Question 1

What are graphic organizers and how do I use them?

Accepted Answer

Graphic organizers usually include boxes for writing information and pictures to help students organize information they read from a text. Below is a picture of a historical timeline which is a perfect example of a graphic organizer to help students organize important dates from a historical text.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/VJjCVlXBck/resources/ZMOnaK5ADk/ESL-Teaching-Graphic-Organizers6.jpg (ESL-Teaching-Graphic-Organizers6.jpg)

Graphic organizers are incredibly helpful tools for organizing information, regardless of whether students are English learners or not.

For our English learners who are attempting to access grade-level materials, they can be crucial.

In the ESL Curriculum Membership, you can find a growing library of graphic organizers you can use to scaffold learning for your English learners.

Click Here to Check Out the Graphic Organizers

Question 2

Do you accept purchase orders?

Accepted Answer

Hi customer.first_name,

Purchase orders are accepted. Here is the process:

Follow the link below, choose a membership option, and fill out the quick form to get started.
You can also request a W-9 if needed.
After you fill out the form, I'll send you a quote that you can provide your school.
Once your school approves the quote, they will give you a purchase order which you can send me by hitting reply to this email and attaching the purchase order.
After receiving the purchase order, I will set up the account for you and send you an invoice that you can pass along to the accounting department.
The invoice needs to be paid within 30 days.

Get a Quote ->

Get a W-9 ->

Question 3

What's the difference between Diphthongs, Blends, and Digraphs?

Accepted Answer

Diphthongs, Blends & Digraphs

Q: Monitoring Forms Attention Level & Overall Score

When you or a colleague fills out a monitoring form, an overall score and attention level are calculated based on the responses. These are based only on the questions that were actually answered in the form. The attention level helps identify any students who may be struggling and need extra assistance. Note: Monitoring Form Results will update the student's Latest Score and Attention level on the Students page. Assessments will update the same fields for the student so if you see an issue with the attention level for a student, it could be either from an assessment or a monitoring form. You can change this field on the Students page if you want to set it to something else. CAREFUL : The overall score and attention level are automatically calculated when the form is completed, but they are NOT UPDATED AUTOMATICALLY if you change responses on the form. This allows you to change the overall score or attention level to whatever you feel best represents your students actual situation.

I had no idea what these were when I first began teaching phonics.

Not that I needed to know what these terms meant in order to teach phonics well, but it did help when it came to sorting out the different combinations in my head as I was teaching them.

Here are the basic differences between Diphthongs, Blends, and Digraphs:

Blends - Consonant Blends include letter combinations like st, pr, and nk. You can hear the individual sounds even as you are blending them.
Digraphs - Digraphs include letter combinations like oo and ew. They only make one single sound when blended together.
Diphthongs - Diphthongs include letter combinations like ai and oa. They make one sound that morphs into a second sound when blended together. (For example, "ai" sounds like "aaaeeee" if you say it really slowly, like a long a morphing into a long e sound 😁 .)

Question 4

Do you provide refunds?

Accepted Answer

If, for any reason, you don't absolutely love all the time you save using the ESL Curriculum Membership, you can get a full refund anytime within the first 14 days after your initial purchase. To request a refund, please contact support@kid-inspired.com or click the bubble at the bottom right hand corner of the screen and click "Get in touch."

If you have any issues, I'm here for you. I want you to have the absolute best possible experience. I started the Kid-Inspired Classroom to make a difference in teachers' lives and, if I don't succeed in that, I don't want your money.

Question 5

Setup Wizard Video Walkthrough

Accepted Answer

Here is a step-by-step walkthrough of setting up your account with the setup wizard to help with any questions you might have. You can skip around in the video to find the section you need.

Question 6

How do I score or grade the Kid-Inspired ESL Placement Assessment?

Accepted Answer

There have been a number of teachers who have asked about how to score the Kid-Inspired ESL Placement Assessment.

If you're a member of the Kid-Inspired ESL Curriculum Membership, there is a mini-course on how to use the assessment. There are also instructions included with the assessment itself. Here are a couple of thoughts though that may be helpful:

There is a little ruler of numbers at the top of each section of the assessment tracking sheet. These little rulers correspond to the questions in that section.

Kid-Inspired ESL Assessment Ruler

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/VJjCVlXBck/resources/rzMPxE64kp/ESL-Assessment-Ruler.png (Kid-Inspired ESL Assessment Ruler)

You take the number from here that the student received and write it at the bottom in the Score area.

ESL Assessment Final Scoring Box

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/VJjCVlXBck/resources/YyOtvfPTUc/ESL-Assessment-Grading-Box.png (ESL Assessment Final Scoring Box)

Once you have numbers for each area in this score box, you average them together for an overall level (add up listening/speaking, reading, writing, grammar and divide by 4).

If you're a member...

If you're not a member...

You can get a free copy here.
You can join the Kid-Inspired ESL Curriculum Membership here.
You can join the Kid-Inspired Interactive Online ESL Curriculum Membership here.

Question 7

How do standards and scoring work with the assessments?

Accepted Answer

Here is the formula used in the portal to get a score for a language domain on an assessment:

(Number Correct / Standard ) * 100 = Score

The standard gives us a little more flexibility in what we expect students should accomplish on an assessment.

How do standards work and why do we have it set up this way?

Most teachers grade assessments with the following formula: Number Correct / Total Number of Questions. This means that the standard they are expecting students to meet is 100%, to get all of the answers correct. If there are 10 questions on the assessment, I am expecting students to get all 10 correct.

But what if a student gets 8 correct and has shown a good grasp of the content? Did they meet your expectations still? If so, then we can consider setting the standard at 8. Any students who score 8 out of 10 will then get a score of 100%. Students who get 9 or 10 out of 10 will get 110% or 120% accordingly.

It's a little like grading on a bell curve only we are not setting the standard based on the strongest and weakest students results on an assessment, but instead on a goal we would like to see students achieve that shows they have sufficiently grasped the content.

There are a lot of benefits to setting it up this way.

This lets us use a variety of assessment types and map them in the same way on a chart.

This strategy allows us to have assessments where there is no upper limit on the number they can achieve. For example, if our assessment is to see how many sentences a student can say in a minute, or how many words a student can read in a minute. We only need a goal or standard in this situation to get a score and then we will see that same range of ability. This also works for assessments where there is a specific number of questions to be answered, but students do not necessarily need to answer all of the questions correctly in order to show that they have grasped the content well. This is particularly helpful when it comes to something like writing paragraphs or essays. When you're grading student writing with a rubric, there is usually a total number of possible points, but that represents exceptional work. We don't need all of our students to achieve that level of writing to prove competency.

**The data we receive can be more helpful. **

We get to see a spread of data around the goal we have set. We can see which students have exceeded the goal and probably need some more challenging work, which students have met the goal, and which students are still in need of extra practice in that area. If most students are under the standard, we know that is likely an issue with how we have taught the material, whereas if most students have met the standard, we know that certain students may need to use a different kind of strategy to reach the standards.

The ultimate goal of assessments is...

to get actionable data on how students are doing in each area so that we can make better decisions about what will be most helpful for them.

If students are consistenly scoring well above 100%, then we know that the content may be too easy and we may want to step it up a notch.
If we notice students are consistenly scoring below 80% in an area such as reading while doing well in other areas, we know that we should focus extra time on reading and less time on other areas.

For WIDA scoring...

...the suggested standard is 4.5 since that is usually what is required for students to exit the ELL program. Then formula for an assessment then would be, for example, listening 3.3/4.5=73%. This means the student is 73% of the way to the goal for listening of exiting the ELL program.

Basically, when you see a percentage score for an assessment, it means that they are that far along to the goal!

Question 8

What do the codes (i.e. B1.03) at the beginning of the resources mean?

Accepted Answer

Resource Codes

Many of the resources have a little code in the title. For example, B1.03.

This is a very special, insider code that is only for members of the Kid-Inspired ESL Curriculum.

.

Alright, here is the top secret meaning of the codes:

B1 = Beginners Level 1 (B2 would be Beginners Level 2)

.03 = This is the unit number that the lesson comes from, in this case Unit 3.

Other codes:

Now...

This message will self-destruct in 20 seconds.

Question 9

Monitoring Forms Attention Level & Overall Score

Accepted Answer

When you or a colleague fills out a monitoring form, an overall score and attention level are calculated based on the responses. These are based only on the questions that were actually answered in the form. The attention level helps identify any students who may be struggling and need extra assistance.

Note: Monitoring Form Results will update the student's Latest Score and Attention level on the Students page. Assessments will update the same fields for the student so if you see an issue with the attention level for a student, it could be either from an assessment or a monitoring form. You can change this field on the Students page if you want to set it to something else.

CAREFUL: The overall score and attention level are automatically calculated when the form is completed, but they are NOT UPDATED AUTOMATICALLY if you change responses on the form. This allows you to change the overall score or attention level to whatever you feel best represents your students actual situation.

Question 10

How do I assign materials online using Zoom?

Accepted Answer

Using materials on-line in Zoom is simple.

If you're already a member of the Kid-Inspired community, you can log in and take the course Engaging Learners Online! for lots more resources and strategies you can use while teaching online.

Start the Course

To get access to the curriculum, you can choose from one of the following memberships:

Kid-Inspired ESL Curriculum Membership ->

Includes printable PDF files for the entire curriculum and all supplementary teaching resources.

Kid-Inspired Interactive Online ESL Curriculum Membership ->

Includes landscape PPT files and engaging online interactive lessons.
Bonus: Get the basic Kid-Inspired ESL Curriculum Membership free with this membership.