Spanish considering ESL students means students with english as a second language. However, they either get put in classes with other students who speak their native language or get tutoring which helps them learn english and get help in their native language.

These students do have help now with their own curriculum and don't take the standardized test unless they have reached a certain point in mastering English. I know some companies now have materials that are translated into spanish that match worksheets and textbooks in that series so teachers don't have to make anything special.

In the special education classes, they don't really go into how to teach children with the label ESL specifically but for general guidelines, teachers should do modeling to help with the language problem and if possible have more manipulatives to help with visualizing or understanding.