District Administration - June 2007 - (Page 58)

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT such students had demonstrated basic English mastery they were moved to mainstream classrooms for instruction in academic content. The problem, says Melissa Castillo, senior national faculty at the SIOP Institute, is that students fell further behind in content area classes as they learned English. Today ELLs are expected to simultaneously acquire language and learn content—and prove it on standardized tests. The Signiﬁcant Challenge Census data from 2000 indicate that the ELL population is dispersing beyond traditional destinations such as California, New York, Texas and Florida. Indiana has seen a 400 percent increase in ELL students in the last three years, says Castillo. Mexico and Latin America account for about half of English learners in the United States, and another 25 percent are Asian. Many districts grapple with a panoply of languages and cultures. For example, ELLs in Clifton (N.J.) Public Schools speak 68 diﬀerent languages. NCLB exacerbates the impact of the demographic shifts. In the past, students learning English often were exempt from testing. Now pupils must be tested in their ﬁrst year of U.S. residency, although some states do allow schools to suppress the ﬁrst year’s scores. But by their second year of residency, ELLs are expected to perform as monolingual English speakers, says Janina Kusielewicz, district supervisor of bilingual education and basic skills in Clifton Public Schools. In the 2005 National Assessment of Best Practices for ESL Professional Here are prerequisites to successful ESL professional development regardless of the model: • Commit “Educators need to commit to the long haul. A one or two day workshop is a band-aid that won’t solve the problem,” says Janina Kusielewicz, district supervisor of bilingual education and basic skills in Clifton (N.J.) Public Schools. • Identify The ideal professional development mix includes three types of participants— content teachers, ESL teachers and administrators, says Betty Ansin Smallwood, manager of CAL’s services and a pre-K12 ESL/ELL specialist. Content teachers are the target audience who will apply new strategies. ESL teachers provide expertise but need strategies for collaboration. Administrators should nurture systemic change. Districts should up their chances for success by choosing their best teachers for SIOP training. SIOP cannot ﬁx a weak teacher, but a weak teacher can negate the effects of SIOP, says Niki Konecki, coordinator of bilingual/ESL and innovative programs in San Marcos, Texas. • Fund A three-day SIOP training costs $15,000 for 30 participants, and follow-up is another $5,600. English learners fall under Title III and Title I, from which dis- were demonstrated in mathematics. The demographic and accountability changes translate into a massive challenge. Districts need to employ tools to boost performance of such students, and professional development is an important component of the solution. General teachers typically aren’t prepared to teach ELLs, says Konecki. Many have fewer than eight hours of training in ESL methods, according to the 1999-2000 Schools and The program is designed to help kids simultaneously learn grade-level content in any subject, such as math or science, while they also learn English. Educational Progress (NAEP), a mere 29 percent of eighth-grade ELLs scored at or above the basic achievement level in reading, compared to 75 percent of native English-speaking students. Similar gaps 58 June 2007 Linguistics (CAL), which oﬀers various ESL professional development programs, focused on speciﬁc ESL staﬀ. Today about 75 percent of professional development targets mainstream K12 teachers, says Betty Ansin Smallwood, manager of pre-K12 services at CAL and a pre-K12 ESL/ELL specialist. And ESL teachers need assistance, too, as ESL programs move from self-contained pods, or pullout programs, to collaborative programs with classroom teachers. Administrators also need a hand in training, as they need to understand the issues and nurture systemic change. The SIOP Model A number of districts are turning to SIOP, a scientiﬁcally validated professional development program that trains teachers in techniques of sheltered instruction, which emphasizes content vocabulary District Administration Staﬃng Survey, published by the National Center for Education Statistics in 2002. And school districts are trying to ﬁll the gap. Ten years ago the majority of requests to the Center for Applied

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - June 2007

Contents
Editor's Letter
Letters
News Update
Security Update
Technology Update
Curriculum Update
Inside the Law
Admistrator Profile
District Profile
Refreshing the ISTE Technology Standards
Action Teams
RE-Construction
Professional Development for the New Century
Multimedia LIT
New Products
Leadership Books
Problem/Solution
Online Edge
Speaking Out
Supervisor's Opinion
Professional Opinion
Research Corner
Calendar of Events
Understanding the Times

District Administration - June 2007