I created my needs based assessment around English Language Learners and the amount of vocabulary instruction they receive from their classroom teachers.
Almost 1/3 of Douglas Elementary students are from a household that either speaks completely Spanish or a mix of Spanish and English. This means that ELL instruction should be at the forefront of many teachers minds. The chart to the left shows the frequency of vocabulary instruction. It is possible that this could be new math, science or reading vocabulary. |
Many teachers tend to focus on teaching decoding in hopes that students will make the connection between the word and the meaning; however, if they are learning the English language then they will not have a meaning in place for each word. “It is our long term experience that phonics instruction simply does not work well until a learner has acquired a fairly substantial English vocabulary,” (Gunderson 156). If the majority of teachers at my school are only teaching new vocabulary 1-3 times a week, then it is possible that vocabulary is an inhibiting factor on the students reading comprehension.
This bar graph represents how comfortable teachers are with teaching reading comprehension to students who are ELL.
This surprised me because when asked how many ELL students in these classes were on grade level for the Middle of Year TRC, only 8 out of 24 students were proficient. This indicated a discrepancy between the comfort and the effectiveness of delivering instruction. |
Findings
From this Needs Based Assessment I determined that although teachers are comfortable with teaching students who are ELL, the students' current test scores do not indicate that teachers are teaching to what the students need in order to succeed. In order for these students to succeed they need a balanced literacy plan that includes vocabulary, fluency, reading comprehension and writing instruction.