Mawi Asgedom's Blog, page 2
May 24, 2015
Online resources for ELL students
Here at Mawi Learning we are passionate about Social Emotional Learning for ELL students. We believe that developing non-cognitive skills will increase academic and life success.
Our new course, Super ELL, gives students the success tools and cultural training they can apply immediately to create a better life. We also recommend the following online resources to increase language acquisition and content knowledge in your students.
Language Caster – Football (soccer) fans enhance English language skills with all things football.
The English Learner Movie Guides – A great resource for students who love movies or American culture
Digital Dialects – Features games to learn vocabulary and grammar
What other resources do you use to help ELL students in the classroom. Please comment below to share your ideas with other educators!
May 17, 2015
Online Education for ELL Students
Technology is quickly becoming an integral aspect of the classroom. Students are now able to use the internet and computers to enhance their education and engage with content and peers.
As an ELL student turned Harvard graduate, I have always been passionate about ELL education. That’s why we created Super ELL, a success course designed to increase the academic and life potential of ELL students. These students face unique challenges with culture and confidence. Yet, these students also have tremendous opportunities.
Technology is creating even more opportunity for ELLs. Software and web-based tools give students an integrated experience to develop their language acquisition and content knowledge. Teaching ELL students via technology helps them to acquire the necessary skill-sets for 21st century success, and allows educators to meet diverse and individual needs.
If you’re an ELL educator looking to incorporate technology into your classroom here are a couple of recommendations:
Understand different levels of experience
As an ELL educator, you know the importance of identifying gaps in knowledge. The gaps within technology may include vocabulary and previous exposure to software and hardware. There will be varying degrees in technology vocabulary understanding, for example, a student may understand that mouse means a four-legged rodent, but may not know that it is also a computer tool.
Similarly, students will have different technological backgrounds. Some have had years of practice with computers, but others you will need to spend additional time on the basics. If your students needs additional help, extend practice time with scrolling, dragging, clicking, or using a search engine.
Provide meaningful interaction with content
There is a plethora of resources available to use in the classroom to enhance ELL education and engage students. Many of these resources are great at language acquisition and content knowledge, but here at Mawi Learning, we are passionate about Social Emotional Learning. Other than use Super ELL in your classroom, educators can use additional technology resources to increase non-cognitive skills in students.
Some of our favorite resources include digital field trips and connecting students to other cultures. Digital field trips, like Inside the White House and NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System can provide an interactive experience in an area that a student shows interest in. Today there are many social networking sites to increase communication with their home culture and community, but sites like ePals connect students cross-culturally. These are experiential and authentic ways for students to absorb new information.
What other suggestions do you have for ELL educators to increase technology competence in the classroom? Please let us know in the comments!
Preview two lessons of Super ELL, a course created specifically for ELL success today!
May 12, 2015
Critical Thinking and Study Skills
Mawi Learning is excited to introduce our new course, Critical Thinking and Study Skills! This course was designed to deepen student learning, raise grades and increase test scores.
Throughout the course, Mawi coaches students in 19 videos, where he shares how he went from a C/D students in 8th grade, to a scholarship to Harvard by his senior year of high school.
To create the course, we reviewed the best research available, as well as Mawi Learning’s own proprietary tools from our work with over 1,000,000 students. It can be taught online or in a blended format to students in grades 8 – 12.
Preview two lessons of the course today!
May 4, 2015
Teacher Appreciation Week
May 4th – 8th, 2015 is Teacher Appreciation Week. The Mawi Learning team took to the streets where our corporate office is located to learn how teachers are making an impact on students’ lives. Here is a short video of how YOU are inspiring YOUR students!
April 21, 2015
Mawi Honored as Youth Advocate of the Year
Mawi Asgedom will receive the 2015 Advocate for Youth Award from SCOPE-Midwest. The Advocate for Youth Award is presented annually to an individual or organization that demonstrates a special commitment to improving the lives of children.
Since 1991, over 20,000 financially disadvantaged children, many from the Chicago area, have attended summer camp through SCOPE (Summer Camp Opportunities Promote Education) camp scholarships. The award ceremony is dedicated to raising funds for SCOPE’s summer camps scholarship program.
“We are thrilled to present Mawi with The Youth Advocate Award at this year’s SCOPE benefit. This award goes to an individual who demonstrates a special commitment to improving the lives of children. The work Mawi does with today’s youth and teens will help them become productive, successful, and happy adults. We are fortunate to have Mawi as an advocate for how important a camp experience is for all children regardless of their socioeconomic background,” says Dayna Hardin, President of CampGroup LLC.
The award will be presented at SCOPE-Midwest’s annual fundraising dinner on Friday, April 24th at Viper Alley in Lincolnshire, IL. Please visit http://support.scopeusa.org/mwbenefit to learn more and register for the event.
April 20, 2015
Mawi to Keynote at National Symposium for Refugees
Mawi will keynote The National Partnership for Community Training National Symposium on April 27th. The Connecting Leaders, Impacting Communities and Sustaining Programs: Strengthening the National Torture Treatment Network Symposium features leading experts in the torture treatment and refugee fields who will share tools and techniques for creating robust programs and networks.
Mawi’s remarkable journey took him from a Sudanese refugee camp to a full scholarship at Harvard University and then to training over 1,000,000 youth in life-changing success skills at his own company, Mawi Learning. At the National Symposium, he will deliver an inspiring and uplifting message to refugee and torture victim professionals about the importance of their work.
The National Symposium takes place on April 27th and 28th, 2015 at the University of Miami Student Activities Center. Please visit http://gulfcoastjewishfamilyandcommunityservices.org for more information and to register for the event.
April 14, 2015
Super ELL Earns Finalist Honors at SIIA CODiE Awards
We are very excited to announce that Super ELL is a finalist in the prestigious Software & Industry Association (SIIA) annual CODiE Awards. The CODiE Awards are the premier award for the software and information industries, and have been recognizing product excellence since 1986.
Super ELL is honored in the Best ELL/World Language Acquisition Instructional Solution category.
Preview a video lesson in the course!
98 percent of ELL students recommend Super ELL to other students, while 94 percent say the course helped them with their other classes. The lessons, which are accessible on computers and tablets, cover topics such as time management, goal-setting, community impact, social networking, college readiness and pride in one’s heritage. Students learn through interactive tools, videos and engaging examples.
Winners in the Education category are announced at the Education Information Summit on May 3rd, 2015. We look forward to updating you on the status of our award!
January 27, 2015
Restorative Practices in the Chicago Public Schools: Interview with Amy Mart
Welcome to part two of our exciting interview with Amy Mart, Manager of Universal Supports, in the Chicago Public School’s Office of Social and Emotional Learning. Today, Amy and Mawi discuss the meaning of restorative justice and what it looks like in a school setting. Drawing upon a growing research base, they explore how restorative justice can improve learning outcomes, build strong faculty/student relationships and redefine our vision and goals for student accountability.
Check out the resources Amy mentions at the International Institute for Restorative Practices, and the Illinois Balanced and Restorative Justice.
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January 20, 2015
Social Emotional Learning Best Practices: Interview with Amy Mart
How can Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) transform school culture and academic success? How do you introduce (SEL) to skeptical colleagues and friends? What does it look like to build sustainable structures to support SEL? Amy Mart is the Manager of Universal Supports for the Office of Social and Emotional Learning for Chicago Public Schools, a district with over 600+ schools and 400,000+ students. In part one of this two part series, Mawi asks Amy to share her insight on how SEL can help students and schools succeed. In part two, Amy will delve deeper into the concept and best practices of Restorative Practices.
Check out the research Amy cites in her interview at the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning.
http://mawiasgedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Mawi-Interview-with-Amy-Mart-1.mp3
August 25, 2014
6 Fall Speaking Engagements
Here are six of my presentations for Fall 2014. Some are public events that anyone can attend.
1) Hinsdale Central High School: I just presented to 3,100 students and staff at Hinsdale Central in Illinois. Hinsdale Central can feel like a high achievement, high pressure school and I challenged the students to go beyond their test scores. Their principal made the above poster after my presentation.
2) Regional Superintendent of Schools: I’m doing a keynote for 1,200 educators with the Illinois Regional Superintendent of Schools on December 9. This is a public event.
3) Florida Virtual School Annual Conference: Am really looking forward to this keynote to 2,000 educators on October 1. FLVS is the largest online high school in the country with over 220,000 students last year; they offer three Mawi Learning classes. This is a public event.
4) Latin School: This will be my third year in a row presenting to the Latin School in Chicago; they read my memoir each year in their middle school, and I also train their high school student leaders. For my student speeches, I mainly speak at schools that read one of my books or use one of our leadership classes.
5) Oneida-Madison Counties: On November 13, I’ll train teachers from nine districts in New York. This will be a professional development keynote based on our 5 Powers of an Educator book/framework.
6) Princeton Schools: Mawi Learning has worked with the Princeton, NJ schools for about ten years now. This year we will focus on integrating the research on Growth Mindset and Grit into their schools.
