English Language Learner Case Study
To meet the needs of the ELL
student, the state of Texas has adopted ELPS (English Language Proficiency
Standards). Texas also has the Texas
Essential Knowledge & Skills (TEKS); it is one of a few states who have not
adopted the Common Core Standards. Since
the student in the case study attends a Texas school, the report will include
proficiency test scores which are Texas based along with the assessment of her
language skills TELPAS and LAS Link scores along with how they parallel to the NYS
LEP/ELLs Learning Rubric and the Student Oral Language Observation Matrix
(SOLOM).
This study is a continuation of the
observation of a 6th grade student previously called Maria to
protect her identity. To recap
information previously presented, Maria was born in the United States and her
first language is Spanish. Maria’s mom
does not speak any English. Her mother
did not graduate from high school; therefore, is unable to assist Maria with
her school work. Maria’s mom also is
unemployed and has moved Maria and her sibling from one school district to
another. According to school records,
Maria has moved nineteen times since kindergarten. When interviewing Maria’s English Second
Language (ESL) teacher, the teacher stated that Maria speaks Spanish; however
she cannot not read or write at proficient level in her native language. According to the LAS Links test administered
at Maria’s previous school, she scored a Level 4 in English and in
Spanish. This score indicates that Maria
is fluent in both languages, but the test only measures oral language
proficiency not comprehension. Maria’s
TELPAS scores indicate that she is advanced high in listening, speaking, and
writing which indicates that she is nearly comparable to her native English
speaking peers. However she ranks as
advanced in reading, which is low.
TELPAS is not meant to rate academics, but only the student’s ability to
communicate in English in the four domains.
Therefore, Maria’s scores maybe in the normal range; yet, her
comprehension of the academic content and vocabulary is below average.
The previous TELPAS results from
last semester correspond to the Advance Low ranking for listening, speaking,
and writing in the NYS LEP/ELLs Learning Rubric. As for reading, Maria was ranked Intermediate
Mid-level. Since the first semester,
Maria has made great gains. She is now
at the Advance High for listening, speaking and writing and Intermediate High
for reading.
When conducting a QRI-5 (Qualitative
Reading Inventory), I first administered Maria a 6th grade examiner
word list. She automatically identified
thirteen out of twenty (65%) words correctly and three out of twenty (15%) of
the words were correctly identified after she used phonics to decode the
word. Hence, the total number correct
was sixteen out of twenty (80%) of the words from the list correctly, which
places her vocabulary identification at the instructional level. When continuing the QRI-5, Maria scored a
three out of twelve (25%) on the concept questions, which indicated she was
unfamiliar with the topic of the story “Pele.”
After reading the passage, Maria had ten total miscues, but no miscues
that changed the meaning of the text.
Therefore, she read at the instructional level with a reading fluency of
103.6 WPM (Words per Minute) rate. Her
corrected WPM was 100.7. Additionally,
Maria could remember twenty-eight out of sixty-six ideas from the story. She also recalled that soccer was on TV in
the United States and this why soccer became popular due to Pele. Maria answered correctly one explicit
question and four implicit questions without look-backs. With look-backs, she answered another
implicit question correctly. Overall,
Maria’s reading comprehension of the 6th grade reading level text
was at the frustration level and her recollection of ideas from the story was
low.
To assess her growth in writing, I gave
Maria the same prompt from first semester.
I did not notice a difference between her writing from first semester
and now. Her sentence structure was not adequate, but
the reader can understand her story. I
would rank the writing as advanced under TELPAS. However looking at other writing samples from
this year, Maria still communicates her thoughts in writing when the writing
prompt is personal. However, she continues
to struggle with the conventions of writing.
Her paragraph was one long run-on sentence. In a few spots, she used a comma to end a
sentence. Furthermore, the writing
prompts in her math journal also did not demonstrate growth in using
punctuation correctly. When writing a
personal narrative, she can give detailed information, but struggles with
giving detail in academic writing. Her
writing does demonstrate organization in thought, but the word combinations remain
simple. Therefore, Maria would be ranked
at the Intermediate Mid-level when using the NYS- LEP/ELLs Learning Rubric.
Using the SOLOM Matrix, Maria’s scored
a four in the domains of comprehension, fluency, and vocabulary in the first
semester and scored a five in pronunciation.
In the second semester, I continued to observe Maria in reading, math,
and ESL class. Maria continues to communicate
with teachers and peer in normal conversation.
Maria interacted with her peers and teachers during a book study group,
ESL discussion table, and working with peer during small group rotations in
math. Her fluency in everyday
conversations is comparative to a native English speaker. She sometimes struggles with fluency during
academic discussions. On occasion she
will use inappropriate vocabulary during academic discussions, but during
everyday conversations, she used appropriate vocabulary with teacher and
peers. Her pronunciation of words during
everyday conversation is comparable to that of a native speaker even though she
has a slight accent. However, in the
domain of grammar, she improved from scoring between a three and a four in the
first semester to a solid four in the second semester. Maria improved in fluency from the first
semester. Her SOLOM score was a 22 (20
first semester), which indicates English language proficiency.
As in the first semester, being an
ELL student is not affecting her full participation in all academic
activities. She still has difficulty
with understanding and expressing her thoughts to higher level Blooms questions. There is still a difference between her
performance in social settings, such as the playground or cafeteria, compared
to the academic setting. However, her
academic vocabulary and performance is improving. During the social settings, Maria has
increased her group of friends and participates more in the discussions,
fluently like a native English speaker. During
book study and small group discussion in math, she has become more confident in
her academic responses. Maria continues
to ask for clarification on questions or vocabulary words. Maria utilizes her vocabulary quick sheet
accommodation and the Spanish/English dictionary for math homework and tests.
Maria continues to struggle with
reading comprehension and vocabulary words.
Yet, she does have growth in these areas. I spoke with her reading teacher, Mrs. Songer
and she indicated that she has also seen improvement in Maria. I asked her what she did different the second
semester, and she told me she partnered Maria with high academic students
during literacy circles, book study and other small group instruction. She also increased the amount of time Maria
spent at the teacher small group station during rotations.
As I continued to work with Maria in
math, I used reading strategies to help her understand the math word
problems. I noticed Maria struggled with
common math terms such as: reasonable, approximate, product and quotient. In addition to these few academic words,
Maria continued to struggle with other common vocabulary. To help with the language acquisition, I gave
the ESL teacher weekly a worksheet of math word problems to use to discuss
vocabulary and using context clues to comprehend the problem and unknown
words. I found having the ESL teacher,
is a wonderful resource for designing intervention lessons for an ESL student
and for intervention support.
The year is almost over; however, I
will continue to have one-on-one mini lessons on using context clues to
determine meaning of unknown words and problem solving with Maria. The reading teacher is continuing using the
web-based programsTumble books and Istation during before school tutoring once
a week. The use of Marzano’s strategies
for building vocabulary has helped with this acquisition of new vocabulary
words. I will also continue small group
or one-on-one instruction and intervention before school twice a week. I will continue checking frequently for
understanding and clarify vocabulary.
With the aforementioned strategies, I believe Maria will continue
showing growth in reading comprehension and academic vocabulary.
Having the opportunity to follow
Maria over a school year has given me the chance to grow professionally in my
knowledge of affective reading assessments and teaching strategies as they
pertain to my ELL students. As I
observed the ESL teacher during group discussion, she used a variety to
techniques to break down a variety of vocabulary words the students needed to
know for that unit of study. She also
used visuals to help students understand vocabulary. The most resent discussion was on when to use
a specific reference material: encyclopedia, dictionary, thesaurus, atlas and
almanac. I have used her strategy of
giving pictorial visuals when introducing math vocabulary with all of my
students, and I have extended the strategy to include having the student draw
their interpretation of the vocabulary word.
Furthermore, the math word wall has increased the use of academic
vocabulary in writing with the math journal.
As mentioned in my previous report,
I was able to assess my other ELL students using SOLOM and NYS LEP/ELLs
Learning Rubric. With these results and
the results from the TELPAS assessment, I further differentiated the
instruction for my ELL students to help them grow in their language
acquisition.
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