Express 7.17 - Identifying Academic Language Demands in Support of the Common Core Standards. Identifying Academic Language Demands in Support of the Common Core Standards Susan O'Hara, Robert Pritchard, and Jeff Zwiers As issues of equity arise with the achievement gap and differing dropout rates between English language learners (ELLs) and their English-speaking counterparts (Kindler, 2002; Ruiz-de-Velasco & Fix, 2000), meeting the needs of ELLs is an increasingly urgent focus for education practitioners and researchers.
Underscoring this urgency are the performance results of ELLs on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the nation's only ongoing assessment of what students know and can do in various subject areas. The national assessment's results (Rampey, Dion, & Donahue, 2009) show a large gap between ELLs and their English-only counterparts on achievement scores in science and mathematics at grades 8 (ELLs score 31 points behind non-ELLs in math) and grade 12 (ELLs score 28 points behind non-ELLs in math).
Focus on Academic Language. Procedures for Classroom Talk. Pep_language_lines_sentence_frames. Tech Tools for Busy EL Teachers.