scholarly journals Do High-Stakes Test Really Address English Language Learners’ Learning Needs? – A Discussion of Issues, Concerns, and Implications

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jinyan Huang ◽  
Turgay Han ◽  
Kelli Schnapp
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
Learning Needs ◽  
High Stakes

scholarly journals Differentiation in the Digital-Based Classroom: A Universal Design Approach for Inclusive Settings in Middle Schools

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathleen McCoy ◽  
Sarup Mathur
Keyword(s):  
Middle School ◽  
English Language Learners ◽  
Learning Styles ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
Learning Needs ◽  
Autistic Behavior ◽  
Diverse Classrooms ◽  
Inclusive Settings ◽  
Diverse Student

Teachers across the world have become barraged with various techniques to meet the educational needs of multiple subgroups, e.g., autistic, behavior disorders, English Language Learners (ELL), gifted. They have the responsibility of creating environments in which learners become more knowledgeable and skilled from the time when they entered the classroom. For the current and future generations of learners and their teachers, the emergence of technology has created new prospects for accommodating the learning styles of diverse classrooms. The versatility of technology can be used to organize and design material that promotes successful acquisition and retention of expected middle school content within the inclusive settings. In this paper, the authors provide a greater understanding of how technology can be an effective change agent for learning in middle school inclusive settings. Suggestions are included for teachers’ capacity building to integrate technology to accommodate diverse student learning needs and styles.

Standards-based classroom assessments of English proficiency: A review of issues, current developments, and future directions for research

2011 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 367-382 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorena Llosa
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
English Language ◽  
Classroom Assessment ◽  
English Proficiency ◽  
The United States ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
Classroom Assessments ◽  
Key Issues

With the United States’ adoption of a standards-based approach to education, most attention has focused on the large-scale, high-stakes assessments intended to measure students’ mastery of standards for accountability purposes. Less attention has been paid to the role of standards-based assessments in the classroom. The purpose of this paper is to discuss key issues and challenges related to the use of standards-based classroom assessments to assess English language learners’ English proficiency. First, the paper describes a study of a standards-based classroom assessment of English proficiency in a large urban school district in California. Second, using this study as an example and drawing from the literature in language testing on classroom assessment, this paper highlights the major issues and challenges involved in using English proficiency standards as the basis for classroom assessment. Finally, the article outlines a research agenda for the field given current developments in the areas of English proficiency standards and classroom assessment.

The Language Policy of Placement Tests for Newcomer English Learners

2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (7) ◽  
pp. 936-968 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kendall King ◽  
Martha Bigelow
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
Placement Test ◽  
Formal Schooling ◽  
High Stakes

U.S. public schools are required to establish policies ensuring that English language learners have equal access to “meaningful education.” This demands that districts put into place mechanisms to determine student eligibility for specialized English language services. For the most states, this federal requirement is fulfilled through the local administration of the WIDA–Access Placement Test (W-APT), arguably the most widely used, yet under-studied, English language assessment in the country. Through intensive participant observation at one, urban new student intake center, and detailed qualitative, discursive analysis of test administration and interaction, we demonstrate how the W-APT works as a high-stakes assessment, screener, and sorter, and how test takers and test administrators locally negotiate this test and enact this federal and state policy. Our analysis indicates that the W-APT is problematic in several respects, most importantly because the test does not differentiate adequately across students with widely different literacy skills and formal schooling experiences.

scholarly journals Teaching Disciplinary Literacy to Adolescent English Language Learners: Vocabulary Development and Reading within the Disciplines

2020 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingling Lou
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Paradigm Shift ◽  
English Language ◽  
Vocabulary Development ◽  
Disciplinary Literacy ◽  
Learning Needs ◽  
Literacy Teachers ◽  
Ell Students ◽  
Diverse Learning

Recent research on disciplinary literacy has called for a paradigm shift among secondary content teachers from perceiving themselves as disciplinary content transmitters to disciplinary literacy teachers who model and engage students in reading, writing, inquiring, and doing like experts within each discipline. How do content teachers incorporate disciplinary literacy and stay responsive to the unique and diverse learning needs of the adolescent English Language Learners (ELLs) who are integrated in the mainstream classes? Drawing on Moje’s (2015) 4Es framework and a translanguaging pedagogy, this paper presents a set of instructional practices to support content teachers in integrating disciplinary literacy within the disciplines to enhance adolescent ELL students’ learning in vocabulary development and reading. La recherche récente en matière de littératie dans toutes les disciplines appelle à un changement de paradigme chez les enseignants des différentes matières du secondaire pour se percevoir non plus comme des transmetteurs de contenu de la discipline mais comme des enseignants de littératie de la discipline qui servent de modèles et motivent les élèves à lire, écrire, se renseigner et à se comporter comme des experts à l’intérieur de chaque discipline. Comment les enseignants de contenu incorporent-ils la littératie dans leur discipline et restent-ils à l’écoute des besoins d’apprentissage uniques et variés des adolescents qui apprennent l’anglais (AALS) et qui sont intégrés dans les classes ordinaires? En s’appuyant sur le cadre 4E de Moje (2015) et sur une pédagogie translangagière, cet article présente une série de pratiques d’enseignement visant à soutenir les enseignants de contenu dans l’intégration de la littératie dans toutes les disciplines de façon à enrichir l’apprentissage des adolescents ASL en matière de développement du vocabulaire et de lecture.

On My Mind: University Faculty—Making Classroom Connections

2007 ◽  
Vol 12 (9) ◽  
pp. 488-489
Author(s):  
Denisse R. Thompson ◽  
Gladis Kersaint
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Teacher Education Programs ◽  
University Faculty ◽  
Full Time ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
Use Of Technology ◽  
Graduate Teacher Education

University teacher educators typically wear many hats. Their many roles may include providing professional development (i.e., workshops) for practicing teachers on various topics (e.g., use of technology, teaching English Language Learners); teaching mathematics or methods courses to teachers or teacher candidates enrolled in undergraduate or graduate teacher education programs; and working with various groups or entities related to policy issues in mathematics education (e.g., teacher licensure, high-stakes assessment). Although mathematics teacher educators contribute to the field in various ways, a perception exists that university faculty are in an “ivory tower,” having few or ancient connections to schools. In some cases, their credibility may be questioned because of the time that has elapsed since they were in a classroom full time.

scholarly journals Peddling Pedagogies: The Winners and Losers of a Standardized Testing Economy

2014 ◽  
Vol 100 ◽  
pp. 153-155
Author(s):  
Lucy Arnold Steele
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
English Language Learners ◽  
Standardized Testing ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
Urban Students ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Teacher Roles ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
The Impact

This review compares the ethnographic research of Jessica Zacher Pandya’s Overtested: How High-Stakes Accountability Fails English Language Learners with the programmatic prescriptions of Yvette Jackson’s Pedagogy of Confidence. Both texts are concerned with the impact of standardized testing on urban students, but the focus of each book is quite different in terms of public policy on education and the way teacher roles are construed.

scholarly journals The impact of language and high-stakes testing policies on elementary school English language learners in Arizona.

2006 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne E. Wright ◽  
Daniel Choi
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
High Stakes Testing ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
Ell Students ◽  
Sheltered English Immersion ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Sheltered English

This article reports the results of a survey of third-grade teachers of English Language Learners (ELLs) in Arizona regarding school language and accountability policies—Proposition 203, which restricts bilingual education and mandates sheltered English Immersion; the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB); and Arizona LEARNS, the state’s high-stakes testing and accountability program. The instrument, consisting of 126 survey questions plus open-ended interview question, was designed to obtain teacher’s views, to ascertain the impact of these polices, and to explore their effectiveness in improving the education of ELL students. The survey was administered via telephone to 40 teacher participants from different urban, rural and reservation schools across the state. Each participant represents the elementary school in their respective school district which has the largest population of ELL students. Analyses of both quantitative and qualitative data reveal that these policies have mostly resulted in confusion in schools throughout the state over what is and is not allowed, and what constitutes quality instruction for ELLs, that there is little evidence that such policies have led to improvements in the education of ELL students, and that these policies may be causing more harm than good. Specifically, teachers report they have been given little to no guidance over what constitutes sheltered English immersion, and provide evidence that most ELL students in their schools are receiving mainstream sink-or-swim instruction. In terms of accountability, while the overwhelming majority of teachers support the general principle, they believe that high-stakes tests are inappropriate for ELLs and participants provided evidence that the focus on testing is leading to instruction practices for ELLs which fail to meet their unique linguistic and academic needs. The article concludes with suggestions for needed changes to improve the quality of education for ELLs in Arizona.

scholarly journals What are the perceptions of stakeholders of an online ESOL programme?: The case of one intermediate school in New Zealand

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Annette Tate
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Online Teaching ◽  
English Language ◽  
English Language Learning ◽  
Learning Needs ◽  
Intermediate School ◽  
Second Language Teacher

<p>Online teaching for English language learners in New Zealand schools is a recent phenomenon. Increasingly complex technologies allow expanding and far reaching options in the teaching practices of English, particularly to those students in remote geographical areas, or in schools with no qualified English as a second language teacher. This qualitative research project investigated the case of one intermediate school that adopted online English language learning to meet the learning needs of their English language learners. Stakeholders’ perceptions of barriers and facilitators to learning were reported and examined. Data indicated research participants formed three distinct groups according to the extent of their involvement in the daily programme; their communication about English language learning and the particular online programme they were using; and their understanding of the purposes and processes of the online English language programme. These three factors influenced stakeholders’ perceptions of the value of online English language learning. The more actively stakeholders were involved, communicated about and understood the online English language learning programme, the more they were convinced of its value. These findings suggest that stakeholders who have a more peripheral involvement may benefit from increased opportunities to connect with other stakeholders in the programme. Online English language learning is likely to be enhanced if formal and informal structures are developed to allow stakeholders to develop greater involvement, opportunities for communication and knowledge of the programme.</p>

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