ELL News Headlines

When the Kansas City, Kan., district decided to take a fresh approach to student attendance, Naomi Tolentino knew she would need to get all hands on deck. As coordinator of student supports, Tolentino leads the “Attend to Achieve” program, which aims to shift strategies from punishing truancy to preventing chronic absenteeism. That meant she needed to create a common language to help employees throughout the system — from teachers to front office staff — understand why even excused absences can harm a student’s academic progress.

Unlike the recent surge of evidence on science-based reading instruction, research and emphasis on number sense isn’t making its way into schools and classrooms in the same way. Students spend less time on foundational numeracy compared with what they spend on reading; elementary teachers often receive less training in how to teach math effectively; and schools use fewer interventions for students who need extra math support. 

"This is my home. This is my community. Why do I have to leave?" Gloria Rubio's son asked her when he learned Jefferson Jr./Sr. High School might close. He didn’t understand why the school that had shaped him and his friends, where he felt safe and supported, could be taken away.

As English language arts teachers, we’re always trying to find ways to build student comprehension with grade-level texts in reading and listening. We’re also trying to support our students with their ability to write. A language dive is especially useful in this effort. In a language dive, we take a juicy sentence from a text and utilize it to support students’ understanding of the main ideas while they learn different types of language and ultimately model writing. One of the most challenging things about a language dive is that students may not know all of the words or concepts in the chunks they’re deconstructing.

When Gaby Pacheco was applying to college, her high school counselor discouraged her from applying anywhere. As an undocumented student, she could get herself and her family in trouble, the counselor warned. Pacheco is now president and CEO of TheDream.US, the nation’s largest college scholarship provider for undocumented students.

In her award-winning entry for NPR's Student Podcast challenge, Ameya Desai interviews her grandfather, Kishor Desai, whose family migrated from India to Uganda, where Kishor was born and raised. His father worked at a sugarcane factory outside of Uganda's capital, Kampala.

Here's how to build a culture of reading to welcome students who are learning a new language, particularly those who come from strong oral storytelling traditions.

School and district leaders are navigating questions from educators, students, and families on how safe schools are from deportations after the Trump administration rescinded a policy protecting schools from immigration enforcement actions. But just how many students and families would be affected by changes to immigration policies? That number — likely in the tens of millions — stretches beyond estimates of an undocumented immigrant population, researchers said.

Studying the lives of mathematicians can help elementary students discover a positive math identity for themselves.

Denver Public Schools is taking the Trump administration to court in an effort to keep immigration enforcement away from schools locally and across the country.