ELL News Headlines

As immigration agents and protests lead some families to keep children home, schools around the Twin Cities are offering a remote option for the next several weeks.

Artificial intelligence has already entered K–12 classrooms, whether schools are ready for it or not. From lesson planning and grading to essay writing and research, AI tools are changing how teachers teach and how students learn. Some educators see endless possibilities for innovation, while others worry that these same tools could weaken students’ ability to think critically, write clearly, and solve problems independently.

As an educator who trains future teachers (Pedro) and one who works with community college students transitioning from high school (Enrique), we find ourselves both hopeful and uneasy about AI’s potential. Uncle and nephew, members of two generations, we are bullish and bearish at the same time, and we believe this tension reflects where K–12 education stands right now.

A new approach to teaching students who are learning English is producing higher test scores and faster language development in the Sioux Falls School District, according to school officials.

A new study from the Brookings Institution's Center for Universal Education lays out some of the pros and cons that the report lays out, along with a sampling of the study's recommendations for teachers, parents, school leaders and government officials:

Tennessee Republicans want all students to verify their citizenship, residency, or immigration status as part of an aggressive immigration package they say was developed with the White House. But there were no details on how exactly the policy that top GOP leaders rolled out on Thursday would play out inside Tennessee schools.

Incorporating peer review and individual reflections makes frequent, intentional formative assessment manageable, with big benefits for student learning.

For more than 30 years, English learners in New York have taken the paper-and-pencil New York State English as a Second Language Achievement Test to measure their English-language proficiency. Beginning next school year, that will change. New York’s English learners will instead test with WIDA ACCESS, a digital assessment currently used by 35 states and the District of Columbia, and five federal agencies and territories.

Today’s post kicks off a series on scaffolding instruction for students. This first column in the series focuses on scaffolds for English learners.

When Kelly Yang recently finished a draft of a book, she called fellow author Kate DiCamillo. Normally, these are joyful conversations between two friends who share a craft and a passion for reading and writing. But she and DiCamillo are “doers,” Yang said, so as the discussion headed toward despair, the question became: what were they going to do about it? Yang proposed a podcast, and StoryKind was born.

This technique gives multilingual students explicit instruction on how to effectively develop their ideas for each part of a paragraph and to link one idea to the next.