Learning the Language

Just in case I want to read about the education of English-language learners on this rainy day on the East Coast, (the rain is welcome here after such a long dry spell), there are a lot of recent publications to choose from.

Scholastic Inc. has published English Learners in American Classrooms: 101 Questions, 101 Answers, by James Crawford and Stephen Krashen. The book answers practical questions, such as "Do ELLs need to be taught English phonics?" The authors' short answer is that teaching ELLs the most straightforward phonics rules can be useful, but drilling them in complex and irregular rules probably isn't.

For help on how to teach science, WestEd, a research agency, has come out with an update of an earlier publication. The new one is called Making Science Accessible to English Learners: A Guidebook for Teachers, Updated Edition. It's written by John Carr, Ursula Sexton, and Rachel Lagunoff. The book is designed to help middle and high school science teachers reach out to ELLs in their classrooms.

Reading expert Margarita Calderon also recently mentioned to me that Benchmark Education has released materials she's written for teaching adolescents who are ELLs how to read. You can find an eight-page brochure about the materials, called Rigor, under the "News and Special Offers" column to the righthand side of the Web site. (See my earlier post, "Teach a Teenager to Read.")

Lastly, the International Reading Association has released a paper about ELLs and literacy. I learned about this from Larry Ferlazzo, a high school English teacher who has a blog about ELLs. The paper is called, "Key Issues and Questions in English-Language Learners Literacy Research." One problem identified is that most of the research on ELLs is on Spanish-speakers; the paper says studies need to include speakers of other languages as well. While pulling up the paper online, I noticed that the association also has a section of its Web site devoted to resources for the education of ELLs.

There's a lot more help out there for teachers of ELLs than there was nearly eight years ago, when I started writing about this group of students.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 2:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If you live near or in the nation's capital and would like to hear how some very accomplished second-language learners in this country learned English, you might want to get tickets to an event at the National Geographic Society on Oct. 30.

Several contributors to a new book, How I Learned English: 55 Accomplished Latinos Recall Lessons in Language and Life, will share stories on that evening. Here's a review of the book by the Los Angeles Times from Sept. 23. I'm thinking that some writings in the book would be inspiring, or at least entertaining, for English-language learners. Television talk show host Cristina Saralegui, for example, writes how when she was a new immigrant from Cuba, her teachers in Miami, who were nuns, weren't too pleased that back in Cuba, she'd learned to say "Stick 'em up!" from American T.V. programs. U.S. Congressman Jose Serrano's early language learning was heavily influenced by Frank Sinatra records.

I would like to read more of the works of some of the essayists featured in the book. I've already read American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood, written by Marie Arana, book editor for the Washington Post. I remember how she talked about being unsure if she should continue to believe the fanciful tales told to her in her home country of Peru or reject those stories because they didn't fit with the pragmatism of American culture, which was the culture of her mother. Lots of English-language learners, I think, have such experiences of being torn between two cultures.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Kathleen Leos has resigned from her position as the director of the office of English-language acquisition of the U.S. Department of Education after two years in the job and five and a half years working for that office.

Starting on Monday, which is also the first day of the Education Department's annual summit for English-language learners, Margarita Pinkos, the assistant associate deputy secretary for the office of English-language acquisition, will be acting director.

In an e-mail message answering questions I sent to the department about her resignation, Ms. Leos said she is "leaving to pursue a multitude of projects" that she had started before she joined the Education Department. She said she hasn't contacted anyone about future employment, which is against the department's ethics regulations.

The former Dallas school board member said her greatest contribution while working for the Education Department has been to change the work of the office of English-language acquisition "from a local, district-based discretionary grant program to a comprehensive systemwide formula-based program—developing systems from the national to the state to the local district level."

In this regard, I remember that many times, Ms. Leos stressed in interviews with me that school districts and states need to establish English-language-development standards for ELLs and align curriculum with them and academic content standards for all students. Also, tests need to be aligned with standards. "Alignment" was sort of her theme.

In addition, Ms. Leos noted in her e-mail, she changed the focus of the National Professional Development Grant program so that it provided training for all teachers who work with ELLs, not just bilingual and English-as-a-second-language teachers.

Ms. Leos was accessible to reporters—and here's one reporter who appreciates her for that.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Despite passionate floor speeches by U.S. Senators Richard J. Durbin and Harry Reid, both Democrats, supporters of legislation that would give some undocumented students in this country a path toward legalization failed yesterday to win the 60 votes they needed for the bill to proceed in the legislative process. According to the Office of the Secretary of the U.S. Senate, 52 senators voted "yea" on the "DREAM Act," 40 lawmakers voted "nay," and four didn't vote.

"I could go through for an hour or more the stories of these young people that I've met," Mr. Durbin said in his remarks on the floor. "They are hopeful and heartbreaking at the same time—hopeful because these are young people who have the same dreams that my children have, the same dreams that every American has, to have a good life, a good family."

He characterized the undocumented youths who would benefit from the bill as hard workers who deserve a chance to be legalized.

Critics of the bill say that it's providing a form of amnesty to undocumented people. For more on the bill, see "Defense Authorization Moves Forward Without "DREAM Act." The DREAM Act is short for the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act.

Oct. 25 Update: A spokeswoman for Sen. Durbin told me in a telephone conversation today that because the current legislative session ends soon—Nov. 16—the DREAM Act doesn't have a chance of passing this fall. She noted that Sen. Durbin has said, "It's tough to get immigration legislation passed in this session. Imagine how tough it will be during the last session before the presidential elections."

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 1:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)

While reporting for an article published in Education Week this week, I couldn't find any reading experts outside of state or federal governments who believe that Reading First—the flagship reading program under the No Child Left Behind Act—is working really well for English-language learners.

When I asked U.S. Department of Education officials if they feel the program has been effective for this group of students, they pointed to what they said was progress in reading shown by English-language learners in some states under Reading First. Click here for the report that they used to back up that assertion.

Meanwhile, my colleague Kathleen Kennedy Manzo reported this week on how an advisory panel for the program finds federal data to be inconclusive in telling whether Reading First, which serves K-3 students, is working nationally.

Some members of the House of Representatives Education and Labor Committee are pushing for changes in the Reading First section of the No Child Left Behind Act, and most of the reading experts I spoke with thought those changes would be an improvement over current law. In a "discussion draft" released in August by the committee, the Reading First section calls for programs that are "linguistically appropriate."

What do you think? Is Reading First working for English-language learners in your school?

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 9:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

My colleague David Hoff has passed along to me a draft of Title III, the section of the No Child Left Behind Act for English-acquisition programs, that a Senate committee is proposing for reauthorization of the act. Unlike the "discussion draft" released by the House Education and Labor Committee in August, the proposals of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee are not yet online. The partial draft of a revised NCLB from the Senate has only been circulated among lobbyists for comments (for more on that see David Hoff's blog, NCLB: Act II).

This afternoon, I laid out before me hard copies of proposals for Title III from the House and the Senate committees, went through them with a highlighter and Post-its, and compared them with Title III in the current law.

The Senate committee draft doesn't propose any significant changes that I can detect. What's most interesting is that the phrase "scientifically based research," which now appears throughout Title III in NCLB, is in brackets. The staff of one of the committee members said language appearing between brackets is "still under discussion and not agreed to."

The Senate draft of Title III doesn't include several provisions for English-language learners proposed in the House draft. It doesn't, for example, require that states describe how they ensure that ELLs are provided with "access to the full curriculum in a manner that is understandable to and appropriately addresses the linguistic needs of such children." That requirement isn't in the current law, though it appears in the House draft. Also absent is the House draft's proposal that states be required to show that all teachers are fluent in English and in any other language used for instruction, another provision not in current law.

In sum, the Senate proposal for Title III is pretty much what the law says now.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 4:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Parents of a Latino boy in Oregon who speaks only English have sued the Hillsboro School District because they claim their son was placed in an English-as-a-second-language program based on his ethnicity, according to an article published this week in The Oregonian.

A Hillsboro school official said in an Associated Press article that the school district places children in ESL programs based on a home-language survey and assessment. That's the practice across the nation, in accordance with federal law. The Oregonian article says the issue was complicated by the fact the boy is developmentally delayed.

What's particularly interesting to me, though, is the claim by the parents that school officials didn't respect their wishes. "His mother complained to school officials, but they insisted he belonged in an English-as-a-second-language program," the article says.

The courts will draw out the particular facts in the Hillsboro case. But this is a good time to note that the No Child Left Behind Act says school districts must tell parents they have a right to take their child out of language-acquisition programs. School districts must tell parents of their child's placement in ESL or bilingual education and notify them of "the right that parents have to have their child immediately removed from such program upon their request," according to the law. (See the parental notification section of Title III.)

I brought this issue up in an earlier post because a parent wrote to me with a complaint similar to that of the parents who filed the lawsuit. In some e-mail exchanges about that blog post, I learned that implementing that part of the law may not be as clear as it seems at first glance.

For example, Gloria M. Pelaez, the director of accreditation for the school of education at the University of Miami, wrote to me that "in Florida, [English for speakers of other languages] is the language arts component in the education of an ELL student. Language arts is a basic subject thus there is no option to opt out of ESL."

I turned to an expert, Roger Rice, a lawyer and co-director of Multicultural, Education, Training, and Advocacy, for clarification on parents' rights. META provides legal representation in education for linguistic-minority children.

Mr. Rice noted that clearly it is wrong for a school to place a child in an ESL class solely because of his or her ethnicity rather than language proficiency. He added that, in his experience, most schools do get parental permission before placing a child in such a program and honor parents' requests not to place students.

But Mr. Rice explained that even if a parent pulls a child out of a specific English-acquisition program, the school district still must give the child some kind of help to learn English. Here's what he wrote to me:

The language you cite in NCLB only goes to parental rights to withdraw a child from a federally funded Title III program. However, the civil right of the child to appropriate English instruction is grounded not in Title III but in Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and in the 1974 Equal Educational Opportunity Act (and ultimately traceable back to Lau v. Nichols, i.e. the right to understandable instruction). Insofar as I know, [the Office for Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Education] has taken the position that regardless of whether a parent pulls a child out of a particular English-language acquisition program, the school district still has an obligation to teach English and not allow the child to sink or swim.

Hypothetically, the hardest question would be if a parent flat-out asked that the ELL child not receive any help at all in learning English, even where basic ESOL is part of the core curriculum of the school. Do parents have an absolute right to insist that their child get no help at all? I've not seen that situation tested in court. What we do know is that parents have no right to request that their child not be taught, e.g. algebra, or history and there are many state cases over the years that make that clear. So why would teaching English through ESOL be different? I'm not answering that one, simply posing it. Or, by way of comparison, what if a child were quite clearly very severely disabled, and legally entitled under federal and state law to special ed services under an IEP, and the parent said 'too bad, I don't want him/her to get any help and, no I don't have any expert opinion to back me up on that.' My guess is that if the school district took the matter to court, the court might well appoint a guardian ad litem for the child and look at the situation on a 'best interests of the child' standard, taking into account that the child had a civil right to appropriate education. You can see where that hypothetical might lead.

Readers, is there any confusion at your schools about these matters?

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 11:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When U.S. Department of Education officials speak publicly about sticky issues concerning English-language learners, such as how to assess them, they usally mention the LEP Partnership.

U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings announced the partnership in July 2006 as an effort to help states deal with assessment of ELLs. State education officials have come to Washington twice so far for meetings of the partnership. The LEP Partnership members will meet for the third time on Sunday, Oct. 28.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education Raymond J. Simon's staff provided a schedule for the release of six publications that the Education Department has been working on to aid states on sticky issues concerning ELLs, which I excerpt here.

Schedule for Release

Of the six projects, the Department of Education is releasing the first one: "The Framework for Developing High Quality English Language Proficiency Standards and Assessments." The other five projects are supported (and will be released) by the Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center. Some of those projects will be disseminated at the Partnership meeting, and some will be discussed at the meeting, but not released yet.

Here are the titles of the projects and the authors:

"A Framework for Developing High Quality English Language Proficiency Standards and Assessments"—authored by the U.S. Department of Education with assistance from the Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center. This document will be released by the department at the LEP Partnership meeting.

"A Guide for Sight Translation of Assessments"—authored by Charles Stansfield. This paper will be discussed at the meeting, but is not yet ready for release. The Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center will release this paper within the next few months.

"A Guide for Plain English/Linguistic Modifications"—there are two companion papers on this topic, one authored by Jamal Abedi and one by Edynn Sato. The Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center will release both of these papers at the Oct. 28 meeting.

"A Guide for Native Language Assessments"—authored by Melissa Bowles and Charles Stansfield. This paper will be discussed at the meeting, but is not yet ready for release. The Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center will release this paper within the next few months.

"A Guide for How Title I/Title III Assessments Can Inform Each Other"—authored by Stanley Rabinowitz. This paper will be discussed at the meeting, but is not yet ready for release. The Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center will release this paper by the end of November.

"A Handbook of Best Practices in Test Accommodations and State Assessment Policies for English Language Learners"—authored by Charlene Rivera. This paper will be discussed at the meeting, but is not yet ready for release. The Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center hopes to release this paper in 2008.

This is all fine and good, but I know some experts on ELLs out there who also want to see the Education Department release its two-year evaluation of how states are faring in meeting adequate yearly progress for ELLs under the No Child Left Behind Act, which is required by the legislation. The most recent data available is from the 2003-04 school year, and some say it's important to have more recent data to inform discussions now going on about how to authorize provisions for ELLs in NCLB.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The lack of a national standard for how English-language learners are identified and tracked—and a lack of a uniform standard even within some states—makes it difficult for anyone to know how well such students are doing academically. That's one point made in a report, "English, Language Education, and America's Future," released this month by the Alexandria, Va.-based National Association of State Boards of Education.

As of this writing, the report hadn't been posted on-line, but the Web site of the National Association of State Boards of Education says it is "coming soon."

The report makes five recommendations for state policies concerning English-language learners. I quote them here verbatim:

—Clarify state language education goals.
—Standardize how English-language learners are identified and tracked.
—Recruit and prepare adequate numbers of specialized, highly qualified ESL and world language teachers.
—Require that all educators learn basic ESL concepts and techniques.
—Select/develop and administer a comprehensive system of valid and reliable assessments to hold schools accountable for students' English-language proficiency and mastery of academic content.

Offhand, I know that California, the state with the most English-language learners, doesn't have a uniform definition across the state for what an English-language learner is because it leaves it up to each school district to determine the criteria for reclassifying such students as fluent in English. And states have a long way to go to meet the recommendation that all teachers would receive training to teach ELLs effectively. The report names two states, Arizona and Florida, that require all teachers to take courses in how to work with ELLs. California and Virginia also have requirements for teacher preparation programs to prepare teachers to instruct ELLs. That's a very short list.

The report is written by a study group of the National Association of State Boards of Education on language and learning. Its recommendations are based on the group's examination of existing research on ELLs.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 10:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Quite a few times when I've interviewed Timothy M. Hogan, the lawyer for the plaintiffs in the Flores v. Arizona federal court case concerning the rights of English-language learners, and he's been frustrated that the Arizona legislature hasn't satisfied a federal court order concerning the lawsuit, he's made the statement: "We'll just have to go back to court." Flores v. Arizona is the case in which a judge has ruled that Arizona doesn't adequately pay for the education of its English-language learners.

Arizona lawmakers missed a deadline to fix the problem set for the end of their last legislative session, which finished up in the spring. Mr. Hogan, the executive director of the Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest, was true to his word and went back to court. And last week, U.S. District Judge Raner Collins set a new deadline for the Arizona legislature to find a way to adequately pay for the education of its 133,000 ELLs by March 4, according to an Oct. 12 article in The Arizona Republic.

See earlier posts about this long-running lawsuit here and here.

Oct. 15 Update: The Arizona Daily Star reports today that the state will appeal Judge Collins' order from last week. State officials plan to argue in the 9th U.S. Circuit of Appeals that the U.S. District Court is illegally ordering Arizona lawmakers to spend more money on English-language learners, according to the article.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 9:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, who is running for president, has urged California's governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, to sign a bill that would enable undocumented students who graduate from high school to receive college aid, according to the Associated Press.

The bill would make low-income immigrant students who are undocumented eligible to receive state grants or community college fee waivers. California, along with nine other states, already allows such students to pay in-state college tuition rates.

To get a sense for how heated the debate is in this country over any policies that give a break to undocumented students, read comments to earlier posts about the "DREAM Act," here and here.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I've spent some time this week browsing Colorin Colorado, a Web site with resources for teachers of English-language learners and their families, and I think it has some really useful information. You can subscribe to e-mail alerts from the site here.

Since I've started this blog, I've begun to get some requests from parents of English-language learners who are having questions about their children's education. A mother of a child adopted from Guatemala, for example, doesn't understand why her 11-year-old daughter seems to understand everything that she says in English, but doesn't try to speak the language. The child has been in the United States for three months. Another mom, who is Hispanic and doesn't speak Spanish, writes to ask how she can get her son out of an English-as-a-second-language class because his first language is English; she said the school placed her child in the class because she had mentioned the family's ethnic background in a home-language survey. Educators at her child's school don't seem to be aware that she has the right to decide where her child is placed, guaranteed by the No Child Left Behind Act.

For such requests, I refer people back to experts in their own states. I'm not an expert myself, but rather report what other experts tell me in interviews.

It seems that Colorin Colorado can be a source to provide answers to some of these practical questions. The Web site has some useful tips for parents, here, on how to seek extra help for their children at school. And it also provides some answers to questions frequently asked by educators. One can also find the most important research reports on ELLs on the Web site.

The Web site is sponsored by WETA, the public broadcasting station here in the Washington, D.C., area, and gets funding from various sources, including the American Federation of Teachers.

The site does not, by the way, provide much insight on the implications for ELLs of the No Child Left Behind Act or other educational policy. Under the section "Policy, NCLB, & AYP," it lists only three articles. For information on educational policy affecting ELLs, I hope you'll keep turning to this blog.

My posting schedule is somewhat erratic, though I try to post something at least three times a week. Don't miss the option to subscribe to an RSS feed by typing your e-mail address into the box to the right side of this page. You'll receive an e-mail message every time I post something—and each message also tells you how to unsubscribe, if you find you don't like the service.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education Raymond J. Simon told a roomful of Latino leaders yesterday that the No Child Left Behind Act is working because it "has driven dramatic gains in math and reading achievement." Mr. Simon spoke at a meeting on Latino education held in Washington by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials Educational Fund.

He cited examples of gains on the National Assessment of Educational Progress as evidence that the federal education law is working for Hispanics as well as for all students. He said scores for 4th grade reading and math, for instance, "are higher than ever, including those of Hispanic students." My colleagues Sean Cavanagh and Kathleen Kennedy Manzo have written an article citing experts on what the 2007 NAEP gains mean. The article includes the views of people who contest the Education Department's argument that the rise in scores can be attributed to the NCLB Act, or to any single education program.

I take the opportunity here to relay a viewpoint by Richard Rothstein, a former education columnist and a research associate at the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute, that didn't make it into the Education Week article about NAEP. Mr. Rothstein included this view in a Sept. 26 e-mail message to Ms. Kennedy Manzo.

"I think that the Hispanic scores on NAEP are utterly meaningless," Mr. Rothstein wrote. He said: "The composition of the Hispanic student population (immigrant, second generation, third generation, etc.) has been changing; we should not expect the same outcomes from recent immigrants as from third generation and beyond Hispanics, who should be fully, or nearly fully, assimilated. NAEP should drop reports of Hispanic scores, unless it can disaggregate such scores by mother's place of birth (data that is not presently collected, but which would be easy to collect from the NAEP sample)."

It's an important point to remember in looking at any data about Hispanic students that they are very diverse. Forty-five percent of Latino children, according to an issue brief by the National Council of La Raza, are English-language learners. An increasing number of those English-language learners are born in the United States rather than in a foreign country.

I see a need for more talk about how to improve education for Latinos who were born in this country and who, after years in U.S. schools, still don't have the literacy skills to get out of the category of being ELLs.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

At Aurora Public Schools in Colorado, 700 teachers and staff are taking an online course in Spanish this fall so they can communicate better with the school district's Spanish-speaking parents.

Jose C. Paz, a translator for the district, who arranged for the classes, said district officials don't expect educators at the beginning stages of studying Spanish to learn much more than pleasantries in the course, which is designed for teachers and requires about 16 hours of seat time. But even that can help teachers to be more comfortable with Spanish-speaking parents, he said.

He noted that the lessons are designed to adapt to the learning curve of the student. They contain some intermediate-level lessons as well as beginning lessons. The lessons also contain cultural information. Half of the district's 32,500 students are Hispanic, and 39 percent of the district's students are English-language learners.

"We teach the basic words and phrases for situations such as: parent/teacher conferences, a sick child, discipline issues, and much more," Philipp Knetemann, the owner of My Spanish Teacher, the company offering the online Spanish classes, explained to me in an e-mail message.

You can try out a few free sample lessons online.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 1:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A number of lawmakers who are working on reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act are invited to speak this week at a National Capitol Summit on Latino Students and Educational Opportunity, being held in Washington, D.C. The one-day meeting is scheduled for Thursday, Oct. 11, at the Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill. Invited speakers include Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, a Democrat from Massachusetts; Sen. Arlen Spector, a Republican from Pennsylvania; Rep. George Miller, a Democrat from California; and Rep. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon, a Republican from California.

The summit is sponsored by the Virginia Beach, Va.-based Educational Policy Institute and the University of Maryland, College Park, and will feature researchers and policymakers who will talk about Latino students in secondary education and higher education. English-language learners aren't mentioned in the overview of the meeting, but I expect that some of the speakers will discuss education policy concerning them because some Latino students are ELLs.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 1:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

William McKenzie, a columnist for The Dallas Morning News, wrote a commentary this week that's worth pondering over. He takes the same position that U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings has taken that it's simply "too long" to permit English-language learners to take tests in their native languages for five to seven years. (See "Secretary Spellings Criticizes ELL Proposals.")

The "discussion draft" released by the House Education and Labor Committee for a reauthorized No Child Left Behind Act proposes that schools be permitted to give ELLs state tests in their native languages for five years—up from the three years currently in the law—with the possibility of extending that time by two years on a case-by-case basis.

Mr. McKenzie says five to seven years is "way too long." He says the proposal "just doesn't pass the smell test."

But neither Mr. McKenzie nor Ms. Spellings have backed up their views with research or case studies from schools that explain or illustrate why letting children take tests in their native languages for a possible seven years is "too long."

I delved into this question a bit in a previous post, "Is English Learning Slowed Down with Bilingual Education?" As this issue heats up, I welcome further insights from readers.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 2:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just learned about another free resource for educators of ELLs.

The Center for Applied Linguistics has created an online kit for schools to evaluate how their programs for English-language learners are faring. It doesn't come with software, but walks school officials through the steps of evaluating a program, with a special emphasis on two-way bilingual programs, in which students who are dominant in English and students who are dominant in a language other than English learn both languages in the same classroom.

The description of the "evaluator's toolkit" says it is especially intended for people who have no prior knowledge of evaluation. The development of the toolkit seems to me to fit into the culture that's developing in a lot of schools, spurred by the No Child Left Behind Act, that favors data-based instruction.

I found out about this resource through the Center for Applied Linguistics' online newsletter. Click here if you want to subscribe.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 1:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the news business, we sometimes joke that if we can find three examples of something, it's a trend. I've found three examples of organizations or companies offering short on-line seminars on the education of English-language learners, so I believe I've stumbled on a trend for how short-term professional development is being delivered in the field.

On Oct. 10, LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc., is offering a "webinar" for strategies and practical tips for teaching English-language learners. Mary Lou McClosky, a former president of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc., and Maria Enrique, a teacher at Alvin Dunn Elementary School in San Diego, Calif., are the instructors. The webinar is free, but expect a pitch for LeapFrog's products.

Also on Oct. 10, several members of TESOL are giving a "virtual seminar," "Is the Emperor Wearing Any Clothes? .... Is ESL Just Good Teaching?" This one costs $25 for members of TESOL and $60 for nonmembers. You have to sign up by 2 p.m. Eastern Standard Time this Friday. (For more on TESOL's virtual seminars, click here.)

Lastly, on Nov. 8, the Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners, or CREATE, is providing a "webcast" on making standards-based lessons understandable for ELLs. Jana Echevarria, a professor of education at California State University, Long Beach, will provide the instruction. It's free.

Whether it was called a webinar, virtual seminar, or webcast, if you've signed on to one of these on-line presentations, tell us whether you think the method of delivery worked well.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

If you'd like to know more about ELLs who were born in the United States, read Debra Suarez's review of the research on these students in the summer issue of the Heritage Language Journal. (Click on the second article in the Table of Contents.)

Ms. Suarez, an associate professor for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages at the College of Notre Dame of Maryland, writes that in the 1991-1992 school year, a researcher found that about one-third of ELLs were born in the United States; in 2006, another researcher found that proportion had nearly doubled to 64 percent.

As an aside, I'll note here that officials from the Los Angeles school district mentioned when they stopped by Education Week's offices on Friday to talk with reporters and editors that 78 percent of the ELLs in their school district were born in the United States.

Ms. Suarez highlights how researchers have found that while many second-generation immigrants would like to keep their native language and culture, they overwhelmingly prefer to use English in their daily lives. A large body of research, she says, shows that keeping one's native language is beneficial for "academic achievement, cognitive development, social and psychological growth, and family relationships."

Hence, she writes, educators should be interested in helping ELLs to keep their native languages. And she implies that supporting students in this endeavor shouldn't be the job only of bilingual teachers. Teachers of English as a second language can encourage students to use their native languages for some classroom activities and help students to value and develop bilingualism as well, she says.

Posted by Mary Ann Zehr at 9:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)