Are we there yet? Exploring English learners' journey to reclassification and beyond
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Limited research exists about the time that English learners (ELs) take to acquire English proficiency, the factors that are related to students' English acquisition trajectories, and the relationship between reclassification as proficient in English and later academic outcomes. I use nine years of longitudinal, student-level data from the Los Angeles Unified School District, combined with interviews and observations from a cohort of San Francisco Bay Area students initially classified as English learners, to explore students' journey to reclassification. The data show that likelihood of reclassification is powerfully related to students' initial proficiency in English and in their primary language. For example, students who enter kindergarten with beginning levels of English proficiency have a 50% probability of reclassification after nine years in the district, compared to an 80% probability of reclassification for students who enter with intermediate levels of English proficiency. Meanwhile, although conventional methods suggest the reclassification is associated with higher academic achievement, I show that when regression discontinuity is used to remove bias from these estimates, there is no significant effect of reclassification on later academic achievement for my analytic sample. Finally, students reclassified at later grades describe the strong stigma they felt when placed in English Language Development classes at the secondary level, highlighting the need to scaffold instruction for ELs in ways that students do not experience as remedial.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2012 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Thompson, Karen Diane |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, School of Education. |
| Primary advisor | Hakuta, Kenji |
| Thesis advisor | Hakuta, Kenji |
| Thesis advisor | Haertel, Edward |
| Thesis advisor | Reardon, Sean F |
| Thesis advisor | Valdés, Guadalupe |
| Advisor | Haertel, Edward |
| Advisor | Reardon, Sean F |
| Advisor | Valdés, Guadalupe |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Karen D. Thompson. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the School of Education. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2012. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2012 by Karen Diane Thompson
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
Also listed in
Loading usage metrics...