English Language Learner Quiz

Which of the following best explains the linguistic phenomenon of difficulty distinguishing between the sounds /b/ and /v/ in English words for a student with a different first language?

• Consonant-vowel phoneme sequences in the student's first language are more complex than they are in English.

• English is a tonal language in which pitch affects the meaning of a word, while the student's first language is not a tonal language.

• The sounds /b/ and /v/ are distinct phonemes in English, while they are allophones of the same phoneme in the student's first language.

• The sounds /b/ and /v/ are voiced consonants in English, while they are voiceless consonants in the student's first language.

Which of the following best describes the student's performance that demonstrates cognitive processes involved in language acquisition?

• Elaboration and inference

• Imagery and representation

• Translation and transfer

• Categorization and memorization

Which of the following visual support strategies would be most effective to use in a literature lesson with English language learners who are beginning-level readers to promote their language and content learning?

• Using a vocabulary chart

• Cognitive mapping

• Story mapping

• Using a cognate chart

Which of the following statements best describes the stance most researchers of sheltered English immersion (SEI) have taken toward the use of students' first language in the SEI classroom?

• Students should be encouraged to develop their first-language skills outside of school but to use only English in school.

• Students need to receive most content-area instruction in the first language to support the ongoing development of academic concepts.

• Students can benefit from some use of their first language to clarify communication and to enhance motivation and self-esteem.

• Students' English language development can be severely hindered by any use of the first language.

Which of the following methods of second-language instruction would be most appropriate to use with middle school English language learners who are at the expanding level of English language proficiency?

• Sheltered content teaching

• Readers theatre

• Total Physical Response

• Natural Approach

An ESL teacher who is planning to implement the Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA) with developing- and expanding-level English language learners decides to begin with lessons that address science content. Which of the following best describes the primary rationale for this decision?

• Students tend to require more time to comprehend science concepts because the language is more complex and abstract than that of other content areas.

• The language of science tends to be less academic than that of other content areas, which eases students' transition from social language to academic language.

• Science concepts tend to be more concrete than those of other content areas and therefore lend themselves to a contextualized, hands-on learning environment.

• The vocabulary of science tends to be more universal than that of other content areas, which facilitates linguistic and conceptual transfer from students' first language.

Which of the following questions should be a teacher's most important consideration when developing language objectives for a sheltered English immersion (SEI) mathematics lesson?

• What approaches (e.g., visual, kinesthetic) to mathematics instruction do the students prefer?

• Which grade-level mathematics content standards are addressed in the lesson?

• Which language structures and functions support the mathematics content of the lesson?

• What is each student's current level of achievement in mathematics?

An ESL teacher teaches developing-level English language learners in a sheltered English immersion (SEI) program. At the beginning of each lesson, the teacher creates a graphic organizer, such as a semantic map, on the board to review concepts from previous lessons. The teacher then refers to content from the graphic organizer when introducing important concepts from the current lesson. This practice best illustrates which of the following key components of SEI?

• Metacognitive development

• Teacher modeling

• Content adaptation

• Schema building

The Natural Approach to second-language instruction is primarily based on the theory that:

• Language learning is a social, inductive process of natural growth within a supportive and empathetic learning community.

• Language is learned through habit formation by imitating and practicing sounds and patterns in the natural environment.

• Language acquisition is a subconscious process that occurs when language is used for natural, meaningful interaction.

• Language consists of a set of universal natural principles that are learned through direct instruction and immediate error correction.

Which of the following best explains the linguistic phenomenon of difficulty distinguishing between the sounds /b/ and /v/ in English words for a student with a different first language?

• Consonant-vowel phoneme sequences in the student's first language are more complex than they are in English.

• The sounds /b/ and /v/ are distinct phonemes in English, while they are allophones of the same phoneme in the student's first language.

• The sounds /b/ and /v/ are voiced consonants in English, while they are voiceless consonants in the student's first language.

• English is a tonal language in which pitch affects the meaning of a word, while the student's first language is not a tonal language.