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ELL Programs

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An issue that has become very important to me is that of fair education, specifically, in regards to ELL programs (English language learners) . This issue is very important to me because I’ve seen the struggles that immigrant students/the children of immigrants face when it come to the education system. During my early school years, I grew up in a predominantly hispanic neighborhood in East Harlem, therefore the schools in the surrounding neighborhoods had many native Spanish speakers. I didn’t encounter any problems in school with language, since English was my first language, but many of my classmates has trouble. I would often see teachers get frustrated with students when they could not communicate effectively with them. Instead of …show more content…

For their other classes, the assignments were amended to complement the ELL program. There was also an after school program with teachers for homework help. When I saw this very different program, I wondered why
Through my bibliographic search, I was able to learn the specifics of what scholars were discoursing on in regards to this topic. Current debates began with the teachers themselves. One article found that ELL teachers were generally “unwelcoming” (Reeves 2006). Reasons for this were the concern that there’s not enough time to address all the students’ needs, too much work for teachers when students are also enrolled in non-ELL classes, and feelings of unqualification to teacher ELL students (Reeves 2006). Another area of discussion is whether ELL programs should take an inclusion approach vs exclusion (from normal school curriculum) approach. Inclusion is when students are mainstreamed for most of the day, with some specific ELL classes. If only in ELL classes, students may not have access to the mainstream education needed to succeed (Reeves 2006). One article stressed the importance of education at home as well. If English is not also spoken at home, acquisition is slowed (Allen 2011). Pride also affects the rate of learning, students will often claim to understand, even though they d not, to avoid the perception of being ignorant (2011).
Research also found a need for more “professional development”.

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