Mutually Adaptive Learning Paradigm (MALP) Project Detailed description of one MALP project: Class Collections, showing the MALP Checklist and how it is used to analyze a project for SLIFE: students with limited or interrupted formal education

1. ELLs with Limited Prior Schooling:
Six Instructional Guidelines
CoTESOL Convention
Denver 2011
Andrea DeCapua
The College of New Rochelle
Helaine W. Marshall
Long Island University

3. Students with Limited or Interrupted
Formal Education
How do we refer to them?
• LFS
• SIFE
• SLIFE

4. Needs of SLIFE
• Develop basic literacy skills
• Master content & concepts in curriculum
• Adapt to cultural differences in learning and
teaching
• Develop academic ways of thinking

6. Mutually Adaptive Learning Paradigm - MALP
SLIFE North American
Classrooms
Immediate Future
ACCEPT SLIFE Relevance Relevance
CONDITIONS
Interconnectedness
Independence
COMBINE
SLIFE & U.S. Shared Individual
Responsibility Accountability
PROCESSES with
Oral
Transmission Written Word
FOCUS on U.S.
ACTIVITIES with
familiar Pragmatic Academic
language Tasks Tasks
& content
(DeCapua & Marshall, 2011; Marshall 1994, 1998)

7. MALP Teacher Planning Checklist
A. Accept Conditions for Learning
A1. I am making this lesson/project immediately relevant to my students.
A2. I am helping students develop and maintain interconnectedness.
B. Combine Processes for Learning
B1. I am incorporating both shared responsibility and individual accountability.
B2. I am scaffolding the written word through oral interaction.
C. Focus on New Activities for Learning
C1. I am focusing on tasks requiring academic ways of thinking.
C2. I am making these tasks accessible to my students with familiar language and
content.
© University of Michigan Press, 2011. DeCapua & Marshall. Breaking New Ground:
Teaching Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education in Secondary Schools

8. DeCapua, A. & Marshall, H. W. (2011). Breaking New Ground: Teaching Students with Limited
or Interrupted Formal Education in U.S. Secondary Schools. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan Press.

9. • Choose a bag.
• Look inside.
• What is it?
• Think about your answer.

10. Questions to ask about the Mystery Bag
• Do you know what it is?
• Do you know what it is called in your language?
• Do you like it?
• Give 4 words to describe it.

11. Sharing Answers
› Tabulate answers
› Write answers as students say them
› Copy down all descriptive words
And now………

12. Apple Collection

13. Benefits of Collections
• Building definitions
• Learning ways to categorize objects
• Developing vocabulary
– academic terms
– descriptive adjectives
• Collaborating on a class project

14. Categorization
A/An _______________________
is
a/an _______________________
Important: small before big!

15. Characteristics
• with ___________________
or
• that has ________________

16. Specific Descriptions
• green • wood • key chain
• good • heavy • teapot
• delicious • glass • bank
• round • silver • basket
• sweet • small • magnet
• plastic • soap • paperweight

17. Classify and Place in Order
1. Opinion 7- Origin
2. Size (Where from)
3. Shape 8- Material
4. Condition (Made of)
5. Age 9- Function
(Used for)
6. Color
big red teapot heavy glass paperweight

18. Talking & Writing about Collections
Talk/write about the items in the collections using
sentence frames:
My apple is a/an ____key chain________.
It is ___________, ___________ and ________.
It is a/an ________, ________, _________ key chain.

19. MALP Teacher Planning Checklist
A. Accept Conditions for Learning
A1. I am making this lesson/project immediately relevant to my students.
A2. I am helping students develop and maintain interconnectedness.
B. Combine Processes for Learning
B1. I am incorporating both shared responsibility and individual accountability.
B2. I am scaffolding the written word through oral interaction.
C. Focus on New Activities for Learning
C1. I am focusing on tasks requiring academic ways of thinking.
C2. I am making these tasks accessible to my students with familiar language and
content.
© University of Michigan Press, 2011. DeCapua & Marshall. Breaking New Ground:
Teaching Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education in Secondary Schools

20. A. Accept Conditions
for Learning
• The category each object
represents is something familiar
• The activity makes abstract—
classification— concrete, by using
real-world objects
• Students and teacher learn more
about each others’ interests
• Students create collections
together as a class

21. B. Combine Processes
for Learning
• Class collectively creates
sentences
• Pairs come up with additional
sentences
• Each person adds information
related to own object
• Students share answers to
questions orally as teacher writes
on board
• Students read from board orally
and later copy into their notebooks

22. C. Focus on New Activities
for Learning
• Classifying
• Representational vs. functional
identification
• Language scaffolded by use of L1
among students
• Content scaffolded by relevant
personal information
• Content scaffolded by sentence
frames

23. Mutually Adaptive Learning Paradigm - MALP
SLIFE North American
Classrooms
Immediate Future
ACCEPT SLIFE Relevance Relevance
CONDITIONS
Interconnectedness
Independence
COMBINE
SLIFE & U.S. Shared Individual
Responsibility Accountability
PROCESSES with
Oral
Transmission Written Word
FOCUS on U.S.
ACTIVITIES with
familiar Pragmatic Academic
language Tasks Tasks
& content
(DeCapua & Marshall, 2011; Marshall 1994, 1998)

24. More about MALP?
Visit: malpeducation.com