The Intersection of Accountability and Language: Can Reading Intervention Replace English Language Development?

Abstract

The language in recent education policy equates academic achievement with reading proficiency for English language learners (ELLs). In response to federal and state accountability efforts focused on reading, California high schools began to substitute reading intervention programs for English language development (ELD) curricula and instruction. This study compared the effect of a reading intervention program to that of a comprehensive ELD program on ELLs' achievement at one California high school. Ultimately, the comparison cohort earned higher achievement test scores than the reading intervention program cohort. Perhaps most striking, however, was the sheer proportion of ELLs excluded from services due to reading levels beyond the program exit level. As educators work to improve ELL achievement, the importance of curricula that meet students at their linguistic and academic level cannot be understated.

Achievement or proficiency? Just getting a pass is enough!

“…In the present curriculum, open tasks are not much focused, as they are not included in both formative and summative assessments. The process of testing and evaluation is solely based on reading and writing, and hence the tasks that instigates listening and speaking is seldom taken to consideration (Callahan, 2006). It is widely recognised that the measures taken to achieve the close tasks necessarily do not lead to proficiency.…”

Secondary Long-term Emergent Bilingual Students’ Educational Needs

“…Several common characteristics that describe secondary long-term emergent bilingual students have emerged from research [2] [9] [17]. Long-term emergent bilingual students: (a) are often bilingual in social settings but have limited literacy skills in both their home language and English, (b) have significant gaps in academic background knowledge, and (c) have experienced inconsistent schooling due to incoherent language programs within a school and across schools they have attended or frequent moves between the United States and their country of origin.…”

“…Long-term EBS exhibit significant gaps in academic background knowledge [2]. Literacy skills affect academic achievement in content areas.…”

“…Schools often place long-term EBS in modified instructional programs designed for native Englishspeaking students with special learning needs. The focus of these intervention programs is primarily on reading, not developing all domains of English language skills, including listening, speaking, and writing, thus these programs merely support longterm EBS' linguistic and academic needs [2]. In addition, modified instructional programs are in general linguistically and academically less rigorous than programs provided in mainstream instructions.…”

Pathways for Educators to Challenge Deficit Perspectives: Adolescents’ Transnational Digital Literacy Practices in the Classroom

“…In our professional and personal lives, we have seen how certain adolescents identified as English learners (ELs) and struggling readers are positioned as having limited literacy abilities (Brooks, ; Frankel, ). Moreover, we have observed that common instructional settings for adolescents identified as ELs are compulsory reading intervention courses that specifically identify these students as struggling readers, with all the deficit perspectives that accompany this label (e.g., Brooks, ; Callahan, ; Frankel & Brooks, ; Gomez, ; Wu & Coady, ). We are concerned that these intersecting labels and instructional settings can serve to mask the linguistic and literate abilities of this student population.…”