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Adjective:Having or showing zeal.
Synonyms: ardent - enthusiastic - eager - fervent - keen - earnest
If you look at the dictonary definition listed above you see some of the synonyms enthusiastic, eager, earnest, fervent. All of these imply an attitude of never giving up and being passionate about learning. Many ELL students by nature are ZEALOUS about their home culture and keeping their identities while at the same time learning this new language and culture so they can fit in. As educators, it is important that we are daily ZEALOUS about our jobs and about making sure that every student has an equal opportunity to learn and receive the best education they can.
Through incorporating the abundance of strategies there are out there for creating fun and engaging lessons in all content areas we can help ELLs not only fall in love with learning English but with learning about their new culture and their new world. There are two things I want to leave you with at the end of this blog. 1) Attitude is contagious-if you are passionate and enthusiastic about what you are teaching, it is hard for students to be disengaged and uninterested in the topic. Always model the behavior and level of enthusiasm you want. 2) Life is 10% what happens and 90% of the way you react to it. The fact that ELL students are coming from a different world is only 10% of the experience for them. It is our job as educators to help them preserve their beauty in their cultural identity while giving them 90% of a reason to love their new home.