Free Online Score Calculators

August means that most of us are gearing up for the school year to start. Each new school year brings new students who need to be screened for English as a Second Language and/or bilingual services. Screening begins with some type of Home Language Survey that parents fill out during registration. The next step typically involves an assessment of English language proficiency. As members of the WIDA Consortium, you likely use either the MODEL or W-APT to assess your new students' English language proficiency.

Occasionally I run into educators who are unaware of the free online score report calculators that WIDA offers. By using these online score calculators, you can expect to save a great deal of time and trouble.

CoCoMo Lessons Learned and Information Shared One Year Later

 

Today's blog is a follow-up to an earlier post where Paula Merchant described her experiences participating in the Common Core and More Institute. Today Paula shares some of the lessons that she and her team have learned one year later.

 

One Year Later

Standards Integration for ELLs: An Insider’s View

It is my pleasure to introduce you to Paula Merchant from the Massachusetts Association of Teachers of Speakers of Other Languages (MATSOL).  In the summer of 2012, Paula attended the inaugural institute on standards integration for ELLs called CoCoMo.  Today she has kindly offered to share her thoughts on the training. Take it away, Paula!  

An Insider’s View on Being a LADDER Coach

 

Recently I told you about the LADDER project at WIDA. This week I wanted to share with you what it is like to actually participate in the LADDER training. Cathy Fox graciously offered to share her experiences with us. Cathy is a model ESL teacher at Veterans Memorial Elementary School in Central Falls, Rhode Island. During the 2010-2011 school year her district participated in a pilot program for LADDER.  At that time she was introduced to the LADDER cycle of analyzing data to identify target areas of need.  Her team worked with a WIDA coach to develop an action plan to improve their area of need. The following summer Cathy was trained to be a LADDER coach for her team.

Can you tell me about your role as a coach?

Running Records and ELLs: Comprehension Considerations

It is easy for a student to come to the erroneous conclusion that reading is about quickly and correctly pronouncing words out loud.  Running records can exacerbate this misconception if teachers are not emphasizing the importance of comprehending what is read. 

The comprehension component of running records is included to help us notice how a child is being thoughtful about his reading. Evaluating or measuring comprehension is difficult for many reasons for all learners (not just ELLs). As teachers, our goal is to uncover the process of comprehension. Consider these tips the next time you give a running record to an ELL.

Tips for Doing Transformations with the 2012 Amplification

Earlier this year I wrote about some of the new features in the 2012 Amplification of the ELD Standards.  I highlighted the new components, including the example context for language use, cognitive function and topic-related language sections. 

Since then I have conducted several workshops on transformations.  (For those of you new to the ELD Standards, check out these posts:  Transformations – Part 1, Transformation s – Part 2, Q&A on Transformations.)  I have been delighted to see that these same new features actually make it easier for my participants to do transformations.  So today I will be sharing some transformation tips. Some are my tips; some came from my workshop participants.

Introducing the Help Desk Staff

Hi, dear readers! Thanks for stopping by the WIDA Blog. I’m Michelle and what’s on tap for this and some future blog entries is an introduction to the Help Desk at WIDA. The Help Desk addresses your concerns and questions, provides you with log in information, and talks you through testing procedures. If you’ve never contacted us, you’re missing out—we’re awesome!  A common misconception we hear is that we’re housed in a giant corporate office full of cubicles with dozens of people (picture the AT&T call center), but we’re really just six people who

Using Rubrics and Checklists for Language Proficiency Assessments

Teachers often tell me that one of the trickiest aspects of designing classroom-based assessments is to identify what we want to assess and then how to document it. 

Recently I blogged about common assessments and ELLs.  In that post, I mentioned that there are two main types of assessments for ELLs –assessments that measure academic content knowledge and assessments that document language proficiency.  So as we design our assessments we need to ask ourselves “Am I assessing my students’ knowledge of the content or their ability to speak/read/write about this topic?”  

Most school districts have multiple assessments for academic content knowledge.  Typically there is a district assessment plan or schedule that details when and how often to give various content assessments.  End of the unit assessments, quarterly or semester assessments and yearly assessments of content knowledge are set. 

But what about assessing our students’ language proficiency? 

Common Assessments and ELLs

T. King, 2012

Last week I had the chance to work with a small group of local high school teachers.  Their district has been doing some extensive curriculum work, and they have now reached the assessment stage.  They wanted to know what they needed to do to appropriately assess their ELLs across several classrooms.  They hoped to learn about different types of assessment tasks that are appropriate for students at different levels of English language proficiency. Some even wondered if it was enough to just assess content area knowledge. (Hint: we also need to assess student’s academic language proficiency).  Ultimately the teachers will be working to create a balanced system of assessments that allows students to show what they know about content area knowledge and academic language over time.  With this information, the teachers can make decisions about future instruction, student placement and