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Breakthrough North
B STEM
Global
Kennelly
Milner
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Montessori at Batchelder

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References

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August, D., & Siegel, L. (2006). Literacy instruction for language-minority children in special education settings. In D. August & T. Shanahan (Eds.), Developing literacy in second-language learners: Report of the National Literacy Panel on Language-Minority Children and Youth (pp. 523-553). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Cirino, P. T., Vaughn, S., Linan-Thompson, S., Cardenas-Hagan, E., Fletcher, J. M., & Francis, D. J. (2007). One year follow-up outcomes of Spanish and English interventions for English language learners at-risk for reading problems. Manuscript submitted for publication.

Denton, C. A., Anthony, J. L., Parker, R., & Hasbrouck, J. E. (2004). Effects of two tutoring programs on the English reading development of Spanish-English bilingual students. The Elementary School Journal, 104, 289-305.

Franklin, E. A. (1986). Literacy instruction for LES children. Language Arts, 63, 51-60.

Gunn, B., Smolkowski, K., Biglan, A., & Black, C. (2002). Supplemental instruction in decoding skills for Hispanic and non-Hispanic students in early elementary school: A follow-up. The Journal of Special Education, 36, 69-79.

Haager, D., & Windmueller, M. (2001). Early literacy intervention for English language learners at-risk for learning disabilities: Student outcomes in an urban school. Learning Disability Quarterly, 24, 235-250.

Limbos, M., & Geva, E. (2001). Accuracy of teacher assessments of second-language students at risk for reading disability. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 34, 136-151.

Quiroga, T., Lemos-Britton, Z., Mostafapour, E., Abbott, R. D., & Berninger, V. W. (2002). Phonological awareness and beginning reading in Spanish-speaking ESL first graders: Research into practice. Journal of School Psychology, 40, 85-111.

Shanahan, T., & Beck, I. L. (2006). Effective literacy teaching for English-language learners. In D. August & T. Shanahan (Eds.), Developing literacy in second-language learners: Report of the National Literacy Panel on Language-Minority Children and Youth (pp. 415-488). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Vaughn, S., Cirino, P. T., Linan-Thompson, S., Mathes, P. G., Carlson, C. D., Cardenas-Hagan, E., et al. (2006). Effectiveness of a Spanish intervention and an English intervention for English language learners at risk for reading problems. American Educational Research Journal, 43, 449-487.

Vaughn, S., Linan-Thompson, S., & Hickman-Davis, P. (2003). Response to treatment as a means for identifying students with reading/learning disabilities. Exceptional Children, 69, 391-410.

Vaughn, S., Mathes, P., Linan-Thompson, S., Cirino, P., Carlson, C., Pollard-Durodola, S., et al. (2006). Effectiveness of an English intervention for first-grade English language learners at risk for reading problems. Elementary School Journal, 107, 153-180.

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Best Practice for ELLs: Small-Group Interventions

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Providing small-group reading instruction in five core reading elements (phonological awareness, phonics, reading fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension) can really help English language learners in the elementary grades.

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Many schools across the country use a Multi-tiered System of Support (MTSS) framework to target instruction and interventions based on students' needs. The MTSS model can be particularly powerful in determining what kinds of supports are most appropriate for English language learners (ELLs), who are frequently over- and under-identified in special education.

MTSS: An Overview

What is MTSS?

MTSS refers to a recommended framework that organizes instruction and interventions in a data-informed tiered system of support. The goals of MTSS are to ensure that all students have access to the instruction and interventions they need to be successful, as well as to improve special education identification/referral practices. This is particularly important for ELLs who are sometimes placed mistakenly in special education classes ( over-identification) or whose learning differences are overlooked because they are learning a new language ( under-identification). MTSS can offer a roadmap for problem-solving and finding the appropriate approach for each student.

Every state office of education has provided guidance and requirements around the implementation of MTSS. The framework addresses a preventive approach rather than the "wait to fail" model. MTSS uses quick assessments (also known as universal screeners) as indicators of:

academic skills in reading, math, and writing

social skills and behavior.

The goal is for teachers to use the universal screening results to:

work together in order to problem-solve

develop better and responsive instructional practices in the classroom

design data-informed interventions

establish cycles of progress monitoring over the year

adjust instruction and intervention to address student needs and growth.

These instructional practices are delivered using a 3-tiered system:

For more information on research-based factors that indicate the difference between Tier 2 and Tier 3 interventions, see Table 1 in this article from RTI Action Network.

Tiers of intervention can address academic, social, and behavioral needs that are monitored for progress monthly and weekly. This monitoring is also called progress monitoring. Progress monitoring cycles provide teachers an opportunity to identify students' strengths, review and re-evaluate students' response to instruction and intervention, and keep track of progress towards grade-level achievement.

What is the connection between Response to Intervention (RTI) and MTSS? What is the same and what is different?

Response to Intervention (RTI) is the first framework that focused on preventively using data to guide instruction and intervention in reading. After roughly 15 years of implementation all over the country, we learned some key components to make it more effective. Essentially, we needed to find ways to address the needs of the whole child and not just students' reading skills. MTSS has become the standard now and has been widely adopted by state departments of education for public schools because it provides a framework that allows schools to look at the whole child.

RTI model

The components of the RTI model (Fuchs & Fuchs, 2006; Johnson, Mellard, Fuchs and McKnight, 2005) are:

Universal screening and continuous progress monitoring

Research-based, evidence-based instruction and intervention in tiers of increasing support

Data-informed instructional decision-making for instruction and interventions development and delivery

Collaboration in data-informed decision-making

Implementation fidelity of instruction and interventions.

MTSS model

The added components in MTSS include all of the above and the following (Higgins and Rinaldi, 2011):

Culturally Responsive Instruction (CRI) and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles for instructional planning and delivery in all tiers of instruction and intervention (e.g. Tier 1, 2 and 3)

a focus on the whole child addressing student engagement in terms of academic engaged time and active learning opportunities across all tiers

social emotional learning and Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) as part of the framework components.

MTSS and English Language Learners

How does MTSS address the needs of ELLs?

Increasing student talk time

ELL expert and blogger Valentina Gonzalez shares strategies for increasing student talk time in the following posts on MiddleWeb:

Based on the components of the MTSS framework, high-quality, research-based instruction or Tier 1 grounded in culturally responsive instruction and UDL will provide greater access to the general curriculum and integrate more coherently with English as a second language (ESL) services provided for all ELLs.

Student engagement focused on time on-task and active learning will support more oral language development and academic language development in the classroom. Research suggests that teachers currently teach at students or lecture an average of 80% during instruction (Echevarria and Graves, 2015). The goal of this component is to reduce directed teacher instructional talk and increase student-mediated learning around academic tasks using research-based strategy instruction (e.g. reciprocal teaching, peer assisted learning, class-wide peer tutoring, cross-age peer tutoring, problem-based learning, cognitive strategy instruction, metacognitive strategy instruction, language of instruction, etc.).

The components of collaboration additionally support ELLs by bringing together the expertise of general educators and specialists who work with these students including ESL teachers, special education teachers, speech and language specialists, etc. As a result, planning for data-informed problem-solving, instruction, and intervention capitalizes on various teacher expertise delivery in a variety of instructional methods from whole class instruction, small group, and 1 to 1 or 1:3 as research recommends in academic and social emotional areas.

By looking at social, behavior, emotional learning and Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS), this component ensures that we look ecologically at the whole child and use the tiered system of support, universal screening, and progress monitoring to develop positive instruction and intervention in social and academic behavior. These components ensure that teams look at the child's social-emotional history (e.g. educational, familial, health, immigration, trauma, etc.)

By ensuring that this MTSS framework and each of its components address effective research-based instruction of all students, teachers make a more precise decision in whether to refer a student for special education evaluation and services. This is illustrated in the following example.

Example: Progress monitoring

Let's look at a class where 75-80% of student are benefitting or learning from Tier 1 core instruction using the components addressed above. How are we going to address the needs of the 20-25% who need extra support? The students that are not making progress should be the ones receiving Tier 2 strategic intervention and Tier 3 intensive intervention with weekly or monthly progress monitoring.

At this point, the team can move forward with a comprehensive evaluation process that includes substantial information on instruction and intervention that will yield a more comprehensive decision for eligibility for special education services.

Comparison with a "true peer"

An additional step that may also be helpful is to compare a student who is struggling with a "true peer," another student who can be used for comparison because both students share the following:

language proficiency, culture, and experiential background

age and time in the United States and acculturation in adapting to a new environment

use of L1 and L2 at home, school, and community

education experience and services such as dual language instruction, transitional bilingual instruction, ESL services, or sheltered-English instruction (Esparza & Doolittle, 2008).

For example:

Javier is a 4th-grade student from Mexico City who has had regular, consistent schooling in Mexico and comes to the U.S. with strong literacy skills in Spanish.

Joaquin is a 4th-grade student from a rural part of Mexico who came to the U.S. as a toddler. His parents are migrant farmworkers and he has moved around to many different schools in the U.S. Sometimes he has attended bilingual programs and sometimes he has been in English-only programs.

Even though Javier and Joaquin are both the same age, speak Spanish, and come from Mexico, their educational, language, and life experiences are very different. If Javier and Joaquin are given the same assessments of language and literacy in (whether in English or Spanish), they are likely to perform differently in both languages. Therefore, they are not "true peers" and comparing their performance is inappropriate. However, if other students share some of the characteristics described above, it may be easier to see patterns among students and to use those commonalities as a benchmark for evaluating individual or group progress.

What does effective Tier 1 instruction look for ELLs?

Videos: Do ELs have access to good instruction?

Before describing the interventions, which are a great way to conceptualize support, it is worth underscoring the following: it is critical to ensure that English language learners have access to the general education curriculum and appropriate ESL supports based on language development levels. Not only should the ELLs receive the general education curriculum, but it should be accessible to most students (75-80% of students) as an indicator of effective high quality instruction that has the recommended components of MTSS.

Although this seems basic, many schools have ELLs taken out of the Tier 1 general education curriculum (i.e ELA, Math) to receive ESL services. If ELLs are taken out for ESL, intervention, or other services during the general education curriculum, they miss out of the richness of the curriculum content, vocabulary, oral language practice, and basic skills learned in ELA and math in exchange for supplementary education supports that are developed to provide access to Tier 1.

Moving into interventions is the next step. Many schools every day provide students with interventions. They send students, including ELLs, to see different professionals including teachers, interventionists, and volunteers; sometimes there is a plan, and sometimes there is no plan. This may also be the only option for students to get one-to-one or small group support. First, educators must agree on what all students receive or what we define as Tier 1. We can then design, define, and deliver an intervention, Tier 2 and Tier 3 (as needed) and monitor its effectiveness for each child every 4 to 6 weeks.

Students' schedules

It is worth taking a look at students' daily and weekly schedules to see how much time students are spending on transitions and missing classtime. This can be especially problematic (and stressful!) for ELLs who are referred to multiple specialists because they are struggling, have experienced trauma, and/or are newcomers to the country. ELL administrator Kristina Robertson writes,
Think about what kinds of supports are available in the school environment if students have had very little school experience or if they've experienced trauma. These students may benefit from a lot of structure and attention from the same small group of people on a regular basis and a regular schedule. For elementary students, this may mean reducing the number of transitions and classroom switches throughout the day, which can be overwhelming - this is a particular challenge for ELLs who are struggling and being pulled out for multiple kinds of services and support. For secondary students, consider connecting students with adult mentors that can provide a check-in each day, as well as a place to take a break when needed.
One approach that schools are using is to revisit staff and student schedules in order to find creative ways to provide support. You can learn more about some of these approaches from the recommended resources below.

What are the recommended Tier 2 and Tier 3 interventions for ELLs in the MTSS framework?

An effective Tier 2 or Tier 3 intervention can be better defined as having the following qualities:

1. It supplements and intensifies the general education curriculum or Tier 1 (in the case of English language learners, does Tier 1 include ESL? Will the tier interventions also include ESL support?)

2. Does the intervention lay out a plan for implementation and is it captured somewhere to review if it was delivered as it was intended (e.g. fidelity of implementation)?
For example, the target student will received a 15-minute fluency intervention with ESL strategy support 3 times per week using instructional level text.

3. For ELLs, is the intervention using information based on the English language proficiency level and co-developed with the support of an ESL teacher/coach expert?

4. Is the intervention research-based or evidenced-based? This refers to an instructional approach that has been proven effective through rigorous research and, when implemented with fidelity (as designed), improves the performance of students (Torres, Farley, Cook, 2012)?

5. Is there a criteria for successful response to the intervention?

A student can read a number of words per minute with fluency and accuracy increasing about 1 word per week toward grade level expectation.

The student is able to match vocabulary words from the curriculum with 90% accuracy.

6. Is there an assessment that is feasible and quick to indicate progress that can be used monthly for students receiving Tier 2 and weekly for students receiving Tier 3? Has the team decided to monitor progress in English language development and academic skills, and perhaps even in their native language?

Curriculum-based measures such as Aimsweb, Dibels, FastBridge are good tools that provide you an indication of progress, but teacher-made ones using the curriculum used are a good option if designed appropriately.

Packaged interventions may also either have an assessment tool to monitor progress or may do so by default, moving from one lesson to the other after students meet a 90% or higher level of accuracy. For more information of research-based/evidenced-based interventions, visit the National Center on Intensive Intervention.

Closing thoughts

There is a lot of useful information about using MTSS with bilingual learners now available to schools. I encourage you to use the resources throughout this article to learn more. By using MTSS to take a careful look at our expectations for students, the instruction and interventions we are using, and our methods of delivery, we can help greater numbers of students reach their potential and achieve higher levels of success throughout their educational careers.

Recommended Videos

For the complete interviews with these featured experts, see our video resources related to special education.

Recommended Resources

Guidelines for ELLs

Articles and books

Resource pages

About the Author

Professor Claudia Rinaldi focuses her work and research on the implementation of comprehensive school reform efforts using evidenced-based models including Response to Intervention, Positive Behavioral Intervention and Supports, and Multi-Tier System of Support. Her experience engages educators on how to improve systems and instructional practices for students with reading difficulties who may be at-risk for failure, or those who are English language learners and who may have mild and moderate disabilities.

Rinaldi serves as member of the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) Board of Directors, as a member of the Advisory Board for the Response to Intervention (RTI) Action Network at the National Center of Learning Disabilities, and as a reviewer for the National Center on Response to Intervention and the National Center of Intensive Interventions. She is also an advisor for Understood.org, a partner of Colorín Colorado.

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Helping English Language Learners Succeed with a Multi-tiered System of Support (MTSS)

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Many schools across the country use a Multi-tiered System of Support (MTSS) framework to target instruction and interventions based on students' needs. The MTSS model can be particularly powerful in determining what kinds of supports are most appropriate for English language learners (ELLs), who are frequently over- and under-identified in special education.

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Learn how HPS identifies students for multilingual services

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English Learners Services – Identification Process | Hartford Public Schools

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Indicadores Dinamicos del Exito en la Lectura

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IDEL is used to measure phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. It is the Spanish equivalent to DIBELS.

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Comparison of Language Differences vs. Disabilities

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Comparison of Language Differences vs. Disabilities

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Look at how learning may look during language acquisition vs. a possible learning disability

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Bulkeley High School
Classical Magnet School
Great Path Academy
R. J. Kinsella Magnet School
Weaver High School

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Lexia Power Up 6-12 District Guidance Document

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Lexia Power Up 6-12 District Guidance Document

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RTI for ELL: Appropriately Using Screening and Progress Monitoring Tools to Improve Instructional Outcomes

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RTI for ELL: Appropriately Using Screening and Progress Monitoring Tools to Improve Instructional Outcomes

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Learn more about programming options for our multilingual learners.

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English Learners Services – Program Options for English Learners | Hartford Public Schools

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Support services and instruction in English language development with a focus on listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills.

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Must be logged in to your HPS google account to access

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Use Heggerty Assessments for Phonemic and Phonological awareness. (Spanish)

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Get access to files anywhere through secure cloud storage and file backup for your photos, videos, files and more with Google Drive.

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Language Acquisition Difficulty or Learning Disability? How to Differentiate and Support English Language Learners with a Learning Disability - LD@school

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English Language Learners and students with learning disabilities are both at risk for lower achievement in language & literacy, but for differing reasons.

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How to Teach Multilingual Learners Based on the Science of Reading

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How to Teach Multilingual Learners Based on the Science of Reading

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Brandon: Within that body of evidence that is the Science of Reading, what kind of research exists specifically on English Learners?

Dr. Echevarria: Although a significant amount of research exists about reading, not enough focuses specifically on multilingual learners. What we do know is that multilingual learners need the same foundational skills that all readers need. However, they need adjustments in instruction. While the Science of Reading helps us understand how students learn to read, it's of course important to remember that English Learners are learning to read in a new language. Before we even discuss the adjustments that multilingual learners require, I want to emphasize the importance of understanding how social language and academic language differ. Multilingual learners often come to school with some social, or conversational, English. As they navigate the classroom, they're introduced to academic language, which is more challenging because it tends to be more complex and abstract. So, some multilingual learners may be speaking English well in the classroom, but haven't yet acquired academic language, and so they struggle to read in class. It's those sorts of nuances that make supporting multilingual learners very complex, but essential.

Brandon: I noticed you're using the term "multilingual learners."

Dr. Echevarria: Yes! There's a shift happening in terminology - while legislation will still use "English Learners," you'll increasingly see "multilingual learners" used to describe these students. The shift reflects an effort to frame students' language abilities as an asset to them as individuals - many of these students speak many different languages! The shift also helps us avoid privileging English over the other languages students speak, and, in turn, culture, because in many ways language is an extension of culture. It's something to keep in mind as you read about English Learners in Science of Reading literature.

Brandon: The Science of Reading, too, is not just for learning English! It's just what we know about how the human brain learns.

Dr. Echevarria: That's right, it applies to dual language programs - if you have an English-speaking student learning Portuguese, all of the principles of the Science of Reading apply.

Brandon: So, if you had a new teacher, who had English Learners in their classroom, and they're grounded in the Science of Reading, what practices would you say are really critical to support English Learners?

Dr. Echevarria: Multilingual learners or English Learners learn how to read in many of the same ways as English-speaking students, but adjustments must be made for them. Educators should bring in students' background, make connections, use repetition, and include opportunities to practice not just the new language but new concepts.

Explicit instruction and structured practice in oral language development is also particularly important. Teachers shouldn't assume that students will pick up the language just by being in a predominantly English-speaking school - truly, that's just "English noise" for many of those students!

When we think specifically about the models associated with the Science of Reading, such as Scarborough's rope, it's important to note that word recognition is the part of the rope that is nearly universal, in terms of learning to read. But the upper part of the rope, including background and vocabulary, is more complex for multilingual learners - this part of the rope is where adjustments need to be made and additional attention needs to be paid. Of course, that's not to say that the bottom part of the rope won't present challenges for multilingual learners. Phonics varies in different languages. But all of these elements of the rope weave together and are dependent on one another. For an English-speaking student, when they finally decode "dog", they know what a dog is! This word represents this concept. For an English Learner, they can decode the word, they can say it, but if they don't know that "dog" means "perro", that decoding work hasn't done anything for their comprehension. Adjustments such as visuals are critical.

Brandon: How do you respond to the idea that anything that benefits an English Learner benefits all learners?

Dr. Echevarria: We have to be very careful with this statement. It's technically true, but English Learners are learning everything through a new language. Instead, I like to frame it this way: Teaching strategies that work very well for English Learners don't disadvantage English-speaking students. Differentiation is always important. For example, practice in academic language is important for all students. But even Tier 1 words are often new for English Learners. They need more instruction in academic language. The same goes for background knowledge and context - all students benefit from time spent in those areas, but it's essential for our multilingual students.

Brandon: How can educators support English Learners through both oral language and reading?

Dr. Echevarria: Oral language and reading are inextricably linked. Students have to develop their oral language skills in order to read with comprehension. Word knowledge is critical and improving oral language will improve reading and writing as well. As multilingual learners read, teachers should work in a lot of chunking of text: pausing, discussing a portion of text, making connections with the student, and getting them to talk about the text. A reading lesson might look like this: Start with discussion about the text, highlight key vocabulary, read the text, talk about it, write about it, maybe have students talk about what they wrote with a partner - incorporate oral language throughout instruction.

Brandon: This doesn't mean that teachers are doing a lot of talking! All of this takes some good classroom management, right? The classroom will be noisy, and student-driven.

Dr. Echevarria: Right. Routines can help, such as setting expectations for when students read and when they talk and using timers to mark discussion time. Students pick up on routines quickly! Additionally, for multilingual learners, routines provide structure so they don't have to try to figure out directions given orally, they know the expectations and routines and they can focus on learning. We often talk about translating research into practice, when it comes to the Science of Reading, and instructional routines are a great example of what that looks like!

Brandon: What about examples of vocabulary strategies for English Learners?

Dr. Echevarria: It's important for multilingual learners to be taught that words comprise units of meaning. Word parts can be manipulated, so multilingual learners can exponentially learn more words, or become more "word conscious". One activity we suggest is word generation: Start with a word part and its definition ("port" means to carry) then review words that have that root. Visuals are also critical for multilingual learners, and teachers can use images to provide context and meaning. Finally, cognates should be explicitly taught. For example, geography in Spanish is geografía. Students might not recognize that these are words they already know, especially since the pronunciation is different. Post a cognate chart and point them out as you come across them - including false cognates!

Brandon: What's the difference between Tier 2 Interventions for English Learners and English Language Development (ELD)?

Dr. Echevarria: ELD, also called ESL, is a specific, dedicated time, usually 30 minutes a day, where multilingual learners are learning about English, especially oral language practice. The time is spent learning how English works, about syntax, building vocabulary and getting comfortable with unfamiliar words. On the other hand, Tier 2 Intervention is a literacy intervention, where students are grouped according to the component of reading that they need additional support to develop. The key is that literacy is language-dependent, but ELD is all about language, using text as a vehicle for discussion. With Response to Intervention, or RTI (Tier 2), literacy is in the foreground.

For example, some multilingual learners may not need help decoding, or with other literacy skills - they could be an excellent reader in their first language. These students just might need opportunities to learn and practice English. They don't need Tier 2 intervention but do need ELD. While there could of course be students who receive both ELD and Tier 2, it shouldn't be assumed that all multilingual learners need Tier 2.

Brandon: It sounds like, through all of this, the bottom line is truly to be intentional?

Dr. Echevarria: Yes! With everything we do. Explicit instruction is truly student-friendly instruction, because it lets students know what they need to do. Intentional instruction is particularly important for language development - create opportunities to point words out for students and encourage them to identify words they recognize, let them practice using language with peers. That's what helps students internalize language. Another way to think about this is intentional redundancy, which can sometimes have a negative connotation, but actually means providing multiple exposures to words and their meanings. We want to make sure that we continually reinforce touchpoints with language, establishing routines.

Brandon: Where would you like to see the Science of Reading conversation lead practitioners?

Dr. Echevarria: Look at multilingual learners not as having a deficit but as an opportunity to build language and literacy, to add to the asset of language they already possess. Also, think about the context in which Science of Reading research is applied. Do educators understand their needs, interests, backgrounds, and something as basic as how to pronounce their names? Do multilingual learners feel welcome and a part of their classroom? All of these elements go hand in hand with the Science of Reading: It doesn't matter how well a teacher is implementing phonics instruction if the student is so shut down because they don't feel like anyone cares about them.

Brandon: On that note, how do the Science of Reading and equity intersect here?

Dr. Echevarria: Sometimes people have a mistaken notion that you are either very culturally responsive OR you're a Science of Reading practitioner. They aren't mutually exclusive at all! Students need the environment and opportunity to be strong readers and speakers. Black and Brown students are the ones that most suffer when we don't have a good understanding of the Science of Reading, and when the research isn't translated to practice. What's more equitable than teaching students to read, to be confident, literate individuals, empowered to be influential members in their communities and have their voices heard?

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How to Teach English Learners Based on the Science of Reading

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Strategies for teaching English Learners based on the Science of Reading include explicit instruction in vocabulary, building background knowledge and context, and practicing oral language skills.

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Key components of an early reading intervention program- Articles

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Key components of an early reading intervention program- Articles

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Students at-risk for reading-related learning disabilities were identified using the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS), a performance-based reading assessment. Students at-risk and students with learning disabilities (LD) received supplemental small-group reading instruction provided by the classroom teacher and support personnel implementing an inclusive special education program. Results indicated positive growth for ELLs, with a disproportionately large percentage of students falling into the risk range. At-risk and LD students showed steady improvement, supporting the coupling of an inclusive special education program with reading intervention in the primary grades. Teacher reports indicated that professional development should be grounded in the reality of classroom experience.

Recently, the failure of many children to develop early reading skills that lead to academic and social success has led to national concern. Poor reading skills lead to lower overall academic achievement and first grade seems to be a critical developmental period (Chall, 2000; Juel, 1988). Multiple and complex factors contribute to poor reading outcomes in urban schools, including a lack of qualified teachers and students who come from poverty (Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). Students who experience early reading difficulty often continue to experience failure in later grades and later in life. Stanovich (1986) describes the "Matthew Effect," a "the rich get richer while the poor get poorer" phenomenon, wherein those who acquire early literacy skills have the tools to exponentially grow in their knowledge and skills while those who fail to develop early skills fall further and further behind. By the later elementary years, those who experience severe reading failure are often given a learning disabilities (LD) label and placed in special education services.

English language learners (ELLs), or students whose primary language is other than English and are learning English as a second language, often experience particular challenges in developing reading skills in the early grades. According to the 1996 U.S. Census data, approximately one third of California's population is of Hispanic origin. In addition, 25% of California's K-12 students are limited-English proficient, and 80% of these students speak Spanish as their primary language (Gandara, 1997). With the passage of Proposition 227 in California requiring mandatory English language instruction in the public schools unless the parents specifically request native language instruction, the implementation of effective strategies to teach reading skills while supporting second-language learning has become a paramount concern. Conducting instruction in English, regardless of whether it is students' native language, makes it critically important to develop strategies for addressing English Language Learner (ELL) students' unique literacy learning needs. There is a considerable urgency to develop teaching strategies for all students within English immersion programs and provide appropriate professional development for teachers.

Of particular interest to this study were intervention strategies for ELL students showing early signs of reading failure and being identified as having learning disabilities and the resulting professional development concerns of teachers. There is little agreement in the research literature on how to effectively teach reading to ELL students (Gersten & Baker, 2000). Continued research efforts must specify how best to provide intervention for students at-risk for reading difficulties.

Professional development for teachers is a key ingredient in improving reading outcomes and preventing reading difficulties. "Continuing professional development should build on the preservice education of teachers, strengthen teaching skills, increase teacher knowledge of the reading process, and facilitate integration of newer research on reading into the teaching practices of the classroom teacher" (Snow et al., 1998, pp. 290-291). However, "one-shot" workshops generally fail to deliver effective research-based strategies to classrooms (Gersten, Morvant, & Brengelman, 1995). Even when teachers adopt research-based practices, they do not sustain use without significant followup training and ongoing, personalized support (Gersten et al., 1995; Gersten, Vaughn, Deshler, & Schiller, 1997; Schumm & Vaughn, 1995).

Critical to this project was the design of professional development that would lead to teacher expertise in reading intervention strategies for at-risk students, incorporating sound pedagogical strategies for teaching ELL students. Of particular concern was how to support both novice and experienced teachers given the large number of inexperienced teachers at the participating school site.

Key components of an early reading intervention program

Assessment

Ongoing assessment that provides teachers with clear information about students' performance levels and progress is an earmark of an effective reading intervention program. Assessment serves three important purposes in developing a reading intervention program: (a) identifying students in need of supplemental instruction, (b) guiding instructional planning, and (c) monitoring student progress. Assessments that are predictive of later reading outcomes are helpful in identifying students who are in need of supplemental intervention (Kaminski & Good, 1996; Torgesen, 1998). Measures of phonemic awareness strongly predict young children's future success in learning to read or, conversely, the likelihood that they will fail (Adams, 1990; Stanovich, 1986).

Assessment should also guide instruction. Assessment tools that reflect the most important aspects of the grade-level curriculum provide information about how an individual student performs within the classroom context. In other words, "a student's performance on various reading and writing measures is considered an indication of what he or she can and will do under a specific set of conditions, rather than a set of fixed abilities and disabilities" (Lipson & Wixson, 1997, p. 57). This type of assessment readily translates to planning instruction to meet specific student needs.

Finally, assessment tools that represent particular requisite skills are very useful in monitoring individual students' progress. Ongoing and frequent assessment provides teachers with current, practical information to guide their further intervention (Deno, 1997; Fuchs, 1989).

Emphasis on essential reading skills

Simmons and Kameenui (1998) describe the "big ideas" of reading as the most essential concepts and principles in reading acquisition. In beginning reading, the three "big ideas" are phonological awareness, alphabetic principle and fluency with connected text. Phonological awareness is the understanding of the different ways that spoken language can be broken into smaller components. An important element of phonological awareness is phonemic awareness. Phonemic awareness is the ability to focus on and manipulate the individual sounds, or phonemes, in spoken words. This kind of understanding of the sound structure of the language facilitates acquisition of the second "big idea," the alphabetic principle. This principle involves learning the code of the alphabetic system, or the letter-sound correspondences and spelling patterns, and applying this knowledge in reading text. Lastly, fluency with connected text represents a level of expertise beyond the alphabetic code. According to Snow et al. (1998), adequate progress in learning to read English (or any alphabetic language) beyond the initial level depends on sufficient practice to achieve fluency, or automaticity, with different texts. More than 20 years of research have demonstrated the important connection between the development of phonemic representations and fluent reading (Naslund, 1997). LaBerge and Samuels (1974) state that for a fluent reader, the process of reading the written word takes only a fraction of a second, and it takes many years to become a fluent reader.

English language development for ELLs

What we know about effective instructional practices for English language learners, particularly in the area of reading, is fraught with conceptual differences and a fragmented knowledge base. Gersten and Baker (2000) culled a wide range of literature sources and convened focus groups to derive a set of instructional guidelines for teaching ELL students. They identified five elements of effective instruction for ELL students: (a) building and using vocabulary as a curricular anchor; (b) using visuals to reinforce concepts and vocabulary; (c) implementing cooperative learning and peer-tutoring strategies; (d) using native language strategically; and (e) modulating cognitive and language demands. Vocabulary development is a critical element of an effective English immersion program where reading instruction occurs in English simultaneously with English language development. Thus, vocabulary development must be integrated with all aspects of the instructional program.

Description of project PLUS

Project PLUS (Partnership Linking University School Personnel) was designed to join university and school personnel in a collaborative effort to improve reading outcomes for ELL students at-risk for experiencing reading failure and being placed unnecessarily into special education. An urban school was selected as a partner because it embodies the complexity of the harsh realities facing teachers in urban schools today such as poverty, low levels of literacy, community difficulties such as gang activity and difficult living conditions, and poor health and educational outcomes for students. Under pressure to improve education against great odds and bombarded by a vast menu of reform initiatives and mandates, the urban school described in this study reached out to the neighboring university for training and support. At the same time, internal reform efforts within the university led to heightened emphasis on directly involving teacher educators in improving the urban schools it serves. University and school personnel agreed that professional development for teachers would be the appropriate vehicle for school improvement because over half of the classroom teachers lacked experience and credentials, hired on an emergency status to fill vacancies.

Project conceptualization and purpose

The primary goal of Project PLUS was to develop a model of early literacy intervention for ELL students who are likely to be identified as having LD. Project PLUS provided ongoing professional development for teachers in the form of intensive workshops followed by classroom-based coaching and consultation. Four principles guided the conceptualization of this project:

University-school collaboration is essential for improving both teacher education and school practice.

Schools and universities need to foster general and special education collaboration.

Early intensive remedial intervention in basic skills is essential to improving achievement outcomes.

Family involvement in literacy practices is essential to improving literacy outcomes.

The purpose of this study was to examine the outcomes of the first year of a professional development project to improve early reading intervention practices for first- and second-grade teachers in an urban school. The following research questions were addressed:

What were the reading outcomes for first- and second-grade ELL students in general?

What were the reading outcomes for first- and second-grade students with LD, at-risk students who received intervention, and students not identified as at-risk?

What was the nature and extent of teachers' implementation of a reading intervention for students at risk for reading disabilities?

Method

Participants

Participants included 335 students in an urban school that primarily serves ELL students and their 17 first- and second-grade teachers. The school exemplifies a typical urban, Hispanic school in this district in several ways. It is large, with almost 1,200 students in grades pre-K through eighth grade. To alleviate overcrowding, the school operates on a multitrack rotating schedule with two-thirds of the students and teachers "on track" at any given time and one third "off-track." The school houses a small middle school as an alternative to the large, neighborhood middle school. The student ethnic distribution is 98% Hispanic, 1.9% white, .1% other. Over 70% of the students were designated by district guidelines as limited-English proficient while 80% of the students' parents reported that Spanish was the students' primary language. Due to a state mandate to reduce class size in the primary grades, there were no more than 20 students in each classroom.

Students. A total of 335 students, including 156 first graders and 179 second graders, participated in this study. Table 1 lists information that was available from school records regarding gender and ethnic classification of students at each grade. In addition, the table provides information about students' language status in primary and secondary languages. It is important to note that school records rely on parent report for ethnicity and language issues and these records are incomplete in many cases, according to the school administrators and teachers.

Students who were designated as having a learning disability and were served by the school's special education program received services from a credentialed resource specialist. These students qualified for services on the basis of the district's criteria: a severe discrepancy of at least 1.5 standard deviations between their cognitive performance and a standardized achievement test, and evidence of a processing disorder. In addition, there must have been evidence that achievement difficulties were not due to some other condition. There were 7 first grade students with learning disabilities (LD) and 24 second graders. Additional characteristics of the students with LD are included in Table 1.

All LD students received reading/language arts instruction in the general education classroom in an inclusion model in which the resource specialist and her aide provided services. The resource specialist worked with LD students in small groups or individually. In all cases, the reading instruction provided by the resource specialist was in addition to the reading instruction of the entire class. Some LD students also received an additional period of reading instruction from the classroom teacher during time designated for intervention.

Teachers. A total of 17 teachers were included in the teacher sample. Participation in the professional development was voluntary, but implementing intervention for at-risk students was mandatory. Table 2 contains teacher characteristics. It is important to note some demographic patterns that characterize the teacher population in this urban school. First, about half of the teachers at each grade level held only an emergency permit to teach, meaning that they had a Bachelor's degree and had passed a basic academic skills competency test required by the state. The district required that teachers with emergency permits be enrolled in a teacher credential program and complete a minimum number of credits per year to renew the permit. Several of the teachers in this sample had been teaching for three or more years, taking only the minimum coursework, thus extending their emergency permit period. Most of the teachers were bilingual and native Spanish speakers and had varying levels of English proficiency.

Measures

Ongoing, qualitative and quantitative information was gathered throughout the academic year to evaluate and refine the professional development program as well as to further the project's efforts to develop effective reading intervention strategies for students at-risk for reading difficulty. Information was gathered regarding student progress and teacher participation.

Student data sources. Students' early reading skills were assessed using the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) developed by Kaminski and Good (1996). DIBELS is a set of tasks designed to assess students' fluency with fundamental reading skills. The DIBELS tasks represent constructs that could be described as a progression of the foundational skills of early reading. These skills are prerequisite to reading success (Good, Kaminski, & Hill, 2000). The skill areas assessed include phonological awareness, alphabetic principle (letter-sound relationships), and fluency with connected text. The score for each task reflects the number of correct responses given in a timed minute. Table 3 provides information about the DIBELS sub-tests used in this study, the foundational skill area represented by each subtest, and the benchmark score that would indicate fluency with the skill. The DIBELS sub-tests were selected because of their predictive qualities. Tasks such as rapid letter naming and phoneme segmentation are known to be highly predictive of later reading outcomes and are represented in DIBELS (Adams, 1990; Good, et al., 2000). Thus, this measure is particularly useful in identifying students at-risk for reading failure for intervention purposes, which was the primary purpose in this study.

Assessment was conducted using the following sub-tests: Phoneme Segmentation Fluency (PSF), Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF), Oral Reading Fluency (ORF), Letter Naming Fluency (LNF) and Word Sentence Fluency (WSF). PSF measures a student's ability to break apart a word by pronouncing each phoneme in isolation. The examiner would say the word "Sam" and the student would respond with /S/ /a/ /m/. The score for this measure represents the number of phonemes said aloud in a 1-minute period with the first-grade benchmark at 35-45 correct phonemes per minute expected to be reached by the beginning of first grade.

NWF measures decoding skills, in which the student reads short vowel nonsense words, either sound by sound or whole word. As an example, the examiner would present the nonsense word "sim" and the student would either read each individual letter sound, /s/ /i/ /m/, or the whole word. The score for this measure represents the number of letter sounds read in a 1-minute period with the first-grade benchmark at 40 correct letter sounds to be reached by the middle of first grade.

ORF measures oral reading fluency on a 1-minute timed measure. The student is presented with a grade-level passage and reads continuously for a 1-minute period. The score represents the number of correct words read per minute with a first-grade benchmark at 40 words read correctly in one minute. The second-grade benchmark is set at 80 words read correctly in 1 minute.

LNF measures rapid letter naming, a skill thought to be highly predictive of later reading outcomes. The student is given a page with rows of letters, both upper-and lower-case, and is asked to name as many letters as possible within a 1-minute time frame. Forty-seven letters per minute is considered mastery.

WSF is an indicator of language fluency that measures the ability to generate a complete or partial sentence orally when given a word and using it in the correct context. The examiner would say the word "carrot" and the student might respond with the sentence "The rabbit is eating a carrot." The student would receive 6 points for this sentence because it was used in a sentence and in the correct context. The number of correct words are tallied at the end of the test. No benchmark is set for this subtest. Scores were examined across grade levels to choose the bottom 25% of the students who may be at-risk for English oral language fluency and then targeted for intervention.

Teacher data sources. Information was gathered from each participating teacher to evaluate the project on an ongoing basis. Information provided feedback on professional development activities, identified areas of needed support, and documented intervention strategies implemented. Data sources included monthly teacher logs, focus group interviews, and field notes from informal observations and consultations.

In the teacher logs, teachers responded to three questions on a monthly basis:

1. What have you implemented related to intervention during the past month?

2. What has gone well for you related to the intervention this past month? What successes have you had?

3. What challenges have you experienced related to intervention during the month? What questions or concerns do you have?

Focus group interviews were conducted with teachers at the end of the first year of implementation. Teachers participated in grade-level groups and responded to questions about the nature of their students' reading difficulties, the benefits of providing intervention for these students, and the changes they would like to see in the project for the upcoming year. Interviews were conducted by Project PLUS personnel. A final source of data regarding teachers' implementation of intervention for at-risk students was informal notes taken by project staff during ongoing observations and consultation sessions.

Procedures

Student assessment. The DIBELS assessment was conducted three times during the year, with one exception. The school operates on a year-round calendar with the school year beginning in July for two-thirds of the students and teachers. The project started in September and project staff were trained in DIBELS in mid-October. The first data point, which would normally be done within the first month of school, was taken in early November. For one third of the students, the first data point was taken in the fourth month of school, and it was missed altogether for another third of students. The second and third data points were taken at the appropriate times and represent the middle and end of the school year, regardless of student schedule. The assessment was conducted by project staff members. Reliability was established with each assessor.

Professional development. All teachers participated in professional development workshops and ongoing consultation. Participation in the Saturday workshops was voluntary and teachers were compensated for out-of-school time. Ongoing professional development was provided on an individual basis during consultation sessions conducted by the project coordinator, university professors, or the resource specialist. The project coordinator also provided extra support to teachers by periodically attending grade-level meetings to answer questions or to address specific topics regarding intervention as these came up. Teacher feedback was received on an ongoing basis as described above.

Professional development activities included the most critical components of early reading development for ELL students and consisted of phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, oral reading fluency, English language development and assessment. School- and university-based project staff agreed that the professional development content should be research-based and reflect the state-mandated curriculum standards for grades K-2. For phonological awareness, alphabetic principle, reading fluency and English language development, a training module was prepared that included the research base as well as a collection of practical, hands-on strategies that teachers could implement in their classrooms with small groups or individual students. Assessment was covered in each workshop and included knowledge about assessment practices as well as practical application. Teachers examined their students' DIBELS scores during workshops and engaged in collaborative planning for intervention with their grade-level peers and project staff.

General and special education collaboration. Collaboration across the perspectives of general and special education was an important element of Project PLUS. The project coordinator, a seasoned special educator, had the primary responsibility for delivering ongoing coaching and consultation. The school's primary-grade resource specialist who served students with learning disabilities had daily contact with the classroom teachers and also provided consultation regarding students with disabilities as well as other students having difficulties who might eventually be referred for special education. The resource specialist provided direct services to the students on her caseload in the regular classroom setting and also included students identified as at-risk for reading failure in small group instruction.

Results

Student outcomes

Because of the school's history of low achievement in reading, we were interested in examining reading outcomes for all students. Table 4 presents the student outcomes for first grade. Overall, first graders made upward growth in each skill area. However, we see a pattern of meeting the established benchmarks later than the expected timeline (Good et al., 2000; Kaminski & Good, 1996). For example, the established benchmark for Letter Naming Fluency is 47 letters per minute by the end of kindergarten. The first graders in our study neared the benchmark by the middle of first grade. Similarly, students should reach the benchmark of 35 phonemes per minute by entrance to first grade for phoneme segmentation, but participating students did not reach that benchmark until mid-first grade. For Nonsense Word Fluency, the benchmark of 40 sounds per minute should be reached by mid-first grade but students reached it by the end of the year. The benchmark for Oral Reading Fluency is 40 words per minute by the end of first grade, a goal students did not meet. Finally, since Word Sentence Fluency does not have an established benchmark, it was used here as an indication of oral language growth. We see students' scores on this subtest increasing with time.

Table 5 shows second-grade outcomes for DIBELS scores. Second graders began the year right at the benchmark of 40 sounds per minute on Nonsense Word Fluency, a point that should be reached by mid-first grade, and they made steady progress. The second-grade benchmark for Oral Reading Fluency is 80 words per minute by the end of the year. We see that the second graders in this study surpassed the first- grade benchmark of 40 at the midpoint of the second-grade year and did not reach the second-grade benchmark at all.

Fluency benchmarks were not reached by either grade-level group, so we examined the extent to which the NWF, a measure of the alphabetic principle, predicted fluency outcomes at each grade level. Figure 1 shows first-grade students' scores for NWF and ORF at mid-year and end, respectively. The trendline indicates that NWF is predictive of ORF. However, we see a group of students (n = 13) who reached the benchmark for NWF but not for ORF. Figure 2 shows the second-grade NWF and ORF scores at mid-year and end. Similar to the first-grade outcomes, there is a predictive relationship between the two measures and a significant number of students (n = 65) who have met the NWF benchmark but were still below the ORF second-grade benchmark of 80 words per minute. Sixteen second graders met the NWF benchmark but did not even reach the first-grade ORF benchmark of 40 words per minute. In other words, for both grade levels, we see a sizable group of students who had adequate skills with the alphabetic code and a smaller group who did not develop reading fluency.

[FIGURES 1-2 OMITTED]

Of interest to this study was the extent to which there were students who were at-risk in each skill area. For each skill area, there is a cutoff point below which students are considered to be highly at-risk. Table 6 shows the percentage of students at each grade level who fell within the risk range on the subtests given at each data point.

We were interested in comparing the performance and progress of the students with LD and the students identified as at-risk with the overall student progress. We charted means for these groups on the reading measures that were given at all three data points. Figure 3 shows the progress of first graders on PSF throughout the year for the three groups. As illustrated, the students with LD performed better than the at-risk students at all three data points, approaching the no-risk students by the end of the year. Figure 4 shows the performance of these three groups on NWF. Here we see that the at-risk and LD students were similar in performance and had a similar rate of progress.

[FIGURES 3-4 OMITTED]

Second-grade students with LD, at-risk students, and no-risk students are depicted in Figure 5 for NWF and Figure 6 for ORF. For NWF, we see the students with LD performed better than the at-risk students at each data point, but both groups reached the first-grade benchmark of 40 sounds per minute by the end of the year. However, for reading fluency, depicted in Figure 6, the students with LD and the at-risk students did not reach even a first-grade benchmark of 40 words per minute by the end of the year. The LD students and at-risk students performed similarly throughout the year while the mean of the typically performing group reached the 80 words per minute benchmark by the end of second grade.

[FIGURES 5-6 OMITTED]

Teacher outcomes

At this phase of the project, we were primarily interested in discerning teachers' perceptions of intervention and the extent to which they utilized information from the professional development workshops. We reviewed all teacher data sources for major themes and extracted descriptive anecdotal evidence for each. Two significant themes were evident.

First, the use of DIBELS was itself a powerful teacher intervention. Numerous comments from teachers involved their use of the assessment data and its impact on their teaching. Teachers reported in various sources and on an ongoing basis that the DIBELS provided an expanded awareness of their students' performance, as evident in this comment: "This is the first time that assessment data are meaningful." The second significant theme was simply that the teachers thought about their at-risk students and how to meet their needs. Teachers reported shifting from a whole-class focus in planning and instruction to at least considering, and in many cases acting upon, the needs of individual students. There was an increased sense of responsibility for teaching at-risk students. "I set up a workshop time and worked with two small groups on intervention activities," represents a teacher response in this category.

Information from the teacher data sources was reviewed for documentation of reported use of intervention strategies. Many teachers reported a change in grouping procedures (e.g., "reforming groups to better meet student needs," and "implementing a `workshop' time to allow me to work with small groups"). A simple tally revealed that teachers reported a high incidence of reteaching a lesson as an intervention strategy (n = 37) and making more time for one-to-one instruction (n = 24). Next highest in frequency of evidence was holding a parent conference (n = 16), followed by using flashcards to teach high-frequency words (n = 11). All other strategies or intervention techniques received a frequency rating of 7 or less. They included a range of strategies such as preteaching a lesson to individual students, repeated reading to develop fluency, playing games with letters, and implementing daily writing time.

Teachers responded fairly positively to the professional development. Specifically, the workshop evaluations revealed that topics of immediate relevance and importance to their teaching were rated the highest. Moreover, about half of the teachers had positive perceptions of the ongoing consultation regarding their at-risk students and the in-class coaching. However, they felt it was not sufficient and reported that they did not get enough time with a coach.

Discussion

The purpose of this study was to document the implementation of early reading intervention for ELL students in an urban school and to examine the student outcomes following a year of implementation. Since few previous studies have documented early reading intervention for ELL students learning to read in English, a situation common in some urban centers, it is important to describe the initial phase of implementation and to identify initial challenges. The primary purpose of the professional development for the first-and second-grade teachers was to assist them in identifying students whose skills were insufficient for grade-level success and to implement instruction that would target specific areas of need. The long-term goal of the project is to establish classroom practices to prevent unnecessary referral for special education.

Student Outcomes

In the current climate of increased accountability, student outcomes are of primary interest. To facilitate the translation of research to practice, teacher change efforts must have a direct impact on student outcomes (Gersten et al., 1997; Malouf & Schiller, 1995). Although our primary focus was the students deemed to be at-risk for reading failure and the students with LD, we felt compelled to first describe the student outcomes in general to provide adequate background for interpreting the progress of the target groups. Exactly what to expect of ELL students in urban, high-poverty schools, particularly in the absence of a bilingual approach to literacy instruction, is a topic of considerable debate. Few studies have documented the progression of early reading skills of ELL students in an English-speaking and reading environment (August & Hakuta, 1998).

Generally, we saw upward growth on all measures. However, a significant proportion of students fell within the risk range, particularly in reading fluency. This study demonstrates a range of student performance with a significant portion performing below established expectations rather than pervasive poor outcomes as is often reported in urban schools. The large number of students at-risk at each data point and on each measure highlights the importance of early reading intervention. Our evidence indicates that systematic intervention should not be peripheral in urban schools serving ELL students but should be a top priority and a central focus of all teachers and support staff.

Ongoing assessment that feeds back to the teachers and school administrators may help to keep the focus on ensuring learning for all students. In this project, teachers were well aware of the skill development of their at-risk students and were at least aware of how to address their needs. This is critical to engaging teachers in ongoing efforts to raise the performance level of at-risk students.

An issue that needs further exploration is our expectations for reading fluency for ELL students. In this study, we see a difference in the pattern of outcomes of ELL students for oral reading fluency compared with their outcomes for phoneme segmentation and nonsense word fluency. A large group of students fell below the benchmark line for oral reading fluency in first and second grade. Based on this finding, we hypothesize that there may be a "fluency wall" for ELL students that is difficult to cross in the early grades. Students new to the English language may be able to assimilate the phonological aspects of the code, but without fluent English language knowledge it may be difficult to acquire reading fluency. In other words, we suspect that these students did not have a strong base of English on which to map the code. The ELL students' difficulty with oral reading fluency highlights the importance of integrating English language development into all aspects of literacy instruction.

The students with LD in this study received all their special education services in an inclusion model with the resource specialist and a skilled paraprofessional going into their regular classroom for about an hour each day. The students with LD received a full lesson reading/language arts instruction each day from their regular education teacher along with their classroom peers. Their special education services were supplemental to the whole-class instruction and, in all cases, were focused on the foundational skills of reading that were also emphasized by the teachers during intervention. In fact, the LD students were included in intervention groups with the at-risk students and often received supplemental instruction from their special education teacher, the paraprofessional, and the classroom teacher with as many as three to four focused lessons per day. It is not surprising that these students appeared to be performing similarly to or better than the at-risk students. Given that the students with LD were identified in the early grades and that they showed positive growth on these essential literacy skills, we believe their prognosis for reading is positive. It is too soon to tell if they will "catch up" with their same-age peers, but they are within reach of developing the foundational skills of reading.

Teacher Change

Recognizing that significant change in schools takes time (Dickson & Bursuck, 1999; Goldenberg & Gallimore, 1991), we expected during this first year that teachers would implement practices learned in professional development to varying degrees. Teacher reports confirmed widespread changes in how they thought about their at-risk students, and we were encouraged that teachers moved from focusing solely on whole-class instruction to considering the needs of individual student. The fact that they did think about the needs of students identified as at-risk is perhaps representative of the initial phase of change. Richardson (1991) suggests that changing teachers' perceptions may be the first step to ongoing improvement in practices. The use of curriculum-based assessment may have been a catalyst for this change. Teachers reported that the use of ongoing assessment to guide their instruction had a significant impact. We intended for the assessment to be a tool for teachers but it became more than that and seemed to be a significant source of professional growth for the teachers. The impact of curriculum-based measurement on teachers is well documented (e.g., Deno, 1997; Foegen, Espin, Allinder, & Markell, 2001; Stecker & Fuchs, 2000). We are hopeful that continued support and experience with assessment and intervention practices will lead to more consistent implementation in subsequent years.

We were surprised at how much success the teachers reported with intervention in the end-of-year focus groups because the ongoing documentation in teacher logs did not depict widespread implementation of activities promoted in the professional development. Hargreaves and Fullan (2000) suggest that sustained school reform may be enhanced by simultaneous change movements. Indeed, the teachers in this school were caught up in several change movements that were occurring simultaneously with the intervention project. Specifically, the adoption of new reading and math programs was the manifestation of various local and state initiatives and may have provided a backdrop for the positive teacher comments. Due to increasing pressure from state and district mandates to improve reading instruction, the teachers were in their first year of implementing a reading program that was dramatically different from their previous bilingual, constructivist, whole-language approach. The program, implemented almost entirely in English with strategic primary language support for vocabulary development, emphasized systematic and explicit phonics and spelling instruction and the use of decodable text. The professional development focusing on at-risk students and intervention "piggy-backed" onto the extensive training teachers received for the new reading program. We determined that the fairly inexperienced teachers in our sample found the reading program to be a concrete structure to guide their instruction while the veteran teachers honed their already competent teaching skills.

Consistent with previous findings, teachers found the professional development to be most helpful when it provided hands-on practice opportunities with teaching techniques readily applicable to their classroom or in-class demonstrations with their own or a colleague's students. Workshops allowed time for teachers to "make and take" materials that they could use in their intervention groups and offered opportunities to practice the games and activities with each other. In a previous study,

Research teams did not teach students but they invested considerable amounts of time in supporting teachers in numerous ways, including providing materials and lesson plans and giving and interpreting assessments. For the initiation of reform in schools that are challenged by community poverty, facilitators in such first-generation projects may be critical for initiating reform. (Hiebert & Taylor, 2000, p. 478)

Baker and Smith (1999) reported that much of what teachers learn comes from direct classroom experience. Personalized coaching to improve teaching practices is time-tested (e.g., Gersten et al., 1995; Showers, 1985) and was viewed positively by participating teachers. Furthermore, teachers responded most enthusiastically to topics that were most relevant or significant in their daily teaching lives, or, as Richardson (1991) describes, "situated" in the realities of their classrooms.

The most significant challenge was providing enough reality-based, classroom-based support. Of the 27 teachers in K-2, over half were inexperienced and on emergency credentials. With only three project personnel to provide ongoing support, only one of whom devoted full time to the project, it was difficult to provide the teachers the extensive reality-based support that they reported to be most helpful. Thus, we had to make difficult decisions along the way about allocating support to the classrooms where the need was greatest, knowing that most classrooms would benefit from extensive support if we could only provide it. We believe this raises the question of how quickly and extensively it is possible to effect significant change in urban school reform efforts. How much is enough? Our initial experiences in this project have led us to believe that it is necessary to saturate a school with support to make an initial impact, requiring ample personnel and financial resources.

Conclusions

The site for this project was carefully selected to be typical of low-performing, urban schools serving an ELL population in high-poverty communities. However, we realize the limitations of lacking a comparison school and the bias inherent in using an intact group of teachers. Our primary purpose was to provide sufficient professional development and support to have a significant impact on student and teacher outcomes. Therefore, perhaps the benefit of being able to examine the factors associated with this purpose in depth at one site outweighed the limitations.

Over half of the participating teachers were teaching without full certification. Several teachers had logged a few years of experience while working slowly toward earning a credential. Without project support, these teachers would typically have little ongoing contact with master teachers and would receive little supervision beyond periodic mandatory evaluations. Teachers reported that the hands-on, practical, classroom-based nature of the professional development was particularly important. The teachers received demonstration lessons, observation and consultation, and opportunities to meet and discuss instructional issues with a highly skilled and experienced teacher who was employed by the grant full time to serve in this capacity. Establishing a collaborative, collegial atmosphere for interaction between project and school personnel was critical to teacher acceptance of the project. Because the emergency credential dilemma is not unique to this city or district, and there is a national shortage of qualified teachers, we believe there is much to be gained by investing in master teachers to serve as coaches and models for beginning teachers.

Changing student outcomes in an environment where low academic performance and other social challenges are pervasive is a tall order. We realized at the outset that significant change would take time and that it would be necessary to work within the culture of the school and district to have an impact. It was necessary for the project to have a strong presence at the school site and to maintain ongoing contact with teachers to help them develop a sense of ownership for the program and its outcomes. We have not fully accomplished this but are optimistic that continued collaborative support is rooted in the teachers' classroom experiences will be integral to continued progress.

Following one year of implementation of professional development, ongoing student assessment, and classroom-based support, we are left with critical questions to guide further implementation. First, with regard to teachers, we hope to continue to address the questions of how much support is necessary and how long it takes to improve instruction and transform chronic low achievement. Second, with regard to students, we must continue to address issues related to the role and nature of English language development and literacy instruction for ELL students learning in the absence of a bilingual model. We need continued and systematic research to further develop effective literacy instruction for ELL students in urban centers. Lastly, we were Struck by the similar performance of the LD and at-risk students and believe it is important to continue to explore inclusive educational opportunities that provide early detection of reading problems and intervention for all students demonstrating need.

View tables referred to in this article (72K PDF).

Acknowledgements

This study was conducted with support from the Office of Special Education Programs Grant Number H325P990019. Special thanks are due to the administrators and participating teachers at Harrison School in the Los Angeles Unified School District, who so generously worked with us. We also appreciate the assistance of Nancy Hunt, Michael Carter, Mary Dingle, Nancy Gutierrez, Ana Dingle, Kristin Shaw, and Romelia Ulloa.

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Dickson, S. V., & Bursuck, W. D. (1999). Implementing a model for preventing reading failure: A report from the field. Learning Disability Quarterly, 14(4), 191-202.

Foegen, A., Espin, C. A., Allinder, R. M., & Markell, M. A. (2001). Translating research into practice: Preservice teachers' beliefs about curriculum-based measurement. Journal of Special Education, 34(4), 226-236.

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For any reprint requests, please contact the author or publisher listed.

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Early Reading Intervention for English Language Learners At-Risk for Learning Disabilities: Student and Teacher Outcomes in an Urban School

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Students at-risk for reading-related learning disabilities were identified using the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS), a performance-based reading assessment. Students at-risk and students with learning disabilities (LD) received supplemental small-group reading instruction provided by the classroom teacher and support personnel implementing an inclusive special education program.

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CELP Standards with Proficiency Descriptors

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CELP Standards with Proficiency Descriptors

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Utilizing CELP across the

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CAPELL: SRBI for English Language Learners

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CAPELL: SRBI for English Language Learners

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The Fonetica assessment is similar to the WRS or QPS. It assesses phonological skills. (Spanish)

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5 Ways Teachers Can Create a Translanguaging Classroom

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translanguaging is defined as " the process whereby multilingual speakers utilize their languages as an integrated communication system . It is the only way to create meaning while learning. It is the one thing that everyone needs to do in order to successfully develop their languages, develop their ways of knowing, to develop content, develop their social-emotional identities and for society to develop to a more just and equitable society."

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SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol) Components and Features | North Clackamas School District

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Burns

Parkville - Bilingual Classrooms

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This article provides an overview of how to use language objectives in content-area instruction for English learners and offers classroom-based examples from different grade and subject levels.

This article written for Colorín Colorado provides an overview of how to use language objectives in content-area instruction for English learners and includes:

what a language objective is

steps that teachers can take to create language objectives

how to implement language objectives in a general education classroom

how to align objectives to content and language standards

ideas and resources on how to support teachers as they become familiar with this practice

how to use language objectives in distance learning environments.

Language Objectives: An Overview
Mrs. Shell has been teaching eighth grade math for twelve years. She has deep content area knowledge and wants to provide all of her students with authentic activities and tasks to relate the significance of the mathematical concepts that she teaches to their lives. Mrs. Shell has always felt successful at teaching her classes but this year has been different. Her sections include students with more diverse backgrounds than previous years, particularly more English learners. As Mrs. Shell was beginning to feel frustrated with her inability to reach all her students because of their needs, she learned about one way to make her content more comprehensible to all her students - creating and posting objectives that tell the students not just what content concepts they will learn in each lesson, but also the academic language they will need to learn and use to meet the state's math standards. With this knowledge, Mrs. Shell is now confident that she not only knows what to teach, but also how to teach it so that all her students can be successful.

Generally speaking, academic English is the language of schooling and the language that helps students acquire and use the content area knowledge taught in schools (Anstrom, DiCerbo, Butler, Katz, Millet, & Rivera, 2010).

Teaching content to ELs: The challenge

In my work supporting general education and ESL/bilingual teachers who provide sheltered instruction for English learners (ELs), I have met many teachers like Mrs. Shell. While these teachers want to provide effective instruction for their ELs, often they don't see themselves as language teachers and so they aren't sure where to begin with their students.

These teachers aren't alone, however, and they are facing a challenge shared by teachers across the country. We know that for school-age students, academic language is crucial for school success (Francis, Rivera, Lesaux, Kieffer, & Rivera, 2006). In addition, research allows us to state with a fair degree of confidence that English learners best acquire English when language forms are explicitly taught and when they have many opportunities to use the language in meaningful contexts (Goldenberg, 2008).

Yet while the explicit instructional support that ESL and bilingual teachers provide is essential to English learners' academic language development, English learners receive a majority of their instruction from general education and content area teachers who may not have experience teaching academic language development.

The question becomes then: What do general education classroom teachers need to do in order to support the academic English development of language learners in both face-to-face and virtual environments, especially when English learners are one of many types of students they serve?

Teaching content to ELs: The solution

One principle that teachers of English learners can begin to apply immediately is creating and posting language objectives for their lessons (whether in the classroom or online in a virtual space. Many teachers are familiar with using content objectives to identify what students will learn and be able to do in the lesson. However, they are less likely to include language objectives that support the linguistic development of their students.

Implementing language objectives can be a powerful first step in ensuring that English learners have equal access to the curriculum even though they may not be fully proficient in the language. This is because the second language acquisition process requires opportunities for the language learner to be exposed to, practice with, and then be assessed on their language skills (Echevarria, Short, & Vogt, 2008).

To this end, language objectives:

articulate for learners the academic language functions and skills that they need to master to fully participate in the lesson and meet the grade-level content standards (Echevarria, Short, & Vogt, 2008).

are beneficial not only for language learners but for all students in a class, as everyone can benefit from the clarity that comes with a teacher outlining the requisite academic language to be learned and mastered in each lesson.

Now let's take a closer look at some examples and how to write language objectives.

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Writing Language Objectives

Interview with Dr. Jennifer Himmel

Learn more about language objectives in this podcast interview with Dr. Himmel from Teaching Multilingual Learners, produced by Tan Huynh.

What is a language objective?

Language objectives are lesson objectives that specifically outline the type of language that students will need to learn and use in order to accomplish the goals of the lesson. Quality language objectives complement the content knowledge and skills identified in content area standards and address the aspects of academic language that will be developed or reinforced during the teaching of grade-level content concepts (Echevarria & Short, 2010).

These objectives involve the four language skills (speaking, listening, reading, and writing), but they can also include:

Below are examples of language objectives for different content areas and grade levels. They come from the Common Core State Standards for Math and English Language Arts (2012) and state standards in New York and California.
Sources:
How do I create effective language objectives?

Dr. Cindy Lundgren discusses the process of writing language objectives in this excerpt from her Meet the Expert interview.

Language objectives are directly correlated to content objectives. Once a teacher determines the lesson topic from the appropriate content standards, the teacher will want to begin thinking about the academic language necessary for English learners to complete the tasks that support the content objectives. This identification of the academic language embedded in the lesson's content will become the basis for the lesson's language objectives.

You can use the following guidelines to start thinking about appropriate language objectives for the lesson:

1. Decide what key vocabulary, concept words, and other academic words students will need to know in order to talk, read, and write about the topic of the lesson. Those words might be taught as a language objective. They should include technical terms, such as ecosystem, and terms like distribution that have different meanings across content areas. Other terms to highlight are those that language learners may know in one context, such as family (as in parents, siblings, etc.), but that have a different use in science (e.g., family of elements in the periodic table).

2. Consider the language functions related to the topic of the lesson (e.g, will the students describe, explain, compare, or chart information). See your state English Language Proficiency (ELP) standards for examples of these functions for English language arts, math, science, and social studies for all English proficiency levels and grade-level clusters.

3. Think about the language skills necessary for students to accomplish the lesson's activities. Will the students be reading a textbook passage to identify the stages of mitosis? Are they able to read a text passage to find specific information? Will they be reporting what they observe during a scientific demonstration to a peer? Do they know how to report observations orally? Acquiring the skills needed to carry out these tasks might be the focus of a language objective.

4. Identify grammar or language structures common to the content area. For example, many science textbooks use the passive voice to describe processes. Additionally, students may have to use comparative language to analyze two related concepts. Writing with the passive voice or using comparative phrases might be a language objective.

5. Consider the tasks that the students will complete and the language that will be embedded in those assignments. If students are working on a scientific investigation together, will they need to explain the steps of the procedure to one another? The language objective might focus on how to explain procedures aloud.

6. Explore language learning strategies that lend themselves to the topic of the lesson. For example, if students are starting a new chapter in the textbook, the strategy of previewing the text might be an appropriate language objective.

(Adapted from Short, Himmel, Gutierrez, & Hudec, 2012. Used with permission.)

Aligning Language Objectives and Standards

English Language Proficiency (ELP) standards

Developing appropriate language objectives for lessons involves becoming familiar with a state's content area and ELP standards. Whereas the content standards will provide the topic of the lesson and what exactly the students should be doing with that topic (e.g., solving problems, creating models, ranking ideas), the English language proficiency or development standards help to identify language skills and functions that students should be working on to achieve academic language fluency. These ELP standards can help to identify:

English Language Arts (ELA) standards

Other resources in addition to the ELP standards are a state's English Language Arts standards or the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in History, Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects (CCSS). The English Language Arts and Literacy CCSS might be especially useful to teachers of English learners due to its attention to literacy across the content areas.

Additional resources to consult, especially if a state is a member of the WIDA consortium, are the Model Proficiency Indicators (MPIs) outlined in their ELP standards. The MPIs outline what an English learner at a specific level of English language proficiency can do in a language domain (e.g., listening) by addressing the language functions embedded in an example topic for that content area with appropriate scaffolds or support (Gottlieb, Cranley, & Cammileri, 2007). Classroom texts and other materials (e.g., science investigations, primary source documents) are other good sources to consult when preparing a lesson.

Getting Started

How can I get started?

Careful lesson planning

In creating measureable and student-friendly language objectives that support the content objectives, it is important that learner tasks in the lesson are aligned with the objectives. It is not enough to have well-written objectives that promote language acquisition if the lesson is lacking in tasks that support the objectives. If the language objective for a middle school social studies lesson is for the students to orally retell the key characteristics in a historical event using sequential language, it is important that the teacher previews sequential language with the students, such as providing sentence stems or frames, and builds into the lesson some structured pair work so the students have an opportunity to retell the event to a peer. Therefore, careful lesson planning is another essential step in preparing effective language objectives.

Collaboration

It is also useful for content area and ESL/bilingual teachers to plan lessons together, as we saw with the 7th grade science lesson scenario involving Mr. Zhang and Mr. Lewis. In this co-planning scenario, each teacher used his expertise to better integrate content and language instruction for the language learners. This type of collaboration can help a teacher like Mr. Zhang learn more about the second language acquisition process of his students and can help a teacher like Mr. Lewis become more familiar with the grade-level content expectations that his English learners encounter in content area classes.

How do I know which language objectives are best for my students?

The language objective that the teacher selects will depend on what the English learners in the class need most at that point in the year and what language is most important to understanding the content concepts. If the students have already spent a good deal of time working with new vocabulary, then the teacher might consider having students use that vocabulary to develop their writing skill by writing a summary of the process they followed.

Conversely, the teacher might want to help students become more proficient with a particular type of graphic organizer in order to develop more strategic language learning. As all teachers know, teaching is a dynamic and complex process that requires a multitude of decisions to be made. However, the advance planning required in creating language objectives allows teachers to better anticipate the academic English needs of all students thus increasing the comprehensibility of the lessons.

It is important for teachers to realize that even though their lesson may include all four language skills (it is good if they do, since the language skills reinforce one another), they do not need to post a language objective for every language-related item addressed in the lesson. Teachers address many instructional needs in a 50- or 60-minute class period. Rather than highlighting all language uses in a particular lesson, it is important for the teacher to think about what is non-negotiable in that lesson.

In other words, the teacher should keep the perspective of the English learner in mind and ask, "Of all of the skills and functions addressed in my lesson, which is most important for helping students meet the grade-level standard and develop their language proficiency?" These objectives then must be measureable (i.e., can you see or assess the student's mastery of that objective?) and written in language that accounts for the linguistic and cognitive development of the students.

How can I make language objectives "student-friendly"?

Both of the above objectives are measurable, but both also take into account appropriate developmental stages of the students. Teachers of young students (e.g., PK or K) may even want to consider further adapting the objectives. For example, we have seen kindergarten teachers use symbols such as a pencil to symbolize "write" and a mouth to symbolize "talk" when they post their objectives for the children to see. We have also seen teachers of young learners rely on pictures to show the key terms they want the students to use or to convey the topic of the lesson (e.g., a picture of a ruler and of hands to discuss standard and non-standard measurement).

One way that teachers can ensure that their language objectives are measureable and student-friendly is by using appropriate verbs. Because language objectives should provide students with practice in the four language skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking, verbs related to those skills might include, but are not limited to, the following:

List

Retell

Summarize in writing

Record

Read

It is also important to not equate low language proficiency with limited cognitive ability. Therefore, teachers will want to make sure that the language objectives they create also reflect tasks that fall on the higher end of Bloom's Taxonomy and use verbs (e.g., orally justify) accordingly.

As noted above in the guidelines to creating language objectives, language functions are also a potential source for language objectives. Verbs related to language functions might include:

When should I share language objectives with students?

To help students take ownership of their learning and provide explicit direction to students, especially the English learners who are processing content in a new language, it is important that objectives be stated at the beginning of the lesson and reviewed with the students at the end of the lesson to allow them to assess if they have met the objectives (Echevarria, Vogt & Short, 2008).

How this happens may differ according to the grade level and content area of the class. Some teachers like to have the students choral read the objectives, while teachers of older students sometimes have them record the language objectives in their journal in addition to asking an individual student to read them aloud. Some teachers, such as those who teach science, like to reveal the objectives later in the lesson, perhaps after the warm up or exploratory activity, so that they can maintain an inquiry-based approach (Echevarria & Colburn, 2006).

Should I differentiate language objectives based on my students' language proficiency?

Although all teachers have students of varying language proficiency and skill levels in their classes, it is not necessary to differentiate language objectives by creating and posting multiple language objectives that reflect these proficiency levels. Rather, teachers should have one language objective that is appropriate for all students to meet. To provide the appropriate differentiation, the teacher would provide different scaffolds (e.g., adapted text, visuals, sentence frames) for students to use in order to reach the objectives.

For example, an appropriate language objective for an upper elementary language arts class might be for the students to be able to orally list text features found in a non-fiction book. For lower proficiency language learners, the teacher may give them a word bank from which to choose the text features; therefore, the students are meeting the same objective but with the appropriate amount of linguistic support from the teacher.

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Using language objectives in a distance learning environment

While teachers like Ms. Shell understand that the characteristics of good teaching for English learners does not change in a virtual environment, they do understand that instruction will necessarily need to look different in order to account for the challenges that distance learning presents for many learners.

Accordingly, teachers will need to think through how to:

Presenting language objectives

Many different ways exist for teachers to present language objectives in remote learning. For example, teachers might:

begin every virtual class by orally reading and presenting the content and language objectives in their Google slides and then asking students to briefly summarize in the chat box the activities they will be doing in that lesson to meet those objectives.

post the objectives at the top of a shared digital document that serves as a capture sheet for the lesson. A teacher might then ask learners to self-assess their progress towards meeting those objectives at the end of the document.

use live or recorded videos, especially when working with English learners with lower English proficiency. These videos can include props, for example ears to signify a listening objective.

use realia, such as rocks, if one of the lesson's language aims is for students to orally describe different types of sedimentary rocks.

Monitoring student understanding and engagement

Teachers in distance learning environments must also carefully consider how they will assess learner understanding and engagement throughout the lesson. Given the challenges virtual learning platforms present towards capturing data on learner comprehension (e.g., paralinguistic cues such as facial expressions, gestures, posture) teachers working in virtual environments know that it is more important than ever to ensure that students clearly understand the content and linguistic aims for each lesson.

Using comprehension checks and assessing progress

It is also essential that students understand how teachers will measure their progress towards meeting each objective. Towards this aim, teachers must build in multiple comprehension checks throughout the lesson that align to the lesson's objectives. Teachers can:

At the conclusion of a lesson, teachers can assess student progress towards meeting objectives via:

tickets out that are submitted digitally

the recording of a Flipgrid or use of another video platform where learners respond to a prompt that requires learners to use the academic language highlighted in the lesson's objectives.

Teachers can respond to the submitted tickets out or video with feedback that explicitly targets the students use of the language. When appropriate, teacher can provide learners with additional resources and/or support towards mastering that particular language skill or function. Teachers might also use that linguistic data to inform mini-lessons conducted to small groups of English learners during office hours or intervention time.

Next Steps

How can I learn more?

For more information on the SIOP Model, see Making Content Comprehensible for English Learners: The SIOP Model (Echevarria, Short, & Vogt, 2008).

Although language objectives can be implemented in any lesson design approach, they are especially congruent with sheltered instruction and the SIOP Model. Since language objectives ensure that teachers meet the unique linguistic needs of English learners, they are sometimes easier to implement in the context of instructional practices espoused by the SIOP Model.

Practices that focus on explicit academic language teaching include:

Below are other resources that can help you learn more about creating language objectives and about integrating academic language into content area classes.

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Final Thoughts

We realize that it takes teachers some time to become very comfortable with creating language objectives, but our experience has shown that the implementation of language objectives can bring immediate benefits to instruction. Some immediate benefits include teachers understanding more concretely that they are both a content area and language teacher - as one teacher said in a CAL SIOP Model workshop, "I now see myself as a math teacher AND a language teacher".

We have also observed that when teachers consciously plan to meet the academic English needs of their learners, they end up with better planned learner tasks, and students begin to have more ownership of their content area and language learning. When it comes to building proficiency in academic English, as many teachers in our workshops remind us, "If you want to see it, you have to teach it." Therefore, if teachers want to see language development, language objectives are a great first step in helping teachers explicitly teach it.

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Recommended Resources

Further reading

Short, D., Himmel, J., Gutierrez, S., & Hudec, J. (2012). Using the SIOP Model: Professional development for sheltered instruction. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.

Echevarria, J., Vogt, M.E., & Short, D. (2010). The SIOP Model for teaching mathematics to English learners. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Echevarria, J., & Short, D. (2011). The SIOP Model: A professional development framework for a comprehensive school-wide intervention. Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE) Brief. http://www.cal.org/create/resources/pubs/professional-development-framework.html

Himmel, J., Short, D., Richards, C., & Echevarria, J. (2009). Using the SIOP Model to improve middle school science instruction. Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE) Brief. http://www.cal.org/create/resources/pubs/siopscience.html

Short, D., Vogt, M., & Echevarria, J. (2010a). The SIOP Model for teaching history-social studies to English learners. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Short, D., Vogt, M., & Echevarria, J. (2010b). The SIOP Model for teaching science to English learners. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Vogt, M.E., Echevarria, J., & Short, D. (2010). The SIOP Model for teaching English language arts to English learners. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Jennifer Himmel is the Project Director for the National Center for English Language Acquisition at the Manhattan Strategy Group. She previously served as the SIOP Manager at the Center for Applied Linguistics, a non-profit organization for language education research, policy, and practice in Washington, DC. She has served as a curriculum developer and research associate for the U.S. Department of Education funded project, Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE) that is investigating academic achievement of ELLs in grades 4th-8th, and as a language testing specialist for the WIDA ACCESS for ELLs® language proficiency test. She currently manages the SIOP Model professional development service line and provides technical assistance and professional development in sheltered instruction to districts and schools.

Video Clips: Language Objectives

How to Write Language Objectives: Tips for ELL Educators

In this video from Syracuse, NY, Jesus Ortiz, a bilingual teacher, learns how to write a language objective from Areli Schermerhorn, a peer evaluator with expertise in ELL and bilingual education.

Dr. Cynthia Lundgren explains language objectives

In this excerpt from her Meet the Expert interview, Dr. Cynthia Lundgren explains the value of writing language objectives when teaching English learners.

Anstrom, K., DiCerbo, P., Butler, F., Katz, A., Millet, J., & Rivera, C. (2010). A review of the literature on academic English: Implications for K-12 English language learners. Arlington, VA: The George Washington University Center for Equity and Excellence. Education.www.ceee.gwu.edu.

Echevarria, J., & Colburn, A. (2006). Designing lessons: Inquiry approach to science using the SIOP Model. In A. Lathman & D. Crowther (Eds.), Science for English language learners (pp.95-108). Arlington, VA: National Science Teachers Association Press.

Echevarria, J., Vogt, M., & Short, D. (2008). Making content comprehensible for English learners: The SIOP Model. Boston: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.

Echevarria, J., & Short, D. ( 2010). Programs and practices for effective sheltered content instruction. In California Department of Education (Ed), Improving education for English learners: Research-based approaches. Sacramento, CA: CDE Press.

Francis, D., Rivera, M., Lesaux, N., Kieffer, M., & Rivera, H. (2006). Practical guidelines for the education of English language learners: Research-based recommendations for instruction and academic interventions. Portsmouth, NH: RMC Research Corporation, Center on Instruction. www.centeroninstruction.org/files/ELL1-Interventions.pdf

Goldenberg, C. (2008). Teaching English language learners: What the research does-and does not-say. American Educator, Summer 2008, pp. 13-44.

Gottlieb, M., Cranley, E., & Cammilleri, A. (2007). Understanding the WIDA English Language Proficiency Standards: A resource guide. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System, on behalf of the WIDA Consortium.

Short, D., Himmel, J., Gutierrez, S., & Hudec, J. (2012). Using the SIOP Model: Professional development for sheltered instruction. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.

World-Class Instructional Design and Assessment (2007). WIDA English Language Proficiency Standards. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System, on behalf of the WIDA Consortium http://www.wida.us/standards/elp.asp

You are welcome to print copies or republish materials for non-commercial use as long as credit is given to Colorín Colorado and the author(s). For commercial use, please contact [email protected] .

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Language Objectives: The Key to Effective Content Area Instruction for English Learners

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This article provides an overview of how to use language objectives in content-area instruction for English learners and offers classroom-based examples from different grade and subject levels.

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SIOP Lesson Plans and Activities

Our collection of SIOP lesson plans and activities includes exemplary SIOP lesson plans developed by teachers who were involved in the foundational SIOP research study, as well as new updates from our current research and professional development projects. We invite you to read these lesson plans and activities individually or with your colleagues in order to learn more about the SIOP Model. You may want to discuss why these lessons are effective for English learners or how to incorporate the SIOP strategies these teachers used in your own lessons.

All Grade Levels Early Childhood Elementary Middle High GED/Adult
Spotlight

CAL was a partner in the Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners (CREATE). CREATE researchers developed curriculum to build the language and literacy skills of English learners in the middle grades. Lesson plans and materials were infused with instructional features of the SIOP Model including language objectives, explicit vocabulary instruction, student interaction, building background knowledge, and comprehensible input.
Learn more.

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Our collection of SIOP lesson plans and activities includes exemplary SIOP lesson plans developed by teachers who were involved in the foundational SIOP research study, as well as new updates from our current research and professional development projects. We invite you to read these lesson plans and activities individually or with your colleagues in order to learn more about the SIOP Model.

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F&P Spanish Sample can be used to test reading comprehension in the native language.

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Supporting K-12 schools:

SAND

Rawson

MLK

HMTCA

SMSA

Burr

BSTEM

BMS