English language development program (EDL)

[Anonymous]

DD can't speak well due to unknown speech disorder. At age 5, she can talk but she can't rhyme, mixes up all prounouns, no sense of tenses, plural/singular and does not have enough volcabularies. I & DH speak to her 99% in English and she does not know other foreign language (except a few words and 2 short songs). All of her books at home are in English even though she can't read yet, and she she watches everything in English. Her preschool is 100% English only, and she has been there for almost 3+ years.

I just want to confirm that we should not let the school put her in EDL program at K if they ever suggest it, right? She has IEP. Our elementary school has some spanish families & other minorities that only/mainly speak other foreign languages at home. I am asking because they mention that they have this program at k orientation, and they are trying to identify which kids should be enrolled in this program as pull out. They say normally the criteria is those kids have family speak other languages at home. Is EDL same as ESOL? They have 3 teachers in this EDL program.

[Anonymous]

We are in MCPS, from op.

[Anonymous]

Former MCPS ELD (formerly ESOL) teacher in MCPS of 30 years who retired last June.

There is a Home Language Survey of three questions that determine if a student will be screened for ELD services at the beginning of the school year.

Based upon what you’ve written, if I were in your shoes and your child was screened and qualified for ELD services, I would refuse services. Your child should receive services based on their IEP.

Having your DC participate in the ELD classes would probably muddy the waters.

If your child qualifies for services, read the forms carefully about refusing ELD services. I believe, if your child qualifies for ELD services, they would need to take the English proficiency assessment annually until they score proficient (whether they participate in ELD classes or not). In my experience, students with speech and language issues often have difficulty exiting the ELD program depending on the severity of their disabilities.

The refusal forms should say that you can change your mind at any time and have your child participate in the ELD program if they still qualify for services.

Hope this helps!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Former MCPS ELD (formerly ESOL) teacher in MCPS of 30 years who retired last June.

There is a Home Language Survey of three questions that determine if a student will be screened for ELD services at the beginning of the school year.

Based upon what you’ve written, if I were in your shoes and your child was screened and qualified for ELD services, I would refuse services. Your child should receive services based on their IEP.

Having your DC participate in the ELD classes would probably muddy the waters.

If your child qualifies for services, read the forms carefully about refusing ELD services. I believe, if your child qualifies for ELD services, they would need to take the English proficiency assessment annually until they score proficient (whether they participate in ELD classes or not). In my experience, students with speech and language issues often have difficulty exiting the ELD program depending on the severity of their disabilities.

The refusal forms should say that you can change your mind at any time and have your child participate in the ELD program if they still qualify for services.

Hope this helps!

Op here. Thank you very much for spending time to type all these. Yeah, if they screen for her English level, she definitely can get in because she is falling behind on her speech developmemt. We have been doing speech therapies privately to help her. I don't think putting her with other kids learning English as new language is good for her because she is not that case. So far, they only give her 45 min a week for speech service from IEP. I don't even know how much she could catch up. I think there is a chance that they may want to push for this ELD service once school starts.

[Anonymous]

You might want to look into a verbal behavior based ABA program.