ESOL Level 5?

[Anonymous]

My kindergartner has spent years in speech therapy to first correct a number of pronunciation errors (he worked with 1/3 of the alphabet!), then to fix all the bad habits he picked up while trying to avoid the sounds he could not say. He speaks well now. His pronunciation is actually advanced -- he now makes sounds that most 5-year olds still struggle with, and he has an amazing phonemic awareness. But he's a chatterbox, and he still explains everything with higher level associations rather than the crisp word needed. So he's still hard to understand.

Since we have more than one language spoken in the home, he was evaluated for ESOL. He qualifies for Level5 (bridging) support. Surprising to me, because our second language has come and gone, and we have not put too much emphasis on it, hoping to resolve the speech issues first.

Before I sit down with his ESOL teacher, could anyone give me a quick understanding of what I should reasonably and realistically expect out of these "bridging" services? I was hoping that he would continue on with speech therapy through school, but I am grateful for any language-based support. In fact, it may be the most appropriate support for him, given his reluctance to use precise and economical language. Maybe vocabulary building could be useful. The FCPS ESOL page has no information on services, beyond identification.

Thanks!

[Anonymous]

I am in high school so maybe it is different in elementary, but at level 5 students do not receive any ESOL services beyond being able to use bilingual dictionaries on SOL tests (not really applicable to your child yet).

[Anonymous]

Self help in HS is a bit more advanced than in K. I can sort of see how Bridging services at HS level may simply mean the accommodations that would empower the student to better manage language intensive situations. (Although "services" should still mean some modicum of support...

But I'm expecting / hoping there's a bit more of that in K...

[Anonymous]

We started out a bilingual household (Spanish/English) and so all my kids were evaluated when they were in K. They ALL received a level 5. Two of them were as fluent in English as any other kid and when I asked the teacher how they could be eligible for bridging services when they were as good as any kid coming from an English only environment, she told me that kindergartener's don't ever score higher than a 5 and they would not be receiving any services. Instead, the ESL teacher would work with their general ed teacher on strategies for working with kids whose first language was not English and some of whom were LEP. I think they were tested again in 1st grade and scored 6 which meant they were considered fluent English speakers and not in need of any interventions/targeted teaching strategies.

My youngest has a language based communication disorder and his verbal scores are so low on the WISC that he's considered LEP. We rarely spoke Spanish to him because it was evident from an early age that he had language challenges (also has apraxia/MERLD) and we focused on English and sign language. He is eligible for ESL services but they occur the same time as his pull out education services - which isn't an issue for us because he doesn't need ESL services.

[Anonymous]

Very, very helpful. Thank you so much, PP! I did get a short note from our ESOL teacher, that L5 means a watchful stance, but no services at this point. I still think that additional work on vocabulary expansion would serve him well -- either from ESOL, or from Speech specialists, but I doubt he would get either. We're doing our best at home, but obviously not quite enough.

[Anonymous]

In our district, kids test out of ESOL at a level 5. Even if that isn't the threshold in your county, it would most likely just mean minimal services or just the ESOL teacher checking in with the classroom teacher. Kids still get testing accommodations for 2 years after testing out of ESOL.

[Anonymous]

At our school, my son was evaluated for ESOL in K because they assumed English wasn't his first language despite having two older siblings at the school. We speak primarily English at home especially with him because he did have some significant speech issues, hence why the teacher could not understand what he was trying to say.

[Anonymous]

In our district, we can only test students for ESOL if their home language survey notes that a language other than English is spoken at home. Was this a public school PP?

[Anonymous]

OP, it has been a while since taught ESOL (we called it ESL back then) in Fairfax, but how it works in my current district is that we identify students in K who could possibly need services, then watch the ones who score that high (Level 5). If it turns out they are having trouble in the class, they have been identified and so it s easy to provide services. If t turns out they are doing well, they test out the next year, generally speaking, or the parents just refuse services. There's not really any downside to being identified, assuming you have good competent teachers. If you had ESOL teachers who were pulling the kids out of class and providing low - level instruction, that would be a different matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In our district, we can only test students for ESOL if their home language survey notes that a language other than English is spoken at home. Was this a public school PP?

Yes it was a public school. We do speak another language (secondary to English). I am not conversationally fluent in that language but my husband is. I am the primary care giver and my kids attended an English only speaking preschool, so by far, they predominantly speak English. What struck me as odd, the forms were filled out the same as his siblings but he was flagged for ESOL and they weren't. However, he did have significant speech issues compared to his siblings.

[Anonymous]

Legally, all of them should have been screened if something other than/in addition to English was listed on the home language survey.

As a practical matter, if a parent speaking fluent English comes to school to register the child, a busy school registrar may not think to look at the form to see if the child should be screened. They should look, but things get overlooked. Then the child isn't flagged for testing, and no one ever looks again, unless the child is having difficulty speaking and understanding English, or is receiving other services.

Sometimes parents don't fill out the forms the same way for each child. In one case I know about, mom filled out the form for child A and wrote "Spanish/English" for what language was spoken in the home, so that child got tested for ESOL. A few years later child #2 entered school and dad filled out the form and just wrote "English" so that child didn't get flagged for testing.