84 ◆ The Language of Word Problems
- ELLs and Math as a Language
When working with English Language Learners (ELLs) you should always
have a content goal and a language goal (Echevarria, Vogt & Short, 2000).
You want to always think about the ways in which you are exposing the
students to the vocabulary over time.
A. Content Goal
The content goal is the math that students are working on. This should
be written in an “I can” statement on the task.
B. Language Goal
When working with ELLs, (however, I would argue that this is a good
practice when working with all learners), teachers should have a variety
of strategies to make the language accessible to the students. Language
frames are part of the tools used to scaffold access to the words and
phrases. So, statements like “I am proving my thinking by.. .” should be
put on a sentence frame for students to use. Another example is “I have
_________ more than __________. I have __________ less than __________.ELLs also do not necessarily have the background knowledge to com-
prehend math word problems (Short & Spanos, 1989; Barwell, 2011). There
are various cultural differences that also hinder the understanding of word
problems. Word problems that use the customary system of measurement
(used only in the U.S., Liberia and Myanmar) or U.S. money might confuse
students. ELL students might make a mistake and give an answer in
meters instead of inches, thus resulting in 3 meters instead of about 3
inches. Let’s think about a weather problem involving the temperature.
If students are thinking Celsius but the problem is in Fahrenheit, then
there could be a big discrepancy. If the problem said that it was 80 degrees
outside and everyone had on their bathing suits, students would have a
difficult time imagining this scenario if they were thinking Celsius.
The issues of linguistic complexity (readability, syntax and complex
vocabulary) and word problems have long been studied (Martiniello,
2008). Martiniello looked at how the linguistic complexity interferes with
an ELL’s comprehension of word problems. The NRC points out that
“[a] test [of proficiency in a content area] cannot provide valid informa-
tion about a student’s knowledge or skills if a language barrier prevents
the students from demonstrating what they know and can do” (cited in
Martiniello, 2008, p. xx).
Key Points
- Math language is specialized.
- Wording matters.