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myON News: Putting More Fun into Nonfiction

From futuristic features on flying cars and fun facts about the rainforest to the latest football stats and fashion trends, who said nonfiction reading can’t be fun? Yet despite recent calls for increased nonfiction reading from the National Governors Association (NGA) and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), more often, students are reaching for fiction books. In fact, according to the 2018 What Kids Are Reading report, the world’s largest study of K–12 students’ reading behavior, nonfiction reading has only grown by less than 10% nationwide since NAEP laid out its reading framework in 2010. 

A solution many classrooms are using to engage K–8 students is myON News, powered by News-O-Matic. The service delivers five daily news articles, 52 weeks a year, on timely topics and current events. Each article incorporates engaging multimedia to help students better understand news and other informational topics.

Accompanying maps show where news is occurring relative to the location of the reader, as well as other fun facts. Students can read about a wide variety of topics: high-interest U.S. and world news, arts and entertainment, sports, science and technology, animals, wacky news, and kids in the news. Every article is written at three Lexile levels (pre-K–3, 3–5, and 5–8), with accompanying audio supports to further student understanding. Each article is also vetted by a child psychologist to ensure children are reading content that is age appropriate for K–8 students. In addition, the articles, which are written by professional journalists, are available in multiple languages, including English, Spanish, and French. 

Teachers can use the metrics from myON News to track the number of articles their students have read as well as the categories and articles that are most popular with each student. Students can learn about the world in a way that fosters their natural curiosity. The platform also assists students with developing critical-thinking skills to determine the difference between “real” and “fake” news and helps educate them on global headlines that may impact their daily lives. renaissance.com/products/myon-news

Free TESOL Lesson Plans, Activities

In preparation for the new school year, freshen up lesson plans with new ideas from the TESOL Resource Center (TRC). The TRC is full of free classroom activities, lesson plans, teaching tips, and assessment tools made by teachers, for teachers. Educators can explore the TESOL Resource Center for specific resource types, browse by audience or language proficiency level, or search by keyword. If you have a great resource you’d like to share, you can upload it to the TRC. www.tesol.org/trc

Growth Planner Helps Students Prepare for Future

MetaMetrics’ Growth Planner is a tool to determine if students are on track to graduate college and career ready. With the tool, students, educators, and parents can forecast student reading and math growth and compare that forecasted performance to the text and mathematical demands of college and careers. If the student is projected to fall short of graduating college and career ready, the planner can identify the recommended growth path to close the gap between where they are and where they need to be. Included are resources to encourage and promote reading and math growth to meet the desired goals.

The Growth Planner forecasts a student’s reading growth using Lexile measures and mathematics growth using Quantile measures. More than a dozen departments of education report Lexile and Quantile measures on their end-of-grade assessments. Lexile and Quantile measures are also used in more than 75 other learning assessments and programs. The tool supports students of all ability levels and languages who are receiving a Lexile measure and/or a Quantile measure.  

ccr.lexile.com or ccr.quantiles.com

Escalate English

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s Escalate English is an English language development program designed to accelerate English learners’ growth in grades 4–8. Students with social English language skills but needing intensive support to build their academic English skills across all language modalities—reading, writing, listening, speaking, and viewing—are the optimal candidates for this CODiE award-winning program.

Through its design, students actively engage with robust grade-level text and multimedia every day and respond through activities such as structured collaborative conversations, daily writing, active listening and speaking activities, and performance tasks. Throughout every step of the lesson, a variety of scaffolds promote access without compromising the rigor needed to reach the next level.

Escalate English makes active academic language learning and production a daily routine. A recent yearlong study of the program with students in grades six, seven, and eight saw students in all three grades show significant growth with increased language skills, abilities to analyze texts, critical reasoning, and thoughtful communication. 

Included are an array of videos that model academic language and further extend the topic covered in the text, podcasts that allow students to practice their listening skills, and an interactive digital student experience rich in supported digital writing and learning tools that enhance each lesson. 

Digital learning tools are built into instruction, ensuring that each step of the way, students can access grade-level content and respond using the academic language they need to practice, whether they are online or offline. With the HMH Player app, students can easily download the program’s texts, videos, interactive lessons, and responding assignments for use when they do not have internet access. 

hmhco.com/EscalateEnglish 

Measuring Teacher Impact

Verso Learning’s platform is a teaching resource designed to collect evidence and data from the classroom to develop and deliver personalized professional development and measure a teacher’s impact on student learning. The platform uses student response data, along with feedback from teachers, to recommend research-based strategies capable of enhancing the relationship between teacher and student.

Teachers have access to high-impact strategies and structures, practical guides, model activities, and personalized support that help them build lessons aligned with evidence-based best practices. In the process, schools and districts have visibility of teaching and learning in their classrooms and build a curriculum base of high-impact activities that have been proven to work by their own teachers.

The cloud-based platform is designed specifically for both teacher and student use and provides valuable insights to district leadership as well. Educators can use the platform as both a teaching tool and a professional development resource in the classroom that provides vital visibility for their impact on each student’s learning outcomes and highlights areas for improvement. 

Teachers can refine advanced teaching strategies that align with their class activities and daily lesson plans, based on student or peer feedback and their own reflection data, enhancing the lessons’ effectiveness not only for them but for their students and their colleagues.

Lesson plans and activities are accessible to both teachers and students. Teachers can manage students’ work, while students can respond and comment on others’ work with the click of a button. The platform displays a visual representation of how engaged students are by providing graphs that compare with other students, along with recently completed activities and “strategy cards” offering best practices for specific lessons.

With PD training courses such as Engage with New Concepts and Teacher Clarity, schools and districts can deliver uniform, on-demand PD that includes lesson structures designed to help every student. 

VersoLearning.com

Informing Instruction for English Learners

A fresh start. A clean slate. The beginning of a new school year can be brimming with possibilities and excitement around the growth potential that has yet to be tapped for your students. It is also the perfect time to re-evaluate and tweak some of your instruction methods for the year ahead. When it comes to helping English learners succeed this year, you can make a significant impact by taking one simple action: connecting students’ assessments to your instruction. 

With piles of assessment data to sort through, you may be thinking, “it’s not that simple.” So, where do you begin? Start by asking these four essential questions.

1. How are my English learners doing compared to grade-level benchmarks? 

Pull a screening report for the entire class to determine how your English learners are performing against grade-level benchmarks. That way, you can evaluate whether your English learners are at or above benchmark, considered on watch, or in need of urgent intervention. Renaissance Star Assessments provide easy-to-read screening reports, with color-coded sections for each category.

2. How are my English learners doing compared to their “true” peers—other EL students in the same grade and at the same English language proficiency level (ELP)?

Group your students by ELP level to determine how they are performing relative to their fellow EL peers. For example, Star Assessments let you sort this information by WIDA level, which ranks their progress on a scale from 1 to 5 (1 is students who need urgent intervention, and 5 is students who are on their way to approaching benchmark).

These first two questions provide information about students’ achievement in English, irrespective of their native languages. Now consider the fact that over 3.7 million of the English learners in U.S. public schools during the 2014–15 school year were native speakers of Spanish. Imagine how amazing it would be to have the ability to identify the skills your native Spanish-speaking English learners are able to demonstrate in 1) English and 2) Spanish. This leads to our next set of questions.

3. Do your native Spanish-speaking students have skills in Spanish they cannot yet demonstrate in English?

A report like the one shown above provides the answer to this question concerning the grade-level literacy skills a student can demonstrate in English versus the skills he or she can demonstrate in Spanish.

The black dots represent the student’s ability to demonstrate mastery of skills in English. The white dots represent the student’s ability to demonstrate the same skills in Spanish. Both sets of scores appear mostly in the red section of the report, which tells you the student has not yet mastered these skills in either language. But the scores also reveal the student is much more able to demonstrate mastery in Spanish (white dots) than English (black dots).

How you use this information in the classroom depends on the language of instruction, which leads us to our next important question.

4. Do your students receive instruction in both English and Spanish or in English only?

Knowing the grade-level skills your students can demonstrate by language can be used to inform instruction in both the English-speaking classroom and the Spanish-speaking classroom. While it is more obvious how this information applies to a student receiving instruction in both languages, consider the value of knowing that students have already mastered skills in their native language that they simply cannot yet demonstrate in English.

It is important to have the right data to connect assessment to instruction for ELs. Want more insights? Check out this on-demand webinar (https://www.renaissance.com/webinar/connecting-assessment-instruction-english-learners/) to learn practical tips for supporting English learners in your district. 

Carol Johnson is a bilingual educator and national education officer at Renaissance. She holds a PhD in second-language acquisition and teaching, specializing in how people learn second languages. 

Improving Learner Outcomes

David Bong explains the what, why, and how of measuring world language skills

The world of language assessment is endlessly fascinating. What, why, and how we measure language skills are constantly evolving to incorporate new strategies and technologies as the field becomes increasingly aware of how language testing can improve learner outcomes.

What

There are three fundamental types of language tests: Achievement tests measure the ability to repeat language elements that have been taught, focusing on specific vocabulary or grammar structures taught in a lesson or unit.

Performance tests measure the ability to use practiced language in a limited and controlled situation. Proficiency tests measure the ability to use language in a simulated real-world situation. Each has a role in language learning. 

Our company, Avant Assessment, specializes in proficiency assessments that measure students’ levels in relation to the goals of the student and the program and show growth across time. 

Why

Over the past five years, we have seen a significant increase in the use of proficiency testing to document student language skills and gather data on program effectiveness. The two drivers for documenting skills are credit by examination (CBE) and the Seal of Biliteracy movement that is sweeping the country.

CBE programs provide credit for student language proficiency regardless of how the language was learned. CBE is a powerful tool for increasing graduation rates of heritage students who bring a language skill to school.

Avant participated in a Gates Foundation study of CBE testing for heritage speakers of 47 languages in the Seattle area. Thirty-four percent of the heritage Spanish speakers earning CBE credits needed them to graduate. Overall, this CBE program increased graduation rates among all Hispanic students by 5.26%. 

To earn CBE credits, students have to demonstrate literacy as well as oral fluency through testing, which encourages them to take classes in the literacy skills that will make their language more useful for employment. 

The Seal of Biliteracy movement has also driven expanded testing of students’ proficiency. With the leadership of Californians Together and Velasquez Press, California launched this movement in 2011, and it has spread across the country to 33 states and the District of Columbia. Yet today, about 70% of the students earning the Seal are second-language learners, not the heritage-language learners who were expected to be the main recipients of the Seal. Several districts have proactively addressed this issue.

Chicago Schools, for example, promoted the Seal to heritage learners and provided easy access to tests, so that 64% of students earning the Seal in Chicago are heritage speakers. In order to fill gaps that exist in state-sponsored Seal of Biliteracy programs, Avant recently sponsored the launch of the Global Seal of Biliteracy. The Global Seal certifies learners with second-language proficiency ineligible to qualify for the state-sponsored Seals because they are in private school, colleges, or homeschool situations or are heritage speakers already in the workforce.

As dual-language immersion and bilingual programs grow in number and stature, programs seek proficiency data on both heritage- and second-language learners. Educators have had English language testing data for years but now recognize that understanding students’ proficiency levels in non-English languages provides more complete information on student language development and program outcomes.

In more traditional world language programs as well, we see significant increases in district-wide proficiency testing to measure program effectiveness. A new generation of technology- and data-savvy language supervisors recognizes the importance of proficiency data to harmonize instruction practices and share common goals. Nevertheless, we estimate that fewer than 5% of students receive rigorous third-party proficiency assessments that can provide this kind of data.

Cutting-edge universities are increasingly testing student proficiency to measure the effectiveness of hybrid or fully online language courses. They are also using the data on proficiency outcomes for all language programs to demonstrate that they can generate proficiency outcomes to increase employability in the workforce to administrators, who are increasingly data driven and often pressured to shift funding to STEM programs. 

As states have moved to align their language standards with the national proficiency standards and can-do statements, language teachers, especially at the K–12 level, recognize the need to improve their assessment literacy. As one teacher wrote, “I used to give tests to determine grades.

But once I understood the proficiency descriptors for each proficiency level, my focus shifted from text completion to student outcomes. I now look at assessments as formative feedback on my language learners and their progress. As their guide on the path toward proficiency, I need to know two things: 1) What should they be able to do now?, and 2) What do they need to learn/be able to do to get to the next level?” 

To provide cost-effective and convenient online training in the proficiency standards, Avant recently launched ADVANCE, an online tool that trains teachers in the standards using the same methodology and technology that we use to train our STAMP raters. ADVANCE supports more effective assessment in class and improves the ability to use testing data to improve outcomes. 

How

Nearly 20 years ago, we launched the first online, adaptive language-proficiency assessment. As technology has advanced, we have leveraged it to improve our tests and develop new tools. We recently developed a tool called Otto. Using artificial intelligence, Otto automatically and instantly scores a portion of students’ writing responses in the Spanish STAMP test.

For each response, Otto calculates the level of certainty that it can rate it accurately and consistently. Human raters score the rest. In keeping with our philosophy of leveraging technology to its fullest extent possible but always combining it with human knowledge and insights, we still use human raters to double score 20% of all responses to ensure that both Otto and the human raters are doing their jobs well. 

We are currently piloting a tool for teaching Spanish writing proficiency that uses Otto to score student Spanish writing samples on the national proficiency scale. With the time saved grading responses, teachers can add individual feedback and create digital portfolios. This is just one example of how technology is changing assessment and giving teachers more power to improve student proficiency outcomes. 

Solid data on student proficiency can reward students, guide teaching, and improve programs. Leveraging technology to put that data in the hands of educators is central to Avant’s mission. We will continue to explore new technologies and work with educators to maximize the positive impact on student learning.

David Bong is CEO of Avant Assessment. Avant STAMP and WorldSpeak tests are used to improve learning and award competency-based credits and Seals of Biliteracy. David speaks Japanese and was a businessman in Tokyo and Hong Kong. He is on JNCL-NCLIS’s board and an ISO standards-setting committee for assessment. 

Australia Funds Radio Program for Multilingual Seniors

Speak My Language is a new radio program that has launched with the goal reaching out to aging populations across Australia. The project harnesses the power of radio to inform diverse seniors about aged care, health, and wellbeing. The Australian government funded the project with a $1 million backing. Aged Care Minister, Ken Wyatt AM announced via the Australia Department of Health that the program would keep multilingual communities up to date with age-specific information, especially those from diverse backgrounds.

“We owe our older Australians an inclusive aged care system, one that embraces diversity,” Minister Wyatt said. “Talking about aged care and navigating the aged care system can be daunting for older Australians and their families, particularly those from diverse backgrounds. Innovative, community-based programs like this will undoubtedly make the journey easier for many of our most treasured citizens.”

The program will be initially broadcast in Chinese, Russian, Spanish, Portuguese, Serbian, Macedonian, Hindi, Arabic, and English, which a second phase laid out to expand the program to up to 25 languages.

“More than 1,000 people’s stories will be broadcast live and podcast to promote ageing well,” Wyatt added. “Over 600,000 older Australian people were born in countries where English is not the first language. These people have contributed enormously to the economic and cultural wealth of our nation, and the Turnbull Government [Executive branch of government in Australia] is committed to ensuring they have access to high quality aged care services that are sensitive, inclusive and culturally appropriate.”

Mary Karras, chief executive officer of the Ethnic Communities’ Council of NSW, told SBS Australia, “By telling their stories in their own language using their trusted ethnic radio program, they are able to connect with members of their own community and share strategies to overcome the ageing barrier.”

The program will be broadcast across 80 ethnic radio stations in New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, Tasmania, and the ACT. The program partnered with SBS Radio, NEMBC, Ethnic Communities’ Council of NSW, and the Ethnic Communities Council of Queensland among others. The programs can also be accessed online for free at https://www.speakmylanguageradio.com/listen for those without radio access. The website also features free resources for aged care, dementia, care support booklets, accessibility and more in each of the offered languages.

See below for the Speak My Language intro video.

Early Literacy Especially Important for ELLs

A new study from Oregon State University (OSU) shows that English learners are more likely to become proficient English speakers if they enter kindergarten with a strong initial grasp of academic language literacy, either in their primary language or in English. The study, published recently in the journal Educational Policy, is part of an emerging body of research examining the role that language acquisition plays in a student’s education. “This study shows that building literacy skills, in English or the child’s native language, prior to kindergarten can be helpful,” said Karen Thompson, an assistant professor of cultural and linguistic diversity in OSU’s College of Education and lead author of the study. “Having those academic language skills – the kind of language used in school to retell a story or explain a math problem – is likely going to set them on a path to success.”

Continue

K–2 Library Resource PebbleGo Expands Its Spanish Content

Capstone’s K–2 online resource PebbleGo has added new Spanish materials. The latest offering, contextually translated to maintain proper academic vocabulary and supported by natural voice audio, will begin to roll out later this fall. PebbleGo’s database is used by students in nearly 20% of the country’s elementary schools. With more than 1,000 articles connected to K–2 curriculum topics, PebbleGo exposes students to the concept of research and credible sources to begin developing good digital citizenship skills at an early age.

Each article is supported by natural voice audio, recorded by professional voice-over artists, which engages students and improves comprehension. Students at schools that subscribe to both the English- and Spanish-language versions can toggle between the two. “Capstone is thrilled to introduce more Spanish options to our popular PebbleGo resource,” said Darin Rasmussen, vice president of digital product development. “‘More Spanish’ is one of our most common requests.” The expansion of Spanish content is enhanced by audio that guides students with follow-along text in the student’s first language to foster understanding. The professional voice-over models correct pronunciation and fluency with no robotic text-to-speech, which helps learners develop necessary speaking skills in their second language.

“We’re happy to help educators make sure that every student has access to curriculum-connected content that can teach them foundational research skills, such as finding facts from credible sources, and expand their content-area knowledge,” said Rasmussen. Spanish content is increasingly seen as a matter of equity. The read-aloud audio helps promote listening skills, which are often ahead of reading comprehension when it comes to developing content knowledge and academic vocabulary. PebbleGo.com

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LanguageMagazine 2023

Language Magazine