IES Blog

Institute of Education Sciences

Looking Beyond the Label to Better Help English Learners

By Karen Douglas, NCER Program Officer, English Learners

The education of English learners (EL) continues to be a topic of great interest across the country. But there has been little research to identify what steps to take in order to best serve this diverse group of students.

In recent years, the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) has funded a number of grants that are using data to better describe EL students and study the factors that are related to better educational outcomes. Findings from these studies are included in a recent policy brief by the Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE) entitled “Improving the Opportunities and Outcomes of California’s Students Learning English: Findings from School District-University Collaborative Partnerships.”

Although these studies all took place in California, the key findings likely have implications across the United States.

(Editor’s note: In some places you will see EL students referred to as English language learners (ELL), language minority, or limited English proficient (LEP) students. However, English learner (EL) is the term used by IES).

Defining ‘English Learner’

The term ‘English Learner’ seems pretty straightforward. It denotes a student that doesn’t speak English as a first language and whose lack of English skills serves as an impediment to learning. However, this simple term belies the diversity of this group of students.

Many EL students were born outside the U.S., but some are American citizens who were born in this country. Some arrive in the U.S. having gone to school starting at a very young age, while others come to the U.S. as teenagers and may not have had access to regular instruction in their previous country. And some EL students—such as the recent influx of unaccompanied minors from Central America—come from war-torn countries, where they have experienced significant trauma and have social emotional needs, as well.

Some EL students do not speak any English, but others come to our schools with basic English skills. And while a majority of ELs speak Spanish at home, many others speak European, African, and Asian languages.

Given all the ways that EL students differ from each other, there is a pressing need to move beyond the simple “EL” designation in order to better address the educational needs of these students.

You can learn more about the characteristics of EL students in a recent post to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) blog.

Meeting the Needs of EL Students

The context in which students designated as EL attend school is equally varied.  Schools differ greatly in the criteria they use to identify students as ELs, as well as the rules for deciding that a student is no longer an EL.

In addition, some students attend schools at which the majority of students are ELs, whereas others are one of a handful of ELs in the school. Instructional programs, even among those that provide support for the home language, vary widely in regard to the amount of instruction in another language a student will receive and the manner in which it is integrated across content areas.

Leaving EL Status

The complexity of reclassification out of EL status is a central issue in the PACE brief because there is a concern that EL students may not have the same access to the full curriculum as their non-EL peers.  The brief shares study findings in which EL students are overrepresented in lower-track classes, less likely to take important gateway math courses, and are more likely to be in classes with a higher percentage of ELs.

The studies in the PACE brief suggest that it is beneficial for students to be appropriately reclassified out of EL status, but these studies show that there is great variability in the stated criteria used by schools and districts as well as inconsistency in implementation. The report also highlights the potential benefits of bilingual and dual language programs both for learning in English as well as maintaining the first language.

Key Findings
 
The PACE policy brief makes three broad recommendations. Again, while these recommendations are directed at serving EL students in California, these are ideas that can be used throughout the country:

  • Improve the ways in which students who need language supports are classified and reclassified in order to improve alignment across districts, and alignment between classification and services;
  • Be more systematic in how data on EL students are collected and used, by tracking students’ progress over longer time periods and including all students who were ever EL students in accountability metrics; and
  • Improve EL students’ educational opportunities in school by expanding access to core content, bilingual instruction, and well-prepared teachers. 

Through better attention to the diverse characteristics of students designated as ELs, schools across the country will stand a better chance of both improving educational opportunities, as well as benefiting from the many contributions that EL students can provide to our school communities. 

Practice Guides: How to Use What Works in the Classroom

By Diana McCallum, NCEE

With new education research released every day, it can be difficult to know which teaching methods and classroom practices have been tested and shown to improve student outcomes. You want to know what really works and how to use evidence-based practices in your school or classroom.

What Works Clearinghouse practice guides help bridge the gap between research and practice by examining the findings from existing research studies and combining them with expert advice about applying these findings in the classroom. For each guide, a team of nationally-recognized practitioners and researchers work closely with the WWC to combine evidence from research with guidance from hands-on experience.

Practice guides offer specific recommendations that include a description of the supporting research, steps for carrying out the recommendation, and strategies you can use to overcome potential challenges. Many of the guides also feature supplementary materials, like videos and summaries, to help you quickly find what you need.

One example is our most recent practice guide, Teaching Strategies for Improving Algebra Knowledge in Middle and High School Students. Mastering algebra helps students move from arithmetic operations to understanding abstract concepts, and is for a key to success in future mathematics courses, including geometry and calculus. Teaching Strategies for Improving Algebra Knowledge in Middle and High School Students presents three evidence-based recommendations educators can use to help students develop a deeper understanding of algebra, promote process-oriented thinking, and encourage precise communication. These recommendations help address common challenges in algebra instruction and focus on:

  • Utilizing the structure of algebraic representations to make connections among problems, solution strategies, and representations; 
  • Incorporating solved problems into classroom instruction and activities to help students develop their algebraic reasoning skills; and
  • Comparing and selecting from alternative algebraic strategies to give students flexibility when solving problems. 

You can read the Practice Guide Summary for a quick overview of these recommendations or spend a few minutes watching videos in which Jon Star, of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education, explain the recommendations.  

The Teaching Strategies for Improving Algebra Knowledge in Middle and High School Students is just one of 19 practice guides available on the What Works Clearinghouse website. Some of the others are:

  • Teaching Math to Young Children: Preschool and kindergarten teachers can get details on how to improve math lessons with this guide, including strategies to create a math-rich environment. You’ll find examples of classroom activities and games that can supplement lesson plans and provide opportunities for children to learn math.

You can find information and links to all 19 practice guides on our website. We also cover a variety of other math and literacy topics, as well as guides focused on dropout prevention, using data to monitor student progress and make decisions, and preparing students for college.

Visit whatworks.ed.gov to find the practice guide that’s right for you or to suggest a topic you’d like us to explore.

Dr. McCallum is an education research analyst on the What Works Clearinghouse team.

About the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC)

For more than a decade, the goal of the WWC has been to provide educators with the information they need to make evidence-based decisions with the aim of improving student outcomes. Established by the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences, the WWC strives to be a central and trusted source of scientific evidence on education programs, products, practices, and policies. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

 

IES Grantees Receive Award for Early Career Scientists and Engineers

By Dana Tofig, Director of Communications, IES

President Obama has named two Institute of Education Sciences (IES) grantees as recipients of the prestigious Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers. This is the highest honor given by the U.S. Government to science and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers.

Christopher Lemons, of Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, and Cynthia Puranik, of Georgia State University, will be honored at a White House ceremony in the spring, along with 103 other recipients of the award. They were nominated for the award by the leadership of IES and the recipients were announced Thursday.

The awards, established by President Clinton in 1996, are coordinated by the Office of Science and Technology Policy within the Executive Office of the President. According to a White House statement, “the awardees are selected for their pursuit of innovative research at the frontiers of science and technology and their commitment to community service as demonstrated through scientific leadership, public education, or community outreach.”

Lemons and Puranik have both served as principal investigators for IES’ National Center for Education Research and National Center for Special Education Research.  Among the IES-funded research they have conducted together are “Enhancing Reading Instruction for Children with Down Syndrome: A Behavioral Phenotypic Approach” and “Peer Assisted Writing Strategies.”

Dr. Puranik, who was at the University of Pittsburgh when she was nominated, is currently an associate professor of Communications Sciences and Disorders in the College of Education and Human Development at Georgia State University in Atlanta. She is also an affiliate faculty for the Research on the Challenges of Acquiring Language and Literacy Initiative at Georgia State. In addition to the IES-funded research above, Dr. Puranik, was also the Principal Investigator for grant that sought to develop a test of emergent writing skills.

Dr. Lemons is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Special Education at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University and a member of the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center in Nashville. He is also co-director of the National Center for Leadership on Intensive Intervention, a senior advisor for the National Center on Intensive Intervention, and serves on the board of a number of scholarly journals, including his work as associate editor for the American Journal on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.  

Diversity in home languages: Examining English learners in U.S. public schools

By Joel McFarland

More than 4.9 million English learners (EL) were enrolled in U.S. public elementary and secondary schools during the 2013-14 school year, representing just over ten percent of the total student population.   

Recently published data from the U.S. Department of Education’s EDFacts data collection shed light on the linguistic diversity of EL students, as well as the distribution of EL students across grades. EDFacts data are drawn from administrative records maintained by state education agencies and provide a detailed picture of the total population of K-12 public school students in the United States. (Depending on the organization or publication, ELs can also be known as English language learners (ELL) or Limited English Proficient (LEP) students.)

States reported that Spanish was the home language of nearly 3.8 million EL students in 2013-14, which accounts for 76.5 percent of all EL students and nearly 8 percent of all public K-12 students. Arabic and Chinese were the next most commonly spoken home languages, reported for approximately 109,000 and 108,000 students, respectively.

It may surprise some to learn that English (91,700 students) was the fourth most commonly reported home language. This may reflect students who live in multilingual households, and those who were adopted from other countries and raised to speak another language but currently live in English-speaking households. Overall, there were 38 different home languages reported for 5,000 or more students.


Ten most commonly reported home languages of English learner (EL) students

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, EDFacts file 141, Data Group 678; Common Core of Data, "State Nonfiscal Survey of Public Elementary and Secondary Education." See Digest of Education Statistics 2015, table 204.27.


EDFacts data also allow us to examine the distribution of EL students across grade levels. Data from the 2013-14 school year show that a greater percentage of students in lower than in upper grades were identified as EL students. For example, 17.4 percent of kindergarteners were identified as EL students, compared to 8.0 percent of 6th graders and 6.4 percent of 8th graders. Among 12th graders, only 4.6 percent of students were identified as ELs. 


Percentage of Public K-12 students identified as English learners (ELs), by grade level: 2013-14SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, EDFacts file 141, Data Group 678; Common Core of Data, "State Nonfiscal Survey of Public Elementary and Secondary Education." See Digest of Education Statistics 2015, table 204.27.


More home language and grade-level data on English learners can be found in the Digest of Education Statistics. Additional data on EL students, including state-level data and data by locale (e.g., city, suburban, town, and rural), can be found in the Condition of Education.

Interested in recent research on how EL students are identified and served? Check out the Inside IES Research blog.

Regional Educational Laboratories: Connecting Research to Practice

By Joy Lesnick, Acting Commissioner, NCEE

Welcome to the NCEE Blog! 

Joy Lesnick

We look forward to using this space to provide information and insights about the work of the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE). A part of the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), NCEE’s primary goal is providing practitioners and policymakers with research-based information they can use to make informed decisions. 

We do this in a variety of ways, including large-scale evaluations of education programs and practices supported by federal funds; independent reviews and syntheses of research on what works in education; and a searchable database of research citations and articles (ERIC) and reference searches from National Library of Education. We will explore more of this work in future blogs, but in this post I’d like to talk about an important part of NCEE—the Regional Educational Laboratories (RELs).

It’s a timely topic. Last week, the U.S. Department of Education released a solicitation for organizations seeking to become REL contractors beginning in 2017 (the five-year contracts for the current RELs will conclude at the end of 2016). The REL program is an important part of the IES infrastructure for bridging education research and practice. Through the RELs, IES seeks to ensure that research does not “sit on a shelf” but rather is broadly shared in ways that are relevant and engaging to policymakers and practitioners. The RELs also involve state and district staff in collaborative research projects focused on pressing problems of practice. An important aspect of the RELs’ work is supporting the use of research in education decision making – a charge that the Every Student Succeeds Act has made even more critical.

The RELs and their staff must be able to navigate comfortably between the two worlds of education research and education practice, and understand the norms and requirements of both.  As part of this navigating, RELs focus on: (1) balancing rigor and relevance; (2) differentiating support to stakeholders based on need; (3) providing information in the short term, and developing evidence over the long term; and (4) addressing local issues that can also benefit the nation.

While the RELs are guided by federal legislation, their work reflects – and responds to – the needs of their communities. Each REL has a governing board comprised of state and local education leaders that sets priorities for REL work. Also, nearly all REL work is conducted in collaboration with research alliances, which are ongoing partnerships in which researchers and regional stakeholders work together over time to use research to address an education problem.  

Since the current round of RELs were awarded in 2012, these labs and their partners have conducted meaningful research resulting in published reports and tools, held hundreds of online and in-person seminars and training events that have been attended by practitioners across the country, and produced videos of their work that you can find on the REL Playlist on the IES YouTube site. Currently, the RELs have more than 100 projects in progress. RELs do work in nearly every topic that is crucial to improving education—kindergarten readiness, parent engagement, discipline, STEM education, college and career readiness, teacher preparation and evaluation, and much more.

IES’s vision is that the 2017–2022 RELs will build on and extend the current priorities of high-quality research, genuine partnership, and effective communication, while also tackling high-leverage education problems.  High-leverage problems are those that: (1) if addressed could result in substantial improvements in education outcomes for many students or for key subgroups of students; (2) are priorities for regional policymakers, particularly at the state level; and (3) require research or research-related support to address well. Focusing on high-leverage problems increases the likelihood that REL support ultimately will contribute to improved student outcomes.

Visit the IES REL website to learn more about the 2012-2017 RELs and how you can connect with the REL that serves your region.  Visit the FedBizOpps website for information about the competition for the 2017-2022 RELs.