Related Links

Resources for Teachers

Minnesota Department of Education
The Minnesota Department of Education strives to be an innovative education agency serving a wide range of customers: approximately 850,000 K-12 students and their families; 118,000 young children participating in a variety of early learning programs including Head Start and ECFE; 82,000 adult learners participating in adult education programs including GED and citizenship programs; Minnesota’s 339 school districts and over 52,000 licensed teachers. The site offers English Language Learners information. St. Paul Public Schools English Language Learners Website
The Saint Paul Public School district (SPPS) enrolls the largest enrollment of English language learners in the state of Minnesota. The English Language Learner Programs (ELL) offer a variety of research-based and innovative programs for students learning English.International Children’s Digital Library
The Foundation pursues its vision by building a digital library of outstanding children’s books from around the world and supporting communities of children and adults in exploring and using this literature through innovative technology designed in close partnership with children for children.

Schools Moving Up
SchoolsMovingUp, a WestEd initiative, helps schools and districts address the immense challenge of raising student achievement in low-performing schools. It offers practitioners knowledge and expertise they need to make sound decisions and take tangible action in their school reform efforts.

Colorin Colorado
Colorín Colorado is a free web-based service that provides information, activities and advice for educators and Spanish-speaking families of English language learners (ELLs).

Course Crafters – The ELL Outlook
Course Crafters is a specialized education company that works with school districts and educational publishers to provide custom education solutions—professional development, curriculum, and materials—for addressing the needs and challenges of English language learners, particularly students in grades 3-12.

Reading Rockets
Reading Rockets is a national multimedia project offering information and resources on how young kids learn to read, why so many struggle, and how caring adults can help.

Somali Folktale Project
This site offers 19 Somali folktales in both English and Somali. Each folktale has also been made into a play for children to perform. Additional classroom activities and a vocabulary focus are included.

CMC/EBBSS Webliography - offers an extensive bibliography of links of interest to teachers working with English language learners.

Forum English Teaching: a quarterly journal published by the U.S. Department of State for teachers of English as a foreign or second language.

Everything ESL: Created by Judie Haynes, an ESL teacher and textbook author from New Jersey with over 24 years of experience. The site features more than 50 lesson plans, 30 teaching tips, 170 downloads, 450 discussion topics, and 60 resource picks.

Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL)
CAL is a private, non-profit organization that applies research and information about language and culture to educational, cultural, and social concerns. Includes a database of foreign language assessments, the National Center for ESL Literacy Education (NCLE) clearinghouse, a database of immersion schools in the country, and digests that highlight topics of current interest in foreign language education, ESL, bilingual education, and linguistics.

National Clearinghouse for English Language Acquisition (NCELA)
NCELA (formerly the National Clearing House for Bilingual Education) is housed at The George Washington University and is funded by the U.S. Department of Education Office of Bilingual Education and Minority Language Affairs. NCELA addresses issues dealing with the education of linguistically and culturally diverse (LCD) students in the U.S.

SIOP Institute (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol)
The SIOP is a research-based instrument that has been shown to be a valid and reliable measure of sheltered instruction

Instructional Strategies Online
A comprehensive repository of various instructional strategies with links to many useful descriptions and teaching tools, including graphic organizers.

Project More
An initiative funded through the Training All Teachers Program for the Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA, U.S. Department of Education). Offers pedagogical materials and identifies teaching and learning strategies and resources for mainstream and ESL teachers to use with ELL students in grades K-12.

Demographics

National Clearinghouse for English Language Acquisition and Language Instruction Educational ProgramsNational Center for Education Statistics information on English Language Learners

Research Centers

CRESST – National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing at UCLA
Located within UCLA’s Graduate School of Education & Information Studies, CSE/CRESST has long contributed to the development of scientifically based evaluation and testing techniques, vigorously encouraged the development, validation and use of sound data for improved accountability and decision making, and aggressively explored technological applications to improve assessment and evaluation practice.CREDE - Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence
CREDE is a federally funded research and development program focused on improving the education of students whose ability to reach their potential is challenged by language or cultural barriers, race, geographic location, or poverty.Lab at Brown: dedicated to enhancing the capacity of teachers to work effectively and equitably with English language learners (ELLs). This Web site provides access to information — publications, educational materials, and the work of experts in the field — that promotes high achievement for ELLs.

Ohio University ESL: A variety of links to valuable resources for teachers working with ESL students. Categories include content based instruction, testing and assessment, lesson plans, and more.

ESCORT - formerly the Eastern Stream Center on Resources and Training, located at the State University of New York at Oneonta, is a national resource center dedicated to improving the educational opportunities for migrant children. Contains links to materials containing practical classroom strategies and resources for use with Migrant English language learners.

UC LMRI – Linguistic Minority Research Institute at the University of California
This site provides professional development to researchers, educators, and policymakers, and disseminates research findings to researchers, educators, and policymakers on educational issues affecting linguistic minorities, as well as racial and ethnic minorities, and immigrants.

CREATE- Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language Learners
This site offers research designed o address the critical challenge of improving educational outcomes of English language learners. It is funded by the Institute of Education Sciences at the U. S. Department of Education.

Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory
NWREL provides research-based products, technical assistance, and training to improve educational systems and learning. We work directly with educators in the field to develop and test research-based publications and strategies that improve learners’ results.

Program Models and Policy

National Clearinghouse for English language acquisition: Main Page | Minnesota Page

Paraprofessionals

National Clearinghouse for Paraeducator Resources

Professional Development

National Staff Development Council
The National Staff Development Council (NSDC) is the largest non-profit professional association committed to ensuring success for all students through staff development and school improvement. The website showcases projects, publications, events, and resources. NEA Foundation for the Improvement of Education
The NEA Foundation supports a variety of efforts by teachers, education support professionals, and higher education faculty and staff to improve student learning in the nation’s public schools, colleges, and universities.National Professional Resources
Along with the videos, NPR publishes and distributes books for staff development in the field of education. Relevant topic areas of interest are ELL /ESL / Diversity.

Teacher to Teacher Collaboration
The site offers additional sites that promote teacher-to-teacher collaborative exchanges for the purposes of improving classroom instruction or provide peer-to-peer professional support. These communications between teachers foster the concept of the teacher as reflective practitioner. Some sites specifically recognize the “professional development” aspects of these collaborations.

Professional Organizations

National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE)
NABE is the national organization for bilingual educators. NABE produces a journal and a newsletter. The website has a page on Frequently Asked Questions in bilingual education. Teachers of English to Students of Other Languages (TESOL)
International professional organization for those concerned with the teaching of English as a second or foreign language. TESOL members receive the bimonthly newspaper TESOL Matters, as well as the scholarly research journal TESOL Quarterly and/or the practitioner’s magazine, TESOL Journal. Each journal is published four times per year.MinneTESOL
MinneTESOL is a professional association of teachers of English as a Second Language in Minnesota and neighboring states dedicated to the education and support of students acquiring English at all levels of public and private education.

National Middle School Association
National Middle School Association is dedicated to improving the educational experiences of young adolescents by providing vision, knowledge, and resources to all who serve them in order to develop healthy, productive, and ethical citizens.

The International Reading Association
National Middle School Association is dedicated to improving the educational experiences of young adolescents by providing vision, knowledge, and resources to all who serve them in order to develop healthy, productive, and ethical citizens.

American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education (www.aacte.org)
The mission of this organization is to promote the learning of all PK-12 students through high-quality, evidence-based preparation and continuing education for all school personnel. Its resolution on the preparation of teachers of second language learners highlights the organization’s efforts related to language issues in our nation’s classrooms.

Journals

Bilingual Research Journal Online
The BRJ deals with bilingual education, bilingualism, and language policies in education (e.g., language assessment, policy analysis, instructional research, language politics, biliteracy, language planning, second language learning and teaching, action research, and sociolinguistics).

Videos

WIDA
Presentation videos on school reform for ELLS, good language objectives, academic needs, and teaching language through content Colorin Colorado
Webcasts discussing effective instructional strategies for teaching ELLs in middle and high schoolStanford University School of Education – ELL Teaching Certificate Video Library
Videos on 2nd language acquisition; English language development; content instruction

Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University
Videos on teaching English language learners, teaching reading, and other topics

Standards / Government Policy

Minnesota Department of Education
The Minnesota Department of Education offers a “Learning Support” link for English language learners that includes English language standards, program guidelines, and MDE staff contact information. TESOL –Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages
TESOL s a global education association for teachers of English to speakers of other languages. Its website offers national Pre-K-12 English language proficiency standards that now include core content areasNCELA - National Clearinghouse for English Language Acquisition and Language Instruction Educational Programs
NCELA collects, analyzes, synthesizes and disseminates information about language instruction educational programs for English language learners and related programs. It is funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of English Language Acquisition, Language Enhancement & Academic Achievement for Limited English Proficient Students (OELA) under Title III of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001.

WIDA –World-class Instructional Design and Assessment
WIDA is a consortium of states dedicated to the design and implementation of high standards and equitable educational opportunities for English language learners. It has developed English language proficiency standards and an English language proficiency test aligned with those standards.

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