the number of persons speaking a language
other than English will increase over the next
ten years. The need to teach literacy to
students who are English language learners will
also increase. Language diversity in Missouri is
not as great as in some other states such as
California or Florida, for example, 5.8% of
Missouri’s population five years and older
speaks a language other than English. This
means according to recent census data, 316,838
people speak a language other than English at
home (U. S. Census Bureau, 2007). Meanwhile,
the Missouri department of elementary and
secondary education reported in 2011 that
21,909 students received English as a Second
language services in Missouri public schools
(Missouri DESE, 2011).
Challenges
This change in our student population
presents a challenge to all teachers because
standards –based assessments which are used
to gauge student progress especially
disadvantage English language learners. ELLs
have an extra barrier to success because of less
vocabulary knowledge compared to EO
students. The assessments themselves present
language which the El learners may not
understand. In addition, the time and effort
used in standardized testing does little to
advance EL learning. Moreover, many teachers
and staff are monolingual and most Missouri
schools, by default, privilege monolingual and
monocultural practices which can inadvertently
create identity conflicts between ELLs’
perceptions of their home language and culture
and their school language and culture. While
the norm of assuming everyone speaks English
was acceptable in the past, many teachers find
that no longer to be the case. As a result, there
is an urgency for teachers, especially literacy
teachers, to understand the differences El
learners present. As literacy teachers, we know
that student success hinges on being able to
speak, read and write well, in English.
Therefore, English language proficiency is an
important component in student success.
In practical terms, basic language
proficiency is considered to be established in
most EO (English only) children by the age of 6.
That is, most EO kindergartners can express
basic needs and communicate about general
topics. ELLs who were raised in the U.S. might
have the same capability as EO children,
depending on their home language use. Home
language use information is an important
variable which is useful to have for all ELLs so
that the affordances of their cultural capital can
be drawn on. Informal assessments such as
Clay’s (2005) An Observation Survey of Early
Literacy Achievement and the Primary Spelling
Inventory (Helman et al., 2012) are
recommended to get a fuller profile of EL
learners.
Basic Second Language Acquisition
Principles
To navigate the complexities of ELL needs,
teachers need to understand several basic
concepts of second language acquisition. First
of all, in regard to spoken language, it is
important to remember that first languages are
acquired from mothers and family members
who simplified their language at first. Likewise,
ELLs who are first learning the language can
learn English in a schoo