Foundation Phase

Foundation Phase learners are a small group of learners, often from pre-literate societies, who arrive in Canada with no familiarity with print. They may not know how to hold a pencil or write their name. They most definitely have no concept that print represents speaking or that the spoken word can be written.

Do you know what Phase your learners are? This month we're blogging about the levels of ESL literacy. Every week an ESL literacy instructor will share about his/her experience teaching a particular ESL Literacy Phase.

Recently I came across this webpage which has a plethora of activities designed to develop alphabetic awareness: Mrs. Meacham's Classroom Snapshots. There is a pdf document, Alphabet Task Bins or Tubs Activiites, which explains the various activities. As well there is a video to see some of the activities used.

For the past week and a  half my Foundation Phase learners have been working on learning orally the English words for colours. We have been practicing with coloured flashcards, playing bingo and talking about what we see in the classroom. 

After much trial and error on my part, I have found that those 8 packs of wax crayons works best. I used to have a big mixed up box of pencil crayons but because of the assortment, it caused confusion.

After unsuccessfully trying to engage my Foundation Phase learners in playing various  memory (also known as concentration) games at the computer, I finally had an a-ha moment. The learners did not really understand the purpose of the activity so were not engaging in it. They did not know that they were supposed to try to a) match pairs and b) try to remember the card layout in order to match pairs.

A few months ago, I came across a series of photocopiable books aimed at Foundation Phase learners. The collection is called Sophie Wang's Literacy Foundation Series and there are six books, each on a different theme. 

My favourite part of the books is the wonderful 5 page introduction where the author introduces what Foundation Phase learners can do and outlines various activities to do with these beginner learners.

Since we are now half way through the term in the Foundation Phase class, it is time to introduce sound letter correspondence. Until now, my class has been working on developing their oral vocabulary and now I hope they have enough words to start some sound letter correspondence.

Our first activity was to circle all the letters B on the whiteboard. Then I showed them pictures of a few beginning with B that they know orally (blue, boy, bicycle, belt).

ESL literacy learners need many opportunities to hear new words. One activity I do with my Foundation and Phase I learners is what I call Sit Down If. I have everyone stand up. Then I say "Sit down if...

Developing vocabulary is one of the most important tasks in a Foundation Phase class. My learners have almost no oral English so much of the class is devoted to oral development. Right now I am doing a unit on keeping warm in winter. Recycling new words is always a challenge so here are a few ideas I use.

Sometimes I make up a simple chant. Here is part of the one I made them:

(Tomorrow I am going to introduce: skirt, skirt, pink skirt, skirt...)

My Foundation Phase learners are new to classroom learning and have almost no English. Because they have such limited English, it is too challenging to do language experience stories or any real text. They don't have the oral skills yet. So in order to focus on something bigger and more meaningful than individual letters, I have been playing around with different ways to use their very limited sight words. Their sight words are limited to their first and last names, their country and their language (with just a bit of help from me).