Classroom assessment can promote language development and mastery for English language learners. Explore how to use classroom assessments effectively and strategically as tools to diagnose learning issues and as springboards to more effective educational practices, curricula, and strategies that help students learn.

This unique two-session course uses material derived from RDLA 200: Facilitating Oral Language Development to offer an intensive focus on the needs of English Language Learners. The course provides both theoretical and practical information to apply in helping non-native English speakers develop language skills, meet learning standards, and experience success in school.

Reading fluency strategies are an important tool in teaching students to read, especially (ELLs) who may be struggling readers. This course will explore what reading fluency is and the importance of reading fluency to the literacy development of ELLs. Learners will have the opportunity to implement a reading fluency assessment and then use the results for the basis of a discussion on how reading fluency assessment informs instruction. Learners will also complete a course project where they develop a Fluency Action Plan specifically designed for English language learners. The action plan incorporates various reading fluency instructional strategies, integrates technology, and lists a variety of relevant resources.

Discover the practices that best promote vocabulary development for English language learners. Learn why vocabulary development is so crucial to ELLs' success in school. In this course, you'll explore the similarities and differences between the strategies for teaching vocabulary development for ELLs and those for native English speakers. We'll also explore the role that knowledge of the student's primary language plays in successful English vocabulary development.

"What classroom practices best promote ELLs' writing development?" Develop an understanding and identify the specific needs of ELLs in writing, by integrating research on how writing and language develops in ELLs with an understanding of the considerations that need to be made for ELLs. These considerations include state, national, and local standards and the use of assessment as a tool for informing instruction. Discuss strategies to support ELLs' writing development, including group lessons in which writing and spelling are modeled for students, programs found to be effective for ELLs, and the use of technology. The course project enables learners to synthesize the information they have learned in the course in the form of an e-article that they will post to an educational blog or a multimedia presentation as part of an online presentation tool.