Being a co-teacher can be a joy or something to dread. Which of these actual teaching situations would you prefer to be in?

When I was still teaching lower elementary English Language Learners, one of my students was a Chinese-American girl whose native language was Mandarin. She didn’t know any English when she started school…

Just as English Language Learners in general don’t fit into one neat package, ELLs who are Muslim come from a variety of cultural and religious backgrounds. Two Turkish 8th grade boys that I had my first year observed Ramadan but were not otherwise especially religious. Two elementary Kurdish siblings I had some years later, though, were. Neither they nor their parents spoke any English when they arrived at my school…

When I was in 5th grade, my math teacher showed the class how to write the number 7 in a different way from what I was used to. She told us that was how people in France wrote it. I was learning French at the time so ever since, I’ve crossed my sevens. When I became an ESL teacher…