The English Language Learning Assessment

Impact of Current Political climate on English Language Learners Students and funding in the public school.

Marcela said the she never felt like she struggled once she got to Kindergarten and that she learned pretty quickly because she was surrounded by English. Marcela mentioned that one of her teachers was pretty hands off with her, not much eye contact and didn’t really teach her words, but other teachers made her feel welcome and were nice by the time she learned more english. She shared that her parents did not learn as quickly. Her father now speaks, Spanish, Italian and English. She said his job required him to eventually speak in all those languages. Her mother still speaks mostly Spanish and she wasn’t exposed to the English language very often because she worked in a Spanish speaking environment. Marcela believes that they didn’t pick up that language as quickly because they weren't surrounded by it like she was. Marcela says she speaks both English and Spanish fluently with no accent in either language. She can switch from one language to the other very quickly, especially when she speaking to her

The passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which is the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), along with areas that are the same, it also brings some significant changes to requirements for English Learners (ELs). Below are the highlights:

In my learning assessment I have learned that I am 50 percent a visual learner and 50 percent an auditory learner. This means that I need to hear and see things to be able to grasp and understand the concept. When taking notes I write down everything I hear and see, if the professor is drawing pictures on the board. This helps me to create a better understanding of the material because the first chance I get after the class I rewrite my notes and look throughout the chapter to find key words and pictures. The “What Kind of Student Are You” assessment told me I was a good student by going to class, taking good notes, and paying attention when the instructor is talking. If there is something I do not understand about the class then I

The article Differentiated Instruction for English Language Learners as “Variations on a Theme” was published in the Middle School Journal in 2012. This article distinguishes sheltered content instruction from differentiated instruction, and provides an overview of some of the key principles for differentiating instructions for English language learners. The article opens by discussing the increasing population of ELL students in U.S. schools, and that the majority of these ELLs are not immigrants, but are in fact, native-born U.S. citizens. The article focuses on the middle grades and as such talks about how students at this age have an intense desire to fit in which can make it difficult for teachers to get these students to take risks in

When walking into Mr. Stanlick’s classroom one may notice the colourful posters covering the blank walls and the abundance of inspirational quotes. The busy room, although it may be distracting, instantly put me at ease. Mr. Stanlick had a method of explaining a math problem that made you instantly understand the solution. His confident

Joe is able to listen and show his awareness of separate words in sentences and this comes to play when he is in small group reading time with Miss Mayra and she asks him to read a sentence on a page he slowly traces along with his finger and pausing when he notices a space between each word on the page so he takes his time and recognizes that those words are separate from each other. When he is practicing writing his name he is able to recognize every letter by saying each one out loud as he writes it down on paper. He makes sure to say each letter slowly so he writes it out correctly. What I have noticed about Joe when he writes his name is that he writes it in the style of letter strings and sometimes doesn’t write his, “e’s and “j’s” in the right direction. A skill that Joe is still working on is his understanding of the events in some stories that are shared to the class verses in small group readings with the teacher. Even though this is a skill that Joe is working on he still shows a strong interest in books that he is familiar with and understands really well versus new picture books at times. Another skill that Joe is working on is his phonological awareness when it comes to singing songs and reciting rhymes that have repeating sounds. He does sometimes have trouble with fluency and writing because he is an English Language Learner but is

Patrick’s attention to his work, and his focus both at home and in school, has resulted in increased class participation and development in both reading and writing. Patrick is continuing to develop his writing skills and he is becoming more adept at not only developing his ideas but proofreading his own work, editing and revising as necessary. It is essential that Patrick continues to read widely at home in English to ensure that he is constantly exposed to new vocabulary. It is evident that Patrick is able to ‘find meaning’ using the correct context of what he has read and makes sound connections. This is a strategy that will help him further develop as a reader and writer. Patrick’s general knowledge is excellent and he is especially

In Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD.) the California English Language Development Test (CELDT) is used by the district to measure the success of K-12 students’ English proficiency. It is used to diagnose the areas students need support in along the fields of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The CELDT categorizes students into five levels: Beginning, Early Intermediate, Intermediate, Early Advanced, and Advanced. According to the California Department of Education (2011), ELs within LAUSD. in English Language Development programs (ELD) scored 17% Beginning, 14% Early Intermediate, 34% Intermediate, 24% Early Advanced, 11% Advanced, ELs within LAUSD. not receiving any ELD programs

The goal of teachers is to instruct students at grade level, guide students in their learning and improve their skills by the end of the year. In the article, “Using literacy assessment results to improve teaching for English-language learners,” by Lori A. Helman (2005), the researcher wanted to discover: “Is literacy testing just getting in the way of good teaching? Or, can the results of literacy assessments assist teachers as they work to meet the needs of learners from diverse languages and backgrounds in their classrooms?” (Helman, 2005, p. 668). Throughout this article, Helman provides background information about the context of the current assessment, assessment results, and two case studies of English-learning beginning readers. The

Students in the pre-emergent stage of language acquisition have a vocabulary base of approximately 500 receptive words (Hong, 2008, p. 61). However, these students may be experiencing the “silence period” or parrot others thought they produce limited language output. Therefore, the read aloud strategy, a method of reading a book audibly either as a class or in small groups provides English Language Learners the opportunity to hear English spoken in a clear slow manner while participating in a classroom activity (Grand Canyon University School of Education website, n.d., expression 2). By reading aloud, the teacher provides a model of proficient reading and a means to provide content for ELLS who cannot yet read at the level of the text (Levine, Lukens, & Smallwood, 2013, p. 94) Also reading aloud “builds students background knowledge and develops academic vocabulary along” with proper enunciation which is vital for this stage of English development (Echevarria, Vogt, & Short, 2013, p. 76).

In all three articles, the main message that they are trying to address is the importance of English literacy skills and how they assist people in the outside world. For starters, English literacy skills can indicate a person’s quality of work and job performance. An example of this is shown when Kyle Wiens compares the results from his employees’ grammar tests with the results from their work, saying, “I’ve found that people who make fewer mistakes on a grammar test also make fewer mistakes when they are doing something completely unrelated to writing.” The comparison shows that the employees who are able to present better work quality are generally those with more advanced English literacy skills, signifying the importance of these skills

All literacy events are culturally created and situated, so they inherently convey significant cultural knowledge and shape cultural identity (Pérez et al., 2003). While biliteracy education is important for minority learners, it is often found vulnerable to societal-institutional constraints, such as uniform curriculum and standardized assessment (McCarty, 2002; Schwinge, 2003). Thus, I agree with Vogt et al. (1995) that teachers should be empowered to participate in collaborative interaction, in order to make informed decisions about pedagogical improvement and challenge the coercive power relations. Concerning its positive effects, I argue that alternative assessment should be developed to help teachers become more reflective practitioners

In an effort to gain useable and positive feedback from English language learners, teachers must use ongoing assessments. Whereas standardized tests only give information on students during a certain part of the year, ongoing assessments will allow teachers to monitor students’ progress throughout the year. Informal assessments are very beneficial in monitoring the progress of students. One type of informal assessment is the use of role playing. During role playing, students are given opportunities to speak in English dealing with different situations. This assessment will let the teacher observe how well the student is comprehends the scenarios and how they respond to them. This type of assessment is effective because it allows students to put the English language into use increasing their English

Based on the charts in classroom I can see they had the numbers 1-20 with appropriate alternatives to represent the numbers (fingers, blocks, number line, etc.). An interesting thing about the classroom he was placed in was, there were both English and Spanish words. In the classroom Omar, prefers to read books in English rather than Spanish but at home he speaks Spanish with his dad. I think this is because some of the student at the school don’t now English and he wants to communicate with them so he prefers English at school but Spanish at home. I did read the questions in English and he did understand and respond back in English, showing me that he has some proficiency in English language development. Physically, emotionally, and socially Omar is a happy child who enjoys playing on the playground with his friend