S6/E03: Engaging English Learners in Math Instruction in a Year Like no Other with Steven Mendoza

Highest Aspirations

What strategies can we use to help students overcome the significant challenges associated with learning in a remote environment? How can we implement tried and true strategies like sentence stems, anchors of support, choral reading and others to help strengthen English learners academic language skills? How might teachers use newly acquired skills to help strengthen EL instruction as we transition back to school?

We discuss these questions and more with Steven Mendoza. Steven teaches 7th grade mathematics at Burnet Middle School in Austin, Texas, where he was selected as Teacher of the Year in 2018. 70% of students at Burnet are English learners and 95% are economically disadvantaged, which was one of the reasons Steven decided to work there. A common theme in Steven’s classroom is “Be Respectful and Do Your Best”. He instills this mantra in his students and points to these traits as necessary to the success of their future endeavors, whether this means going to college, contributing to the workforce, or simply being a valued citizen that sets a positive example for others.

Steven is also works with a team of teachers that encourages sharing ideas and expertise to best serve their students. He is an active participant in his math team’s professional learning community where he helps create lessons that not only teach math concepts, but also seek to inspire student engagement and learning.

As you’ll hear in our interview, Steven is passionate about helping his students succeed, honest about the challenges he and his colleagues are facing and proactive about putting his students' needs front and center.

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