Sunday, February 1, 2009

ESL Students and Sports in America


Tonight a large number of Americans watched the Super Bowl, America's football championship game. In September or October every year, they watch the World Series, the baseball championship. These are two sports not widely played outside of the USA. When your students arrive from the four corners of the world, they may never have seen an American football or baseball game. Yet in our schools, textbooks and novels often include references to these sports. Math textbooks may try to entice students into calculating averages by asking them to figure out batting averages or into learning subtraction by figuring out how many yards need to be run to get a first down. So not only do ESL students have to learn English, but they also have to become familiar with what to them may seem unusual sports. Internationally, the word "football" refers to soccer, so that may cause some confusion too.

They will learn to play American sports in gym class and after school. However, as ESL teachers, you can also help them learn about our sports by reading high-interest stories, watching films such as Remember the Titans, and by encouraging them to attend school games. For example, one of our student teachers is doing a play based on the aforementioned movie with her students. Perhaps you could explain the role that sports played in your life. Moreover, you could explore with them the trend in America to view sports figures as heroes. (In my opinion, this trend is disturbing because heroism goes far beyond playing a sport well and because so many famous sports figures bring such disgrace upon their names.) It is hard to include everything about American life in the limited time we have with our students, but devoting a little time to sports may help them in content learning and social adjustment.

Vocabulary
Four corners of the world-everywhere, the ends of the earth
entice-attract
cause confusion-make seem uncertain or muddled
encourage-inspire or give support to
aforementioned-something that has just been referred to in the text
disgrace-shame, dishonor
social adjustment-getting used to a new way of life

1. The attractive window display __________ me into the store.
2. The fight in the bar certainly _________________ last night during our quiet dinner.
3. ESL students always experience a period of __________________ after they arrive in the USA.
4. The great Olympic swimmer Micahael Phelps was pictured using illegal drugs. It's a ___________.
5. The _____________ swimmer received more medals for swimming than anyone else.
6. Athletes in the Olympics come from ________________________.


Grammar Point+
Discourse markers -- words that signal a relationship among ideas in a text or conversation
Contrast: however, but, yet
Addition: also, moreover
Find these words in the above text, and notice the relationships that they represent. Try using them in sentences.