DCMS Newcomers practice language skills through podcast

Yahoo

03-04-2025

Students arriving at Danielle Mead's Newcomers class at Daviess County Middle School come from all over the world.
That's not an exaggeration: More than 30 languages are currently being spoken in the Daviess County Public Schools system.
What all of those students need, of course, is a command of English, and the Newcomers program is a way the district works to rapidly build English skills in students who are relatively or entirely new to the language.
'It's a variety: Some of them have no English,' Meade said in a recent interview.
To help build their skills in a new way, Meade and a group of Newcomers students created a podcast, where the students talk to each other about their lives and share their stories.
The podcasts were selected, out of thousands of entries, to be judged at the Student Technology Leadership Program state championship later this month in Lexington.
'It's a real celebration of where education and technology merge,' said Jana Beth Francis, assistant superintendent of teaching and learning at DCPS. 'We have worked in the district to work the podcast into the curriculum.
'To be a good podcaster, you have to read, write, speak and listen well,' Francis said.
DCMS media specialist Kate Albers said one of the ideas behind the podcast was to help the students gain confidence in their language skills.
'A lot of times, they are afraid to speak English because they are still learning,' Albers said.
Putting together the podcast wasn't difficult.
'We've had the equipment for a couple of years, so we've done podcasts before,' Albers said.
The podcast is hosted by sixth graders Ehsanullah Mohamadi, Jeremiah Kuriakose-Kocheril and Henry Soni, and by eighth grader Fernando Gonzalez.
'I think it was kind of cool,' Gonzalez said. 'I'd never done that before.'
A script was prepared beforehand, so the students were prepared for taping. The process was easy, Mohamadi said.
'It was just reading,' he said.
The students spend half of each day with Meade, learning English through reading, learning words and concepts, answering questions and by using tools such as videos of Steve Hartman's 'On The Road' series. The students build their vocabulary, learning through written passages that connect to their other classes.
The class follows a routine, with students building on their language skill days. For example, the students begin the week by reading a passage and progressing with it to where they are able to discuss the passage's key ideas by week's end.
'Each day the students spend three hours with me,' Meade said in an email. 'In those three hours, everyone has had a chance to speak. It may be a one word response or a two to three sentence response, but in my room we celebrate all speaking that a student (does). When a new student realizes that we are in this together, they will take more risks in my room and each day grow in their English proficiency.'
For the remainder of the school day, the students go to their regular classes.
Meade said the staff works with the new English speakers to help them succeed.
'When I first got the job, I met with the teachers,' Meade said. 'We looked at how to modify their assignments and how to address their needs.'
Fellow DCPS students are also very supportive of kids who are new to English, Meade said.
'Their peers that are English speakers area always able to help them,' Meade said.
Meade described the Newcomers class as a place where the students help each other and where they know they have an instructor they can turn to for assistance.
'The first thing I do on day one of getting a new student is just building a relationship with them,' Meade said. 'They quickly learn I am their advocate before, during, and after school hours. I am here to make them feel welcomed in America.'