ELL Program Goals and Teaching Strategies for English Learners
This paper examines the growing English Language Learner (ELL) student population and the program structures needed to support their academic success. It outlines effective goals for ELL programs, including English language development and content-area instruction, and details key instructional strategies such as increasing comprehensibility, promoting student interaction, building higher-order thinking skills, and using students' native languages. The paper also addresses the challenges schools face in communicating with ELL parents and describes practical approaches—such as interpreters, translated documents, and community resources—to bridge language barriers and encourage family participation in their children's education.
- The Growing ELL Student Population: ELL enrollment growth and academic achievement gaps
- Setting Effective Goals for ELL Programs: How districts should structure ELL program goals
- Core Instructional Strategies for ELL Students: Comprehensibility, interaction, and higher-order thinking strategies
- The Role of Native Language in ELL Instruction: Using primary language to support content learning
- Communicating with ELL Parents and Families: Bridging language barriers between schools and families
- Community Resources and Long-Term Support: Interpreters, community organizations, and bilingual children
- Conclusion: Student goals and value of strong ELL programs
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What makes this paper effective
- Grounds claims in cited statistics (e.g., 65% ELL population growth from 1993–2003), giving the argument a concrete empirical foundation.
- Moves logically from program-level goal-setting to classroom-level instructional strategies to family and community support, creating a coherent, layered structure.
- Addresses multiple stakeholders—administrators, teachers, and parents—making the paper broadly applicable to school communities.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates effective use of synthesis: it draws on multiple institutional sources (NCES data, OCR guidelines, CALLA research) to build a unified, policy-informed argument rather than simply summarizing each source independently. This approach allows the writer to connect macro-level program design with micro-level classroom practice.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with demographic context and academic achievement gaps, then transitions to program goal-setting principles, followed by four distinct instructional strategy sections. It closes with a practical discussion of parent communication and community resources. Each section builds on the previous one, moving from policy to pedagogy to community engagement. The conclusion restates the central purpose of ELL programs in accessible, student-centered terms.
The Growing ELL Student Population
The English Language Learner (ELL) student population continues to grow at a higher rate than the general student population. According to the National Center for Educational Statistics, the general student population grew 9% from 1993 to 2003, while the ELL population increased 65% during that same period. The ELL student population is now estimated to include 10% of all students (English Language Learners, 2005).
ELL students face the challenging task of learning a new language while simultaneously learning subject-area content. Although there have been signs of progress—including higher reading and math scores for ELL students—more improvement is needed. Current trends show that English Language Learners receive lower grades, are judged by their teachers to have lower academic abilities, and score below their classmates on standardized tests (English Language Learners, 2005).
Setting Effective Goals for ELL Programs
When school systems develop ELL programs, the goals for those programs should flow from whatever educational approach has been selected for serving ELL students. Goal development should connect back to what experts in the field have identified as successful outcomes under the approach the district has selected. When establishing goals for an ELL program, each district must take into account its own individual circumstances. The essential Title VI requirement for ELL students is that they have meaningful access to the district's educational program. For this reason, the goals for ELL students should align with the goals maintained for all students throughout the district (Developing Programs for English Language Learners: Goals, 2005).
Effective goals should indicate to whom they apply, what level of performance is expected, when the performance level should be attained, and how success will be measured. Effective goals for ELL students should address both English language development and subject-matter instruction. In order to meet the many other needs of ELL students, a district may also choose to establish goals in areas such as staff development, curriculum development, and parental participation (Developing Programs for English Language Learners: Goals, 2005).
Core Instructional Strategies for ELL Students
An ELL program should always aim to increase a student's comprehensibility. This standard involves the ways in which instructors can make content more understandable to students. With beginning to intermediate ELL students, this technique consists of providing as many non-verbal cues as possible—using pictures, real objects, demonstrations, gestures, and intonation cues. As a student's proficiency develops, additional teaching strategies include building from language that is already understood, using graphic organizers, hands-on learning activities, and cooperative learning or peer teaching techniques (General Principles for Teaching ELL Students, n.d.).
A good ELL program should also aim to increase student interaction, which expands students' opportunities to use their new language skills for communication and to apply meaning to real-life situations. "A number of strategies can be used to support increased interaction, including cooperative learning, study buddies, project-based learning, authentic writing and speaking tasks, and one-on-one teacher/student interactions" (General Principles for Teaching ELL Students, n.d.).
Another important goal is to increase students' thinking and study skills. Modern educational practice increasingly emphasizes strategies that develop higher-order thinking skills as students' language proficiency grows. For example, the Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA) involves asking students higher-order thinking questions—such as "What would happen if…?"—and modeling thinking through think-alouds. It also encourages teaching and reinforcing study skills and test-taking strategies while maintaining high expectations for all students in the district (General Principles for Teaching ELL Students, n.d.).
Conclusion
Children enrolled in ELL programs face many challenges that their English-speaking peers do not. Having a well-designed ELL program with clear goals and a supportive learning environment is the best resource available to these students. Their primary goal is to learn English so that they can succeed in subject-area studies and help their families become more productive members of the community.
References
Developing Programs for English Language Learners: Goals. (2005). Retrieved April 30, 2009, from Office for Civil Rights Web site:
English Language Learners. (2005). Retrieved April 30, 2009, from Focus on Effectiveness Web site: http://www.netc.org/focus/challenges/ell.php
General Principles for Teaching ELL Students. (n.d.). Retrieved April 30, 2009, from Serving English Language Learners Web site: http://jccdrc.jobcorps.gov/ELL/teach/principles
Logsdon, A. (2009). Top three ways to accommodate parents of English Language Learners. Retrieved April 30, 2009, from About.com Web site:
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