MSU English department hosts teacher institute, helps Mississippi educators assist English learners
MSU Office of Public Affairs
News Bureau (662) 325-3442
Contact: Sarah Nicholas snicholas@deanas.msstate.edu
August 27, 2021
STARKVILLE, Miss.— Mississippi State University’s Department of English hosted a two-week institute this summer geared toward developing educators’ English teaching skills.
The Summer Institute on Working with English Learners in Content-Area Classrooms—held July 19-28 on MSU’s campus and offered via WebEx—was open to middle and high school teachers in Mississippi who work with English learners in their classrooms.
Megan Smith and Lourdes Cardozo Gaibisso, both assistant professors in MSU’s English department, led the event which was funded by a GEER—Governor’s Emergency Education Relief grant—part of the CARES Act funding earmarked for responding to educational needs created by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Participants developed ideas and adapted a lesson plan from the existing curricula to work effectively with English learners in their classrooms,” Smith said. “We talked about ways to make content comprehensible and accessible to English learners.”
Within the United States, Mississippi has one of the fastest growing rates of K-12 students whose families are immigrants and who speak a language other than English at home. The most common languages spoken at home include Chinese, Arabic, Vietnamese and Spanish.
In order to succeed in school, Smith said these students have to learn English while also keeping up with grade-level content in English. “Educators benefit from specific training in the language acquisition process and strategies for making content comprehensible to work effectively with these learners,” Smith said.
Smith said an institute participant evaluated the program by saying, “I gained a sense of clarity of what and how to work with EL students and parents. I also had a lot of misconceptions answered as to how to approach various situations when teaching literacy.”
Part of MSU’s College of Arts and Sciences, complete details about the Department of English are available at www.english.msstate.edu. MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.