When presenting English Language Learners with a new text, whether it be through a class read-aloud or a book in thier independent book bags, there are some things you need to consider that may be different from your English speaking students. One of these is whether or not thier are certain cultural aspects of the book that your students may be unfamiliar with. You then need to consider how you will approach this with them and what instructional steps you will take to allow your students to access the book.
One book that is an example of this is The Halloweener by Dav Pilkey. It is a story about a daushaund who dresses up for Halloween as a hotdog and his friends make fun of him. There are many parts of this book that someone who is new to our country may not be able to understand. Four different parts of the book that would affect comprehension and relate to culture are:
1. Halloween
2. Trick or treating
3. Costumes
4. Graveyards
While the first three components relate directly to each other, they need to be understood seperately in order for full comprehension. Prior to reading the book, the teacher should be prepared with many visuals that represent Halloween, like jack-o-lanterns, ghosts, witches, children in costumes. The teacher could display these visuals and have students participate in a group discussion about what Halloween is and what the images are of. After charting, the teacher should incourage students to talk with eachother and share their memories of Halloween and what they think of when they hear the word Halloween. This could help students who are unfamiliar to hear it from the perspective of a same age peer and to try new vocabulary in a comfortable setting. During discussions and charting, make sure that trick or treating, costumes, and Halloween are well defined. Depending on the grade level of the students, it may be a time to role play trick or treating by dressing up and going around the room to trick or treat.
To introduce the concept of a graveyard it would be helpful to share what different students do in thier own cultures when their is a death. By having the students talking about it, it allows the other students to relate more than they might to the teacher. This could be a very sensitive topic though, so as the teacher you may want to be prepared for what this might look like. It is also possible to have students draw pictures and share them only if they are comfortable.
Another book where it would be beneficial to pre-teach some cultural aspects is One Afternoon by Yumi Heo. It is a story about what a young boy does with his mother during a day, living in a city. There are many cultural components about living in a city that not all students will understand. In this story these include:
1. Laundramat
2. Traffic
3. El train
4. Apartment
This book has fairly simple language and very graphic pictures. I would approach the task of introducing students to this new vocabulary as I read through the story in a small group. As I came across each different thing that students may not understand, I would use the pictures and student talk to define the new vocabulary. When the story was finished I would ask students to draw a picture showing where they lived, either thier home or what their town/city looked like to them. I would then incourage them to discuss what they included in thier pictures, maybe using the vocabulary they just learned.
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