Anonymous wrote:This is one those posts where the way OP writes convinces me that OP doesn't understand basic information that was presented to her by the school/teachers.

Thanks for illustrating what the school system staff tell themselves to justify their racist behavior.

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Anonymous wrote:In our district, once you mention any other language other than English spoken at home (even if it’s one a year when granny comes to visit from Korea), you are on the hook for those tests. However parents know when kids reclassify (and they get info about their levels once the kids do their initial testing). So it’s strange.

Correct. If a child speaks a language other than English at home, schools are legally obligated to assess their need for English learner services, to meet their 14th amendment rights to an equal education. Unfortunately, as some people note, exiting services requires proving English language proficiency, which can be a high standard for some kindergarten students.

The 14th amendment doesn't say you have to assess every child whose parents list English alongside another language spoken at home. That is a choice by school districts to maximize their funding at the expense of students of color.

If they are fully English proficient, it will show when they are tested and they won't qualify for services. Every ESOL teacher I know has a huge caseload including me. I tested a kindergarten student last week who spoke two languages at home. He tested as fully English proficient as do other kids. I'm here to help students reach this point.

That is not what often happens. I personally know multiple families that have had to beg to have their English speaking kids removed from ESL

This is true. First, even the K level initial test requires knowing letters and sounds, reading and writing three letter words etc.
Not all native speaker kids know how to do that. It means you get ELD services and retest mid year.

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Anonymous wrote:Just don’t mention any other languages in the surveys.

My husband and I listed two other languages in addition to English. One is Spanish. We made clear we speak mostly English at home because I didn't want her stuck in ELL.

AFAIK our child was not assessed or pulled out for Kindergarten. Our child attends a dual language (English and Spanish) immersion school though and it would be pretty absurd to put her in ELL when she clearly knows much more English than Spanish.

I guess it depends on the district/state and maybe on the school?
The point is, if you don’t think your child needs testing twice a year and additional English instruction, you know what not to do.

I happen to know people in my district have complained about their English speaking kids being shoved into ESL so I wonder if they changed their practices in response to this. It's a ridiculous practice that is blatantly discriminatory

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Anonymous wrote:Just don’t mention any other languages in the surveys.

My husband and I listed two other languages in addition to English. One is Spanish. We made clear we speak mostly English at home because I didn't want her stuck in ELL.

AFAIK our child was not assessed or pulled out for Kindergarten. Our child attends a dual language (English and Spanish) immersion school though and it would be pretty absurd to put her in ELL when she clearly knows much more English than Spanish.

I guess it depends on the district/state and maybe on the school?
The point is, if you don’t think your child needs testing twice a year and additional English instruction, you know what not to do.

This is one those posts where the way OP writes convinces me that OP doesn't understand basic information that was presented to her by the school/teachers.

Btw I am a Latina that grew up speaking Spanish at home and visiting my home country. One time I was dating this White guy and he literally told me a word I was using in Spanish was incorrect because he didn't understand that people in different countries use different terms for things. This was a word that was literally in the name of a family business in my home country.

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Anonymous wrote:Parents can opt students out of receiving EL services. They will still be annually assessed, but will not receive services.

In 25 years as a classroom and EL teacher, I’ve never thought or heard anyone else talk about a child in terms of funding. We are too busy trying to help the large caseloads we have.

These are real documented experiences families have had. If you don't believe them that's a you problem.

Can you point to this documentation?

For the third time, here is a link.
https://demystifyinglanguage.fordham.edu/articles/language-is-not-the-problem-racism-is-the-problem



Feel free to do your own Google search if you actually care about this issue (I suspect you don't)
By the way I personally know multiple Latino families that have had to BEG to get their English speaking kids removed from ESL.

Did you actually read the article that you are posting? It basically says that these are kids that can't speak any language in a grammatical way, instead speak slang, but you (and the author) are mad at the schools for believing that they should learn both academic English and academic Spanish. Umm... yes, that is what schools are for. If their kids are happy to speak street Spanish and don't feel that they need to be able to write in an academic way, they don't need to go to school.

"Academic" English and Spanish just means people who only know one dialect and don't accept anyone using a different dialect.

It's also just racism. From the article:

We see this in the case of Estela, a Latina born and raised in Texas who, like Tamara, grew up speaking both English and Spanish. She was so passionate about her bilingualism that she decided to pursue a college degree in Spanish and then continue doctoral studies in Spanish literature. So, she grew up speaking Spanish, had a college degree in Spanish, and was now pursuing another degree in Spanish. And guess what? Her professors still thought her Spanish wasn’t good! To make matters worse, when they were asked what was wrong with her Spanish they couldn’t even say. They just thought it didn’t sound right and that her white classmates who only started learning Spanish in high school knew Spanish better than she did. It would appear that not all bilingualism is the same! Bilingualism is perceived as a talent for white students and as a deficit for students of color.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our district, once you mention any other language other than English spoken at home (even if it’s one a year when granny comes to visit from Korea), you are on the hook for those tests. However parents know when kids reclassify (and they get info about their levels once the kids do their initial testing). So it’s strange.

Correct. If a child speaks a language other than English at home, schools are legally obligated to assess their need for English learner services, to meet their 14th amendment rights to an equal education. Unfortunately, as some people note, exiting services requires proving English language proficiency, which can be a high standard for some kindergarten students.

The 14th amendment doesn't say you have to assess every child whose parents list English alongside another language spoken at home. That is a choice by school districts to maximize their funding at the expense of students of color.

If they are fully English proficient, it will show when they are tested and they won't qualify for services. Every ESOL teacher I know has a huge caseload including me. I tested a kindergarten student last week who spoke two languages at home. He tested as fully English proficient as do other kids. I'm here to help students reach this point.

That is not what often happens. I personally know multiple families that have had to beg to have their English speaking kids removed from ESL

Anonymous wrote:Just don’t mention any other languages in the surveys.

My husband and I listed two other languages in addition to English. One is Spanish. We made clear we speak mostly English at home because I didn't want her stuck in ELL.

AFAIK our child was not assessed or pulled out for Kindergarten. Our child attends a dual language (English and Spanish) immersion school though and it would be pretty absurd to put her in ELL when she clearly knows much more English than Spanish.

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Parents can opt students out of receiving EL services. They will still be annually assessed, but will not receive services.

In 25 years as a classroom and EL teacher, I’ve never thought or heard anyone else talk about a child in terms of funding. We are too busy trying to help the large caseloads we have.[/quote]

These are real documented experiences families have had. If you don't believe them that's a you problem.[/quote]

Can you point to this documentation? [/quote]

For the third time, here is a link.
https://demystifyinglanguage.fordham.edu/articles/language-is-not-the-problem-racism-is-the-problem



Feel free to do your own Google search if you actually care about this issue (I suspect you don't)
By the way I personally know multiple Latino families that have had to BEG to get their English speaking kids removed from ESL.

[/quote]

Did you actually read the article that you are posting? It basically says that these are kids that can't speak any language in a grammatical way, instead speak slang, but you (and the author) are mad at the schools for believing that they should learn both academic English and academic Spanish. Umm... yes, that is what schools are for. If their kids are happy to speak street Spanish and don't feel that they need to be able to write in an academic way, they don't need to go to school. [/quote]

The article does not say or imply that "these kids can't speak any language in a grammatical way" in fact it makes clear that for example the Black kids were speaking "Standard American English"

I’m an ELD (ESOL) teacher in MCPS. When a student is identified by their home language survey we have to send home forms to be signed—parent notification letter, accommodations letter. The students are tested (WIDA Access) and can only be an ESOl student based on their scores and they can only exit from the program when they hit a certain composite score. It’s not teachers choice here.

I work in an elementary school with a high number of ELLs so we come into the classroom and support them in their regular classroom; they don’t miss class. A lot of students who are not ELLs think that I’m a para and I’m there to help everyone and they ask for help a lot. When I’m in the classroom during whole group time,
I will help a non ELL if they need some support, but I don’t pull them to the back table for direct support. However I know every student in those classes very well and if I saw them at the grocery store I would say hi and have a conversation with them. If the parent asked how I know them I might say “I’m the ESOL teacher that comes into their classroom” but wouldn’t expect the parent to assume that means that I work directly with your child on ELD services.

Additionally some schools do use us ELD teachers for reading intervention since we are trained. I have done small groups for a few months with students who are not in my caseload. Before you email the teacher, ask your kid what he does with the teacher, try not to freak out and assume racist intentions.

Just don’t mention any other languages in the surveys.

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Anonymous wrote:I think if you write on the intake form whether ‘any other languages are spoken at home’ then they evaluate the child for esl.

This is the answer.

OP - Yes evaluate is fine, but if he passed the test then why the pullouts all year?

Pullouts are a GOOD thing. He's getting help with reading.

To quote a great movie,
"What's your damage, Heather?"

Pullouts are BAD if the child doesn’t need them (and sometimes bad even if the child is behind in the subject).

And the term "pullout" suggests the student is missing some instruction in the gen ed classroom. Our only pullouts occur during scheduled small group time where every student works with a teacher on their level. All students receive tier 1 instruction as a whole group in math, ELA, phonics, writing, science/social studies.

… first of all, it is definitely not true that pullouts only happen during “small group” time. Schools are under no obligation to coordinate like that to minimize loss of instruction time and in my experience, they don’t.

Second of all, if the kid does not need ESL, then an ESL small group is not on their level.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parents can opt students out of receiving EL services. They will still be annually assessed, but will not receive services.

In 25 years as a classroom and EL teacher, I’ve never thought or heard anyone else talk about a child in terms of funding. We are too busy trying to help the large caseloads we have.

These are real documented experiences families have had. If you don't believe them that's a you problem.

Can you point to this documentation?

For the third time, here is a link.
https://demystifyinglanguage.fordham.edu/articles/language-is-not-the-problem-racism-is-the-problem



Feel free to do your own Google search if you actually care about this issue (I suspect you don't)
By the way I personally know multiple Latino families that have had to BEG to get their English speaking kids removed from ESL.

Did you actually read the article that you are posting? It basically says that these are kids that can't speak any language in a grammatical way, instead speak slang, but you (and the author) are mad at the schools for believing that they should learn both academic English and academic Spanish. Umm... yes, that is what schools are for. If their kids are happy to speak street Spanish and don't feel that they need to be able to write in an academic way, they don't need to go to school.

Considering you are showing that you don't know what "grammatical" means, no one is going to give credence to your ignorant opinions.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parents can opt students out of receiving EL services. They will still be annually assessed, but will not receive services.

In 25 years as a classroom and EL teacher, I’ve never thought or heard anyone else talk about a child in terms of funding. We are too busy trying to help the large caseloads we have.

These are real documented experiences families have had. If you don't believe them that's a you problem.

Can you point to this documentation?

For the third time, here is a link.
https://demystifyinglanguage.fordham.edu/articles/language-is-not-the-problem-racism-is-the-problem



Feel free to do your own Google search if you actually care about this issue (I suspect you don't)
By the way I personally know multiple Latino families that have had to BEG to get their English speaking kids removed from ESL.

Did you actually read the article that you are posting? It basically says that these are kids that can't speak any language in a grammatical way, instead speak slang, but you (and the author) are mad at the schools for believing that they should learn both academic English and academic Spanish. Umm... yes, that is what schools are for. If their kids are happy to speak street Spanish and don't feel that they need to be able to write in an academic way, they don't need to go to school.

"Academic" English and Spanish just means people who only know one dialect and don't accept anyone using a different dialect.