Why has my EL not left my class?

You may have asked yourself this question before, “Why hasn’t this EL met exit criteria?” Are they lazy? Are they not trying? Are they unmotivated? What is going on? 

There may be many factors that contribute to students remaining in a sheltered classroom and not meeting exit criteria. However there are a few common problems that lead to long term EL status:

 

Gaps in academic instruction

Students may lack academic vocabulary, language, and content in reading, math, science, or social studies because they were pulled out of instruction to receive English language development. In some schools, English Language Development (ELD) is provided as a pull-out service and English learners miss out on something while they are out of the classroom for ELD. When they return to class it can be difficult to catch up on what was missed and get into the flow of what’s currently happening. Imagine watching a movie that you haven’t seen before and having to leave the movie for 30 minutes. When you return, you need to know what you missed. Consequently, when students have academic gaps, it becomes difficult to meet state testing criteria to exit EL programs. 

Administrative errors

In some states, providing ELs with accommodations during state assessments hinders them from meeting exit criteria even if the EL does not use the accommodation. For example, in Texas, if the Language Proficiency Assessment Committee (LPAC) recommends the use of content and language support or extra time on the English Reading exam or English End of Course Exam then the EL may not exit the program. 

So let’s say I have an EL named Leslie who is taking the 10^th grade English Reading exam and the LPAC recommends extra time for her to complete the exam. Yet on the day of the exam, Leslie doesn’t use the extra time. Well, the scores come back and she exceeds expectations on the English Reading exam. She also meets all of the other criteria to exit the sheltered class. Good job on her! However, since the LPAC recommended extra time, Julia will remain in the sheltered class for 11^th grade. This is why it’s critical that educators examine each student’s needs individually prior to testing and recognize the state exit criteria. I will go into details about the exit exam in California in a future post. 

The truth

Lazy and unmotivated can be manifestations or years of feeling failure and not seeing success. It can be the result of poor-quality instruction or the lack of comprehensible input. It may be due to low self-esteem and low confidence. Imagine year after year doing something that you don’t feel successful with, but your peers seemed to do with ease and still having to do it. Unmotivated can be an effect of lessons that don’t relate to students, books they cannot connect with, and instruction that is one size fits all. This is an US problem not a them problem. 

These students are not “fake ELs”. They are English learners. No matter if they are proficient in another language or not, they are still acquiring English. We all are to some degree. These students need specific support to get them through to the next level. 

With older ELs, we can leverage their maturity to help them both linguistically and academically. These are 4 steps you can take right away to start making a positive impact on your long term ELs’ success:

1. Seek to identify why the student is still classified as an EL. Do your research. Find out about the academic and personal history of the student. 
2. Meet with the student to set language and academic goals. Sit down with the student one-on-one and let them know where they are in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Show them the exit criteria and together identify action steps that will help the student make progress. 
3. Provide the student with regular feedback on their progress. Meet regularly to touch base and talk about how the progress is coming along. 
4. Celebrate even the smallest successes!