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OELA Hosts Multiliteracy Symposium

On May 6, the Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA) hosted a multiliteracy symposium. The theme of the symposium was “Celebrating the Diverse Linguistic and Cultural Assets of All Our Students” and it focused on why developing language and literacy skills in English and other languages is critical in today’s learning environment. The symposium hosted national leaders in research, practice, and policy and featured speakers from federal agencies, Congress, educators, parents, and students.

There is a stream of the entire symposium that can be viewed online here.

Bilingual Children Adapt to Others’ Needs Better

Muslim girl and Caucasian girl communicating by smiling at each other.

Bilingual children adapt to the needs of their communication partners better than monolingual children, according to a study published in Child Development, because children growing up bilingually have to manage challenging communication situations more often and deal with the differing communication styles of their parents.

Developmental psychologists at the University of Zurich (UZH) in Switzerland UZH explored the extent to which children aged three and four are able to respond appropriately to a communication partner. Successful communication requires the ability to cooperate and adapt, so it is important to understand other intentions and communicative needs.


Understanding a partner’s need
Researchers first asked the monolingual and bilingual children to hide puzzle pieces in different places. Two interaction partners in the form of glove puppets—a ladybird and a grasshopper— then went looking for them. The children could watch them search and give clues. The two interaction partners responded quite differently to the help offered by each child. While the ladybird expressed thanks for every hint, the grasshopper preferred to find the puzzle pieces by himself, rejecting any help offered. The researchers then observed how the children behaved in this situation and whether or not they could distinguish between the different needs.

Subtle vs. explicit help
It emerged that the monolingual and bilingual children were equally helpful to both interaction partners. However, there were differences in the way in which they communicated with their interaction partners. The bilingual children often helped the grasshopper non-verbally, by removing the puzzle piece from the hiding place and inconspicuously putting it somewhere where he could easily find it himself. By contrast, the monolingual children continued to give the grasshopper explicit verbal instructions (e.g. “try looking over there”). In other words, the bilingual children adapted to the need of the grasshopper to find the puzzle pieces himself, whereas the monolingual children did not.

Experience of differing communication styles
“The communication behavior of bilingual children is characterized by a greater sensitivity to their interaction partner and a greater flexibility in choosing their means of communication,” summarizes UZH developmental psychologist Anja Gampe. She and her co-authors suggest that this could be because bilingual children have to manage challenging communication situations more often and are confronted with differing and indirect communication styles. “This may result in bilingual children better understanding the communicative signals of others, and having to communicate their own needs more flexibly, including by non-verbal means,” says co-author Stephanie Wermelinger.

Reference:

Gampe, A., Wermelinger, S., & Daum, M. M. Bilingual Children Adapt to the Needs of Their Communication Partners, Monolinguals Do Not. Child Development, January/February 2019: DOI: 10.1111/cdev.13190

¡Qué Rico!

Costa Rica packs a multitude of experiences for the Spanish
immersion student into a small, friendly, happy country

Visit Costa Rica’s official tourism site and read its official slogan, “No Artificial Ingredients”—a mantra of which you will not need reminding from the first moment you set foot in one of the country’s myriad waterfalls or stumble upon one of its 100-plus species of brightly colored frogs. The country is of a manageable size and the bus network is extensive, if somewhat slow due to rainy weather and less-than-perfect roads. Its two airports allow visitors to crisscross the country with speed but at greater expense (if you’ve got the time, a two-peso, six-hour bus ride is hard to turn down—as is the quality time you’ll get to spend with the locals).


The country, a veritable natural amusement park, offers active volcanoes, stunning beaches (both Caribbean and Pacific), and intoxicating rain forests full of exotic flora and fauna. In the country’s center is the famed Arenal Volcano, which is a hefty but picturesque hike from the small town over which it looms. The landmark also overlooks a waterfall and swimming hole as well as a luxury resort based around natural hot springs. Tortuguero National Park, on the Caribbean coast, is an epicenter for ecotourism and a hot spot for sea turtle watching and caring.


The Caribbean coast offers a distinct experience, strongly defined by the town of Puerto Viejo—where Rasta culture reigns. In the Caribbean, more than elsewhere, the pura vida mentality holds sway, and every other word seems to be tuanis, a term borrowed and adapted from the English phrase “too nice.” However, it is not just the perfect waves, water temperature, or breathtaking coastline that is ultimately unforgettable: each town has its own character and charm; each offers you an experience distinct from the one before or after.


For monkeys, iguanas, and sloths galore, head to Manuel Antonio National Park, clear on the other side of the country, to hike in a stunning evergreen forest that grows right up to the shoreline of the Pacific Ocean. Mountainous Monteverde also offers cloud forests, canopy tours, and ziplining for the ultra-adventurous.

Additionally, for the surfer-expat types, no shortage of laid-back, tiny beach towns dot Costa Rica’s shores, offering prime, picturesque beach-bumming locales. On the Pacific coast, there are picturesque beaches and optimal swimming conditions. From the tiny town of Montezuma, you can hike to the water holes and waterfalls hidden in the mountains or take a run down a beach path that extends for miles along the exquisite coast. A short bus ride away is Malpaís, where surf is king and the juxtaposition of forest and expansive ocean is a sight to be reckoned with. Because of the diversity of experience it offers, Costa Rica is a sort of utopia for the outdoor enthusiast. Within the small country, travel from San José to any destination—prominent or secluded—is quick and easy.


Contrary to popular belief, English is not widely spoken in Costa Rica, especially in San José, Heredia, and other larger cities, making it an ideal site for Spanish-language immersion.


While many locals in coastal towns speak limited English in order to cater to the tourist population, Spanish is always the initial and preferred method of communication. Students of all ages will find their cultural niches, from dance classes in traditional Costa Rican cumbia to the vibrant nightlife to the opportunity to join weekend running and cycling groups.


With its diverse array of landscapes, climates, and activities on offer, Costa Rica, as a nation, could not disappoint visitors even if it tried. The main difficulty facing the language traveler with limited time will be deciding which places to visit first. Occupying a small strip of land between Panama and Nicaragua, Costa Rica is home to more than 50 Spanish immersion schools, as well as several universities and colleges.

How Internet Slang Enters ASL Vernacular

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As the Oxford dictionary updates its lexicon with Internet-y terms such as “lolcat” (a photograph of a cat accompanied by a humorous and typically misspelled caption) and “hawt” (an informal spelling of hot), speakers of American Sign Language (ASL) adapt to tech-lingo as well. Change in ASL happens the same way as any other language, with new trends and ideas cropping up organically. The words that stick will be added to the dictionaries. However, ASL doesn’t have one official dictionary.

There is no official ASL website, so multiple grassroots sites provide an open community for the ever-changing language. Bill Vicars, who compiles Lifeprint, starts his research by, “do[ing] a literature review, [and] compar[ing] numerous respected sign language dictionaries and textbooks to see how the sign is demonstrated in those dictionaries.” Along with surveys and online debate, Vicars attempts to identify the most used sign for a specific term. Still, not everyone in the Deaf community uses Lifeprint, and as new words are created, a great variety in their respective signs emerges.

Douglas Ridloff, the current coordinator of ASL Slam, an online space for Deaf performing artists to share poetry and storytelling in ASL, commented on the different ways terms for new technology come about; “With words like ‘Glide’ [a live video messaging app] or ‘Instagram’, we’ve started to see signs emerge. As a collective, we see various signs until one emerges as the agreed upon sign by a collaboration of the community.” For Glide, the CEO got involved, as it was key that he collaborated in deciding on a definitive sign. However, for Instagram, no representative has been involved in the sign decision process, and no official consensus has been reached in the ASL community.

Words such as “selfie”, “emoji”, and “duckface” are being used in ASL, but with a wide variety of signs. To see these new signs and how they differ, click here.

How To Boost Your Resume By Relocating To Asia

60% of employers consider international experience when hiring and promoting employees, according to the International Institute of Education. Spending an extended time abroad forces you to immerse yourself in culture and it’s no easy feat. Moving overseas requires flexibility, the ability to take calculated risks, and networking skills – all valuable skills for the workplace. If you didn’t have them before jumping on the plane, you’re sure to develop them abroad.

Language immersion, study abroad, and internships are all looked upon favorably by hiring managers. But of all the countries in the world, where should you go? A 2017 DHL customer survey found that 33% of respondents indicated that Asia was their highest priority global market. If you’re looking to be a competitive candidate among hundreds of applicants, you can be sure your time spent in Asia will pique interest for all the right reasons.

Learn the Language

Knowing the native language of your target market is a huge advantage. The ability to communicate with others will absolutely allow you to contribute to the development of business by expanding their reach. A majority of Asian business people learn English as the standard business language, so learning their language in turn shows dedication to understanding their culture and customs and instills trust in foreign consumers and partners.

Also, being bilingual has tremendous cognitive benefits. Studies show that bilinguals tend to be better decision makers, task managers, and are not as easily distracted as their monolingual counterparts. Not only is your employer getting someone who can directly interact with their target market, but a solid employee who can contribute ideas and follow through.

Study Abroad

Travel is life’s teacher, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything to learn from a professor. Being abroad doesn’t mean traditional education doesn’t have its place. With so many study abroad options, there’s no reason not to take advantage.

One option is to study for a TEFL certification. Teaching English abroad is a lucrative way to grow your career while traveling full-time. Maybe you’re interested in opening a business on an island off the coast; if so, consider studying business management and economics. Courses for travelers interested in healthcare, anthropology, journalism, and many others are also available to boost the “Education” and “International Experience” sections on your resume.

International Internships

International internships are the perfect way to gain real experience. Program placements are with real small businesses and entrepreneurs who act as your mentor. While you use your academic knowledge and work experience to contribute to the business, mentors provide insight and guidance to understanding the industry and business practices in their country.

Legal recruiter and career development specialist, Ethel Badawi, says that on a resume you should focus on results over duties. Talk about how you helped to contribute to the growth of the business as an intern. For example, instead of saying you “Assisted with translating services” you could write “Assisted an average of 10 clients per day with full translation services.” Including the number of clients can portray the extent to which you assisted.

Spending a significant time abroad, specifically in Asia, can boost your resume to the top of the applicant pile. Employers are eager to recruit candidates with the skills and experience they need to expand their businesses. If you haven’t already, take the leap; learn a new language; watch the doors of opportunity open for you.

Celebrating New Zealand Sign Language Week

May 6-May 12 is New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL) Week. It is organized each year Deaf Aotearoa, a national organization representing the voice of Deaf people in New Zealad. The theme for this year is “My Language My Place”.

NZSL is an official language of New Zealand, and is used daily by more than 20,000 Kiwis. Rather than simply being a signed representation of spoken English, NZSL is a separate language, with its own structure and grammar. To celebrate NZSL week, Parliament will feature NZSL interpretation during the Speaker’s daily briefing videos and question time during the week. The briefings can be viewed on the Parliament website, Facebook page, or on Parliament TV.

NZSL became an official language of New Zealand in 2006 when the NZSL Act was passed into law, and the next year in 2006, Deaf Aotearoa organized the first NZSL Week, making this this 13th year celebrating NZSL Week.

The 2019 theme “My Language, My Place” aims to be a reflection on the unique value of NZSL to New Zealand. NZSL has developed in New Zealand, for New Zealanders, and can be used to express concepts unique to New Zealand, such as Māori concepts and local place names. In 2017/8, the NZSL online dictionary uploaded hundreds of place name signs, so all New Zealanders are able to access and learn signs for their home towns.

Another feature of NZSL Week is the Leaders challenge, which challenges community leaders throughout the country who don’t know NZSL to learn and sign a brief message to show their support for NZSL Week. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was one of the first leaders to take up the challenge.

Here are some NZSL Events going on this Week:

NZSL Week Events:

Northland NZSLW Events

Auckland NZSLW Events

Waikato NZSLW Events

Bay of Plenty NZSLW Events

Taranaki NZSLW Events

Hawkes Bay NZSLW Events

Manawatu NZSLW Events

Wellington NZSLW Events

Nelson NZSLW Events

Canterbury NZSLW Events

Otago and Southland NZSLW Events

Resources, including flyers and booklets for NZSL Week can be found here: http://deaf.org.nz/nzslw-resources

Language Crucial to Accurate Census 2020

In recognition of the fact that limited-English-proficient households are traditionally underrepresented in census reporting, the federal government is planning to officially collect Census 2020 responses in six new language options—Arabic, French, Haitian Creole, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, and Tagalog.


These languages are in addition to English, Chinese, Korean, Russian, Spanish, and Vietnamese, which were available ten years ago, but paper forms will only be available in English and Spanish.


For the 2020 count, the census bureau is accepting responses in languages spoken in around 60,000 or more households with limited English skills. Paper forms will be available in English and in Spanish, while the bureau will collect responses in the other eleven languages online and by phone. In addition, video and printed guides will be available in 59 non-English languages, and there will be a video in American Sign Language, plus a printed guide in Braille.


In addition to making the count more accurate, offering multiple language options should also cut the number of census workers needed to collect information; however, concerns remain that speakers of languages other than English will continue to be among the most likely to be excluded from census figures.

Celebrate Teachers with Teacher Appreciation!

Image courtesy NEA

May 7th National Teacher Day, and May 5-11 is 2019’s Teacher Appreciation Week. PTA launched a campaign, #ThankATeacher. They are urging students and education advocates to thank teachers on social media. PTA created cards that can be personalized and sent to teachers online, or printed out and handed to teachers in person.

On May 8th, the National Education Association (NEA) is urging everyone to wear #REDforED to show solidarity for NEA members and teachers who are fighting for school funding, professional pay, and better learning conditions for their students.

Materials to show support for teachers, such as flyers, thank you cards, social media graphics, and certificates are available for free at
https://www.pta.org/home/events/PTA-Teacher-Appreciation-Week

The PTA also had these suggestions for celebrating teachers:

  • Send heartfelt letters, cards and messages of appreciation
  • Create artwork, poems and video messages
  • Recognize teachers with awards
  • Decorate schools and teacher’s lounges
  • Host surprise assemblies and other events
  • Volunteer in classrooms to help teachers
  • On Thursday, upload a #TBT of you and your favorite teacher and thank them using the official hashtag #ThankATeacher.

Read about more ways to celebrate Teacher Appreciation Week on the One Voice blog and PTAOurChildren.org.

According to the NEA, U.S. teachers on average, teachers work more than 52 hours a week, including 30 hours on instruction and 22 hours on tasks like preparing lessons and grading papers. At the same time, teachers work with an average of more than 20 students per class; as well as work with new students each school year.

How Can Families Effectively Partner With and Support Teachers

  • Develop a relationship with your child’s teacher and keep in touch with him/her often
  • Ask the right questions
  • Set goals with your child and his/her teacher and foster the achievement of those goals
  • Review your child’s data to ensure he/she is on track
  • Look in your child’s backpack every day
  • Frequently view the parent portal (or whichever tool your child’s school uses)
  • Actively participate at school when possible

Leveled Readers

The benefits of free, voluntary reading are undeniable, but finding books that are interesting and exciting without being too advanced can be a challenge. This is where leveled readers really come to the fore—they are designed to deliver great stories and interesting nonfiction to learners at a comprehensible level.

If you only get your students to do one thing this summer, get them to read some books they will enjoy. The following publishers invite you to share their readers:

Renaissance


Renaissance® is a leader in pre-K–12 literacy, helping students of all ability levels—including struggling readers, English learners, and gifted and talented students—grow the strong reading skills needed for success in school and in life.

Renaissance myON® Reader is a student-centered, personalized literacy platform that offers unlimited access to thousands of enhanced digital books at a wide variety of Lexile® reading levels. Students get 24/7 access to thousands of fiction and nonfiction titles, with texts available in English, Spanish, and other languages. Quick assessments match students with books according to their personal interests and the just-right reading levels to grow their literacy skills. Built-in scaffolds—including a searchable dictionary and professionally recorded audio modeling fluent reading—help English learners grow their proficiency and confidence. Rich reporting makes it easy for educators to monitor student reading and growth.

Renaissance myON® News, powered by News-O-Matic, delivers engaging nonfiction reading through a series of five daily news articles, 52 weeks a year. Every article is written at three Lexile reading levels and vetted by a child psychologist to be safe and appropriate for young readers. All articles are also available in English, Spanish, and French, with audio supports for English learners and struggling readers. Integrated multimedia, such as videos, maps, and photo galleries, help further student understanding. Helpful teacher guides make it easy to incorporate articles into small-group or whole-class lessons.

Renaissance Accelerated Reader® puts best practices for independent reading practice into action. Personalized goals help keep students engaged and motivated, while quizzes for nearly 200,000 books and articles at a wide range of ATOS® and Lexile reading levels support student agency and choice. Many quizzes are available in Spanish for English learners and bilingual programs. Interactive reports provide educators with unparalleled insights to support and accelerate growth for all students.
www.renaissance.com

Scholastic


Scholastic Education believes that the development of robust literacy skills is at the very heart of empowering children to thrive in school and in life. For nearly 100 years, it has been our mission to help all children learn—to explore their own questions, make informed decisions, and imagine lives beyond the ones they live. We proudly partner with schools and districts through our research-informed literacy instruction, digital programs, and authentic texts; professional learning courses, coaching, and books; and family and community engagement outreach and resources paired with take-home books.

Guided Reading en español, Second Edition
 Grades K–6
The new Guided Reading en español, second edition—with more than 70% of titles originally written in Spanish—engages students with culturally relevant texts, builds confidence, and fosters a love of reading. Bilingual instructional materials, including Spanish and English teacher’s guides and teaching cards for every title, help teachers support English learners and students in dual-language classrooms during small-group instruction.
 
Guided Reading Text Types, Second Edition 
 Grades K–6
The new Guided Reading Text Types, second edition, features a wide range of genres to support literacy during small-group differentiated instruction. From picture books and photo essays to short stories, graphic novels, and plays, students explore different text types as they grow as independent readers. Robust teaching materials help teachers make the most of small-group instruction with teaching cards that identify essential comprehension skills and support whole child growth with social-emotional learning connections to each and every title.

Next Step Guided Reading Assessment
 Grades K–6
Developed by leading literacy experts Jan Richardson, PhD, and Maria Walther, EdD, the new Next Step Guided Reading Assessment helps teachers assess students’ reading levels in four easy steps and then target instructional next steps. The digital management system gives teachers the power to make data-driven decisions while providing administrators with reports to monitor progress in schools throughout the district.
scholastic.com/education


Stretch Reading Growth with Precisely Leveled Readers


Teachers around the world trust the Rigby PM series for its precise leveling that empowers them to challenge their students appropriately. The Rigby PM series is an ideal instruction within the balanced literacy framework and allows students to decode and read with fluency and comprehension across a wide range of text types and genres. The PM series has taken this complex model and broken it down into 30 incremental levels, spanning grades K through five.


Build Students’ Reading Confidence
 Everyone who has been in the classroom knows how challenging it can be to find a perfect match between students’ reading levels, their interests, and available books. The PM series makes it easy to find just the right book for every student in class by offering a wide range of topics and genres across all its levels. Additionally, students will find books that mirror them and their communities. The series gives students access to a variety of approachable text types and genres with relatable, culturally diverse characters.
Strict Leveling Criteria
 Pinpoint the right book to stretch students’ reading abilities with over twelve leveling factors, including a 1:20 ratio of unknown to known words in each level, predictable text layout in relation to supportive illustrations, and a steady introduction of high-frequency words. With specific criteria for each Rigby PM level, each book is intentionally written to meet a given level’s criteria.
Effective Guided Reading Instruction
 Teachers can systematically help their students become proficient readers with the unparalleled care and quality in precise leveling offered by the PMs. New are the easy-to-use eight-page Take-and-Teach lesson plans with clearly outlined close reading questions, ELL scaffolds, and project-based activities to help students take ownership of their learning.
hmhco.com/RigbyPM

Engage Literacy


Engage Literacy (English) is a comprehensive literacy program (K–5) from Capstone, appropriate for individual, small-group, and whole-group learning. The core of Engage Literacy is its curriculum-linked nonfiction and fiction leveled readers spanning reading levels one to 30 (guided reading levels A–V) with matching oral running records, black-line masters, and teaching notes. From levels two to 30, corresponding fiction or nonfiction titles are also thematically linked.
Through engaging and high-interest texts, rhymes, poems, songs, chants, and recurring characters, children will become active participants in their own learning and in the reading process.
By including both fiction and nonfiction, the materials in Engage Literacy stretch children’s thinking and meet Common Core Standards for both informational text and literature with meaningful and purposeful group activities. Engage Literacy’s careful leveling ensures that children are exposed to texts that match their developmental reading levels, enabling greater potential for reading success, enhancing fluency, and making reading enjoyable.
All texts have been developed using carefully graded vocabulary lists, e.g., the word go is introduced at level one and going is introduced at level four. Therefore, children build up a bank of high-frequency words, providing a smooth transition to higher-level texts. As they move through the levels in Engage Literacy, new words are introduced at a ratio of 1:20: one new word is introduced for every 20 known words. Children are able to build on their prior knowledge and make new connections based on these previous understandings. Engage Literacy also includes extending vocabulary, or a progressive academic vocabulary list, including words such as draw, make, and write, which are essential for early readers to successfully understand and complete academic tasks independently.
Visit EngageLiteracy.com to look inside these leveled readers. You will find the program scope and sequence, skill alignment, oral running record instruction, text samples, and much more support for your literacy instruction.

i-Ready®

Engaging instruction with proven results
i-Ready Instruction delivers powerful online lessons that motivate students on their path to proficiency and growth. Driven by insights and practical data from the i-Ready Diagnostic, i-Ready’s online K–8 lessons provide tailored instruction that meets students where they are in their learning journeys and encourages them as they develop new skills. Students who used i-Ready Instruction experienced substantial learning gains compared to students who did not. Students receiving recommended levels of i-Ready Instruction experienced 39% greater gains in English language arts (ELA). These results were supported by strong effect sizes and statistically significant gains. This research meets the criteria for Level 3: Promising Evidence under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA).
Built for the standards, designed to motivate.

  • Built based on cutting-edge research into effective online learning practices, i-Ready’s online lessons are challenging, supportive, and engaging for students of all ages and provide support for English learners.
  • Helpful instruction at targeted interaction points models strategies and keeps students focused throughout the lesson.
  • Systematic practice and scaffolded feedback promote productive struggle and a growth mindset.
  • A short quiz at the end of each lesson allows students to check their understanding and helps teachers track progress and know when to provide additional support for a skill.


Learn more about i-Ready at i-ready.com/empower.

Lexile Measures


Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!
 Along with Find a Book’s 27 Other Interest Areas
It’s all about engagement and making that connection that gives students a love for reading, and Find a Book can help do just that. Find a Book is a free, fun tool that identifies books based on a student’s reading level (Lexile® measure) and interests.
Are your students interested in animals, fantasy, science fiction, or sports? Find a Book, with its 28 different interest-area filters, can search those interests among its 330,000+ books with Lexile measures.
Lexile measures are available from many year-end state tests as well as from other classroom tests and reading programs. A Lexile measure indicates the reading level of a student or a book. By comparing a student’s Lexile measure with the Lexile measure of a book, you can make a good reading match for the student.
Find a Book is a great tool to use with students including:

  • Those of all ages.
  • Those of all abilities—from struggling to advanced students.
  • Students for whom English is a first or a foreign language.
  • Used by educators, parents, and students worldwide, Find a Book facilitates 1 million book searches a month. It’s simple!
  • Go to fab.lexile.com/fab/go.
  • Enter the student’s Lexile measure or comfort level with reading on-grade materials.
  • Allow the student to select among interest categories.
  • Add books to the student’s reading list and print or email the student’s custom book list.
  • Access book details to determine availability at your local library or on Amazon.

Leveled Readers in English and Spanish


Hameray Publishing offers hundreds of fiction and nonfiction leveled books in English and Spanish. Their Spanish resources are carefully and fluently adapted for kindergarten through second grade (guided reading levels A–M).
Their experienced literacy educators and award-winning authors develop relatable and inspiring stories, in both the real world and imaginary worlds. Hameray believes in the power of great storytelling and understands that creativity is the engine driving our future. Through compelling photography and captivating illustrations, Hameray creates materials that stir the imagination.
All of Hameray’s most beloved series thrive in Spanish adaptations. The best-selling Joy Cowley Collection, home of Mrs. Wishy-Washy, becomes Colección Joy Cowley, with La señora Lávalo Todo. From Zoozoo Animal World to Zoozoo Mundo Animal, students can meet the octopus—or the pulpo—or both. And classic fables undergo a masterly retelling in Fables and the Real World, adapted as Fábulas y el Mundo Real.
Hameray collaborates with educators nationwide, from the district level to the classroom level, to determine school and classroom needs and tailor custom sets that meet them seamlessly—whether you need English texts, Spanish texts, or dual-language sets that combine both.
Since 2008, Hameray Publishing Group has developed literacy resources that instill a love of reading and learning in English and Spanish. Hameray makes it easier than ever to lead your students to their light-bulb moments.
For more information, visit https://www.hameraypublishing.com/collections/dual-language.

Find the Best Selection of Leveled Reading Books at Booksource


Booksource, a family-owned, family-first company since 1974, partners with pre-K–12 educators to ensure all students have access to books that enhance classroom learning and inspire a love of reading. Through our title insights and expertise, we help educators find the right books to engage every reader.
When students have access to books at the right reading levels, they enjoy reading more and are motivated to read more often, becoming better readers in the process. That’s why engaging, high-quality leveled reading books are essential to any leveled reading program. With an in-house team of collection development experts who work with a wide variety of today’s best publishers to select the highest-quality leveled reading books for our Leveled Reading Collections, Booksource makes it easy to bring the best leveled books into your school or classroom.
Booksource’s most popular Leveled Reading Collections include Leveled Series, Leveled Bestsellers, and New Leveled Reads. We also offer a variety of leveled classroom collections by grade and genre and thematic collections by level, as well as Leveled Classroom Libraries, Guided Reading Six-Packs, and more. For English language learners specifically, our 50-book ELL Collections include books with tightly controlled vocabulary and lower reading levels, as well as books featuring diverse characters from a variety of backgrounds. We use both Lexile and guided reading leveling systems, along with other popular leveling systems, to ensure well-rounded collections of titles at just the right reading levels.
Shop all of Booksource’s Leveled Reading Collections or request a leveled reading catalog by visiting Booksource.com. To speak with your personal Booksource literacy accounts manager, who can assist you in finding the right leveled reading books and collections for your needs, call 800.444.0435.

Engage Literacy (Spanish)


Capstone’s Engage Literacy en español is a flexible leveled-reader program that can meet a wide range of your literacy needs. The program includes 90 low-leveled readers (A–E) and can serve as an alternative resource for individual, small-group, or entire classroom instruction and offer support your emergent and ELL learners.
The core of Engage Literacy en español is its curriculum-linked nonfiction and fiction leveled readers spanning reading levels one to eight (GRL A–E). From levels two to eight, corresponding fiction or nonfiction titles are also thematically linked.
What makes Engage Literacy en español different is the authentic transadaptation. With careful precision, each title was adapted using the authentic intent of the subject or story, while directing sentence patterns in Spanish, thus facilitating a natural progression up the guided reading levels.
Unlike translation, transadaptation preserves the conceptual load and level of the English leveled readers to maintain students’ motivation and engagement through the reading process. This technique guarantees an authentic reading experience for dual-language learners. All Engage Literacy en español readers have corresponding English-language titles with matching guided reading levels and instructional notes.
The transadaptors’ use of Spanish high-frequency words yields Spanish texts that are correctly leveled, with natural-sounding sentence patterns based on oral language and developmentally appropriate early literacy in Spanish. The scope and sequence details the rigorous content developed specifically for the Spanish-speaking student and progresses in complexity as the text level rises, i.e., recognize the name and sound of the initial letters/uppercase and lowercase, identify words that begin with e (en, esta), include recognition of the correspondence between letters and sounds, combine and segment one-syllable sounds, recognize digraphs ch, qu, rr, etc.
Visit EngageLiteracy.com and take a look inside these authentic leveled readers.

The Fountas & Pinnell Classroom™ Guided Reading Collection Proudly published by Heinemann


The Fountas & Pinnell Classroom™ Guided Reading Collection is a small-group instructional context in which you support each reader’s development of systems of strategic actions for processing new texts at increasingly challenging levels of difficulty. By bringing together a small group of children who are at similar points in their reading development, you are able to provide teaching across the lesson to support each student in building the in-the-head strategic actions. Through guided reading, students learn how to engage in every facet of the reading process and apply that literacy power to all instructional contexts.  
The Fountas & Pinnell Classroom™ Guided Reading Collection includes 1,300 new, original titles (six copies of each title) that span text levels A through Z, with an accompanying lesson folder for each title. These guided reading books were created by a team of talented authors and illustrators under the direction of Fountas and Pinnell. Each book is carefully calibrated to match the text characteristics underlying the F&P Text Level Gradient™.
At the heart of the Fountas & Pinnell Classroom™ Guided Reading Collection are the highest-quality leveled books that will captivate and engage the hearts and minds of your students. Build a rich guided reading collection over time with the most powerful, engaging, original texts from the creators of the F&P Text Level Gradient™ to advance each student’s ability to process increasingly challenging books with fluency and comprehension.
To learn more about the Fountas & Pinnell Classroom™ Guided Reading Collection, available only from Heinemann, visit us at fountasandpinnell.com.

Mackin


Mackin provides schools with a customized approach to leveled libraries, creating optimal flexibility for guided reading instruction. During guided reading, teachers differentiate instruction according to reading level and target reading skills. Paramount to this differentiation is access to a robust and diverse collection of leveled readers. Since no two schools are alike, every Mackin leveled library contains the newest titles handpicked for each school. When building these collections, Mackin’s experts follow a four-step approach.

We listen: We want to understand your vision. You’ll talk with a classroom specialist who understands your work and can help you talk through the important pieces of the puzzle, such as:

  • What reading program are you using, and which levels do you wish to target?
  • What kind of content and standards alignment would you like?
  • What is unique about your student population?
  • How do you plan to organize and manage inventory of this collection?

We research: You may not have the time to stay familiar with the hottest, newest titles and how they align with the standards; that’s why we’re here.
We meet with publishers and authors to sample new books.
We study standards and your school’s benchmarks.
We talk with, follow, and learn from the experts.

We recommend: With over 3 million titles in our database, we select the best titles for your project.
We draw from over 18,000 publishers to provide a variety of the best titles.
When we provide title recommendations, we allow time for collaboration and revision.
We offer recommendations for making the most of your space and budget.

We deliver: To make your job easier, your order will arrive fully processed to your specifications and ready to use. Standard labeling and packaging include:
One cardboard sleeve per six-pack with a spine label and enhanced barcode
Books labeled with reading levels and barcodes
Customized cataloging records

To learn more about custom title collections to support reading instruction, visit https://www.mackin.com/hq/classroom/.

Getting Personal

Nick Gaehde and Liz Brooke discuss Lexia Learning’s solutions for diverse classrooms and tell us what to expect next

Daniel Ward: We’ve gone through a period of ten to 15 years where everybody expected certain things from technology. It’s delivered different things to a certain extent and it’s going in different directions. We haven’t got what we expected—we’ve got something else which might be better or it might not. And so, I was hoping that you both might be able to give me your take on the advent of blended learning and how we see blended learning developing, how we see fundamentals like access to technology developing.

Nick Gaehde: Our focus has really been to help teachers with the kinds of tools they need to address what is an increasingly diverse set of needs in schools. The schools and the students that we work with are clearly becoming broader in terms of their needs than they have been in the past. There are so many schools where we see 50, 60 different languages spoken, and we see a very broad range of vocabulary foundational knowledge from the first day of kindergarten.
Our goal is to give teachers the data they need to make instructional decisions and to give students the personalized learning path that is engaging, effective, and relevant. This is what we call the PEER framework and the belief is that through technology we can help teachers gain the information they need without the burden of as much testing as they’ve had to do in the past.
That’s where Assessment Without Testing comes in, and a new assessment that we’ve launched in partnership with the Florida Center for Reading Research called RAPID that is just a much more efficient and much broader and deeper screener than has been possible in the past. It’s giving teachers the information they need to connect data to instruction in real time.

Liz Brooke: RAPID was developed in partnership with the Florida Center for Reading Research, where I worked prior to coming to Lexia. They had two IES grants—one specifically around measurement of adolescent comprehension and the second grant around what are the skills that best predict comprehension developmentally across K–12.
Our Assessment Without Testing and RAPID both follow the philosophy of “how can we get the most meaningful and impactful data while minimizing the time taken away from instruction?” In RAPID, focusing on the three domains of word recognition, academic language, and reading comprehension and following the simple view of reading, we get the most predictive skills at a developmental scope and sequence across K–12, but in those same three domains so that you can get powerful information to your teachers in a short space of time.
As a speech language pathologist, I would do individual batteries for two to four hours to get information similar to what you get in RAPID. In RAPID, there’s a K–2 component that is teacher administered, and we believe it’s critical at those ages to have the teacher involved in the assessment process, but we still make it very quick and efficient. And then in grades 3–12, it’s group administered on computers. So even in K–2 it’s computer driven and administered but teacher guided.

NG: Our focus is to give teachers the most relevant data in the least amount of time. I was in a middle school classroom this morning, actually, and one teacher said, “I’m so tired of being bombarded with data that isn’t tied to what’s happening actually in the instructional process in the classroom. It is becoming overwhelming to sift through all that information, and often that information doesn’t help me to make instructional decisions.”

EB: With both Assessment Without Testing and RAPID, the number-one purpose is to connect back to instruction; you connect as soon as the students finish the assessment. In RAPID, the data is available, instructional groups are made, and instructional resources are suggested. And then in Assessment Without Testing, every click of the mouse or tap of the iPad is being captured and analyzed and an action plan is being created for the teacher at the class level, so that he or she can plan as a whole class, and so each individual student has an action plan, so that the teacher can drill down to very specific skills based on the data that is being captured while they work.

DW: And with that data, can the teacher then create groups within the class? Is that done automatically, or would that be the teacher’s assessment?

EB: RAPID provides that three-times-a-year screener with a more broad diagnostic profile in those domains. We suggest instructional groups or instructional focus areas for different students in the class, so the teacher can use those three-times-a-year groupings to help focus his or her whole-class instruction or small-group instruction. And then with Assessment Without Testing, you’re getting your daily, weekly, monthly progress-monitoring data, and that data also forms groups based on skills.
So if some students are struggling on short i, for example, the program will group those students together, and then we provide a lesson on short i for the teacher following the gradual release model—the “I do, we do, you do” model of instruction. We have follow-up for adaptations if students are still not understanding it, or some additional practice for those who are ready to move on. We also provide other ways that they could use our data in conjunction with other data from their classroom to help inform their groupings if they’d like to do that too.

NG: One of the things that I think is an ongoing debate and I think is a misconception about some technology in the classroom is that it’s intended to replace teachers. For us, it’s absolutely the opposite. What we’re trying to do is empower teachers so that they can meet the diverse needs of those students in the classroom, saving them time in terms of collecting data, but also automatically and very quickly grouping students with similar strengths and skill deficits and pointing teachers to the resources they need to continue to move students forward. Without technology at the core of the literacy curriculum, that would be incredibly time consuming—an almost impossible task.

DW: Even with technology, it still can be difficult in such diverse classrooms. Can things be customized to take that into account where you have incredibly diverse classrooms so that you don’t end up with too many groups? Is it then basically task focused?

EB: It is a very difficult task to differentiate and personalize in a classroom when a teacher realistically has 35 students with very different profiles. In RAPID, there is a maximum of five groups based on the domains in which they are struggling, be it one of the three domains or multiple domains, or if they are in a more advanced grouping.
Thinking about profiles of strengths and weaknesses for the class allows the teacher to group the students for his or her in-person instruction and even target questioning during whole-group instruction based on profiles they’re seeing in the data. And then it’s in the technology piece where we can potentially have 35 different pathways through the content. It’s this combination that’s really empowering the teachers to use their talents and their skills and allowing them to effectively apply them in the most-needed areas, and then allowing technology to do what it can to get at the 35 different pathways. The other piece that’s so critical is this ongoing progress-monitoring loop. Once the students are working online and the data is being captured, the teacher then intervenes and the students are back on the program. It’s not just delivering the lesson and then moving on. It’s this ongoing progress monitoring.
You’re constantly adapting the student’s pathway based on his or her performance in the online activities. Then the teacher can modify the lessons—if they continue to struggle in a particular area, they can move to the adaptation section of the lesson, or if the student is ready to move on, we also offer resources for independent student practice where they can generalize those skills that they learned online to an offline environment.

DW: What have you got in the pipeline? What’s going to happen next?
NG: When I think about where the future is headed, I think people think that schools as systems are very slow to change, but I believe that we’re right now in a period of rapid change. People also talk about education as the last place where technology has disrupted processes. Clayton Christianson, in his book Disrupting Class, made a real point of that. I’ll talk about it using the PEER framework of personalization, effective, engaging, and relevant. When we talk about personalization, obviously the more granular and more accurate you can make that personalization, the better.
That requires data—data that is helping you understand specifically on a very granular level where to intervene, where to target instruction. We’ve been gathering data online since 2007 and probably now have one of the largest databases of how students acquire literacy, those foundational literacy skills, of anybody in the world. Maybe the testing companies have more data, but it’s not the kind of data that we have, which is actually data that is derived during the learning process.
I believe we’re just starting to scratch the surface of how we use that data to continue to drive personalization and to make the algorithms behind that personalization more and more effective. When we think about effectiveness, the trend over the past few years is to think about curriculum the way we think about the medical industry. We are taking valuable time from students and valuable time from educators, and we’re working with students in a period that is incredibly transformative for them.
Making sure that we use that time wisely is one of the things we take very, very seriously. And so, continuing to drive the science behind what’s working and what’s not working, what’s effective, is something we’re incredibly committed to. We have, I think, more peer-reviewed, gold-standard research than anyone in the industry, and we do that not just to drive the credibility of our products but to really understand what’s working and what’s not working.
On the engagement side, certainly there is a lot of information that we are looking at from the gaming world and thinking about how we drive engagement, because quite honestly a program can be as effective as possible and yet if the student doesn’t use it, it doesn’t matter. So how do we make the products and how do we bring lessons to students in the most engaging way, while still maximizing the amount of time that students are learning and not just putting gratuitous videos in place and wasting valuable time? As regards time maximization, I think as an industry we’re getting better and better.
And then there’s relevance, which is one of the things we think about. It’s really important that students understand from a metacognitive standpoint why they are doing the work they are doing, and this is something which has changed.

DW: The relevance is changing so quickly as well.

NG: Absolutely. And there are some tools emerging that we are beginning to think about. In the further term, what’s the promise of AI and augmented reality to make the learning process much more relevant to students’ interests and to students’ environment?

LB: One of the things when I think about the big trends goes back to where we started the conversation, with schools seeing 50, 60, 70 languages spoken. Now I’m going to put on my speech and language hat and look at the connection between oral language and written language. We know very well from research—many, many years of research—that those who struggle with oral language are four to five times more likely to struggle with reading or written language. And research shows that it is often the ELL and Title 1 students who struggle with oral language.
We know that many of them are coming in with a gap in language and exposure. So in our program, we focus on building oral-language skills, skills that kindergarteners are learning, how to visualize when they hear a story or sequence when they hear a story. So that later, when they’re able to read those stories themselves, they have those skills in place. Not only do you have to instruct in those skills, but you also have to assess. That’s why RAPID not only assesses reading skills but also language skills. It looks at vocabulary knowledge and syntactic knowledge. Academic language is such a critical component, and it’s often not assessed, and then it’s not connected back to instruction. If we don’t start focusing in on both the oral language and the written language, both in our assessment and our instruction, then I think we’re going to see this achievement gap widen instead of close.

DW: One of my particular interests is the encouragement of creative writing. I feel that kids thrive through creative writing, through that sort of production of language. Is any of that built into your systems in use now or in the future? Is there a way to really encourage children to do, rather than to listen and react?

LB: So, currently how we incorporate the creative writing aspect primarily is in our offline activities and resources. In the Lexia Skill Builders, there’s the opportunity for students to write a response or to write an ending, a different ending to a story or things like that. We are thinking about how we might incorporate written responses into the online component, potentially more for older students than we are for the younger students.

NG: I agree with you that the ultimate goal is to give students the ability and the platform to express themselves.
As a company, we take what we do extremely seriously. I talked about the science of reading and really thinking about it using the same kind of bar as the medical profession.
And there’s a passion that we all have; for Liz, it comes from having been in the classroom as a teacher and then being a researcher, and for me it comes from being dyslexic and an ESL student growing up and struggling tremendously in school. Then having two children who inherited my dyslexic gene and seeing the kind of gains they’ve made with the right instruction at the right time. One of the real injustices in society right now is the fact that we understand the science of reading. It is well proven, and yet it’s still not making it to classrooms. That is our goal. I think there’s a huge societal need, especially right now, to make sure that students have the ability to think critically, to assess information, and to do that, they need those foundational literacy skills.

DW: Is it is a civil rights issue?

LB: Yes, exactly. I was just going to say that term, civil rights issue, because it really is. When you look at all the national results showing that two-thirds of our students aren’t reading proficiently—that is a crisis. The thing that’s hardest about that is we know what works. We just need to get it to all of those students. It’s a passion for all of us here. That is our mission and what drives us.

Nick Gaehde has been the president of Lexia Learning for twelve years and was previously president of Educators Publishing Service. He has a B.A. in Psychology with a focus on early childhood development. Dr Liz Brooke has been with Lexia for over seven years and is chief education officer of Lexia and Rosetta Stone. Liz was with the Florida Center for Reading Research in 2010, where she served as the director of interventions. Prior to that, she worked on the Learning Disabilities Team at Massachusetts General Hospital.

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LanguageMagazine 2023

Language Magazine