English Skills and Reading Scores

I read with great frustration “English Skills Still the Key in Test Scores” (Aug. 15) until I got to the very end. Only at the end was there a quote from James R. Brown from Glendale Unified School District that answered the question, “Why don’t the scores of limited English-speaking students increase more?” The answer is that when they do, the students are called “redesignated” and not counted in the LEP (limited English-speaking) total anymore. By definition, once LEP students score above the 36th percentile in reading and math, they are no longer LEP. It’s like teaching a polliwog to hop. Once it grows legs and hops we call it a frog.

Let’s celebrate the achievement of our students who are learning English, but don’t expect to make polliwogs hop.

MARGARET SANDERS

Coordinator

English Learner Services

Tustin Unified School District

*

Once again I’ve begun another year of teaching kindergarten to students who speak no English. Once again I have a group of students who have come to me two years behind developmentally, having no concept of letters, numbers, shapes, colors or days of the week--in their own language. Many of them don’t even know their last names. However, with the goal of raising test scores, I am being forced by my district to strictly follow a scripted reading program that strongly assumes that my students have had a preschool background--in English. The resulting feeling of going through these motions is like talking to a wall.

If schools across California are really serious about making test scores go up for English language learners, we have to greatly expand preschool programs and legally require preschool as part of the educational process for these (and all) children.

STEVE ORMOND

Thousand Oaks