English Learners (ELs) are one of the fastest-growing student populations in K-12 schools, and attention must be given to the academic achievement gap between ELs and their native English language speaking counterparts. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), passed in 2015, required every state to adopt English proficiency standards aligned with…

This article examines the development, delivery, and outcomes of a year-long, collaborative, professional development (PD) program for 33 K-16 world language educators who taught in the State of Delaware. This work was prompted (in part) by Delaware's publication of its World-Readiness Standards for Learning Languages (Delaware Department of…

The study addressed the gap in fifth-grade science proficiency between English language learners (ELLs) enrolled in two different science programs in a large school district in the Southeast United States. The Inspire program was implemented in 125 schools, while a combination of Inspire and Promoting Science among English Language Learners…

School districts that have adopted the 3Ls™ approach to provide rigorous instruction for English learners (ELs) have, invariably, had to make a case for what this approach offers, how it reflects best practices in English language development (ELD) instruction, and how it meets the needs of English learners. They have also had to make explicit…

Researchers have estimated that by 2030, two of every five American public school students will be acquiring English as second language learners (Shah & Cavanagh, 2012). Providing adequate means by which ELLs can obtain both English language and academic proficiency will be paramount if they are to be successful, contributing members of their…

Increasingly, mainstream teachers rather than specialist language teachers (English as a Second Language, bilingual teachers) are expected to work with English language learners (ELLs) in their classrooms. This reality has drawn attention to the quality and content of the teacher preparation for this group of ELL teachers. Situated within this…

For all students, a high-quality early education is critical to ensuring their long-term academic success. Early learners need to understand why people read and write in order to be motivated to excel in their own literacy development. Through active engagement in the reading process, children learn ways to use their growing knowledge and skills…

This experimental study examined how the reading and writing development of sixth-grade L2 students was affected by syntactic enhancement. Visual-syntactic text formatting (VSTF) technology, which visualizes syntactic structures, was used to convert a textbook to the one with syntactic enhancement. The sample (n = 282), which was drawn from a…

Principals face a tangled web of accountability for several reasons: NCLB shifted the focus of programs for English language learners (ELLs). Success is no longer viewed with the single lens of meeting English proficiency, but rather with a magnifying glass to ensure that students "will meet the same challenging state academic content and…

The Common Core Standards have defined literacy and outlined the mission for English Language Arts in a way that provides a natural fit with the National Standards for Language Learning. Taking advantage of this connection, language teachers can showcase the importance of learning languages by demonstrating how literacy is learned, practiced, and…

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and the National Standards for Foreign Language Education have several areas of commonality: (1) both standards have the goal that all students, by the end of 12th grade, will have the skills they need to be successful world citizens; (2) the literacy skills that are found in the Common Core are the same…

Certain aspects of the implementation of language immersion programs in Delaware are unique given the state's size, demographics, and role in national education initiatives including Race to the Top, Common Core, and Smarter Balance. The Delaware experience typifies what every state, district, or even school goes through as they try to provide…

Although course assignments require English as a Second Language (ESL) teacher candidates to design activities, performance assessments, and lessons that balance the teaching of the English language and academic content, the ESL teacher candidates remain perplexed as to how to teach without a prescribed curriculum. The answer is challenging, given…

Today, English language learners (ELLs)--students whose primary language is other than English--are the fastest-growing major school population in the United States. Between 2000-01 and 2010-11, the number of these students, whose level of English proficiency is not sufficient to support learning in a regular English language classroom, rose 18…

Currently, American schooling, driven by No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and standardized tests, emphasizes development of intelligence. Because of this, teachers must heavily emphasize acquisition of foundational information (facts) in lectures, assessments, and of course, time-consuming test preparation, at the expense of intellect, that…