WIDA and TESOL

WIDA and TESOL

You may be asking yourself what is WIDA and TESOL? In the following post you will read what I have learned about WIDA and TESOL in the past few months.



WIDA ELP standards were designed for people in the education field who are impacted by ELLs. The WIDA standards connect language learning with state academic content standard to address educators’ needs in three different areas: pedagogy, assessment, and educational policy. WIDA standards are considered to be the first step in the construction of reliable and valid assessment tools for ELLs. The NCLB states that states administer a standards-based English language proficiency test annually to all ELLs in Kindergarten through grade twelve (WIDA, 2007). “The WIDA English Language Proficiency Standards are recognized worldwide for their innovative approach to measuring academic language development in English. From those standards, various WIDA assessments have been developed to evaluate student progress according to the WIDA proficiency scale, including ACCESS for ELLs which is administered annually in consortium member states to comply with federal accountability requirements in the United States” (WIDA, 2007).  The W-APT which stands for WIDA-ACCESS placement test is the screener assessment tool used by educators to determine the English language proficiency of students who have recently arrived in the United States or in a school district. This test can determine whether a child needs ESL instruction services and at what level (WIDA, 2007). The English Language proficiency Standards are used for planning curriculum, instruction, and assessment of English Language Learners. These standards reflect the social and academic language expectations of ELLS in grades PreK-12 attending schools in the United States. Each standard addresses a specific context for language acquisition and is divided into five grade level clusters. Furthermore, ELP standards focus on the language needed and used by ELLs to succeed in school (WIDA, 2007).

TESOL's PreK–12 English Language Proficiency Standards signify a starting point for developing effective and equitable education for ESOL students. These standards were developed to complement the discipline-specific standards created by other professional associations and groups (TESOL, 2007).

TESOL standards acknowledge the central role of language in the success of content and highlight the learning styles and particular instructional and assessment needs of learners who are still developing proficiency in English. Developed through a collaborative process involving hundreds of ESL teachers, researchers, administrators, and language specialists, the standards will provide national coherence for students and the educators who serve them (TESOL, 2007).

Both of these standards inform assessment because they focus on the development of English proficiency for ESL teachers. WIDA provides assessments that are appropriate for their ELLs and measure social and academic language for ELLs in grades PreK-12. TESOL standards draw attention to instructional and assessment needs for students who are developing English Proficiency.

Resources

World-Class Instructional Design and Assessment Consortium. (2007).Retrived May 1, 2011 from http://www.wida.us

Teacheers of English to Speakers of Other Language, Inc. (2007). Retrieved on May 1, 2011 from http://tesol.org