Parkway Schools

INTRODUCTION

The English for Speakers of Other Languages Curriculum defines the ESOL program for the Parkway School District. The foundation for the curriculum is a consensus of beliefs about content, instruction, and assessment that comes from several sources including: The revised ESOL Standards for Pre-K-12 Students document of the Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) and the Standards for National Board Certification for English as a New Language (ENL).

In this document the acronyms ESOL and ELL are used. ELL (English Language Learners) refers to the learners who are identified as still in the process of acquiring English as an additional language. ESOL refers to English Speakers of Other Languages Program, since a significant number of these students speak more than one language.

This guide recognizes that all elementary and secondary school students currently in the United States will be living in and contributing to an increasingly diverse society and interdependent community of nations in the 21st century. To realize their personal, social, and long-term career goals, individuals will need to be able to communicate with others skillfully, appropriately, and effectively. The challenge of contemporary education is to prepare all students for life in this new world, including those learners who enter school with languages other than English. The purpose of this document is to identify the standards and benchmarks and their role in meeting this challenge.

Teachers worked during the 2005-2006 school year discussing program expectations to produce this ESOL Curriculum. In 2006-2007, teachers will revise this document. We now have the structure within which we will revise teacher guides, parent guides and other documents that help us articulate and implement the intended curriculum outlined in the framework. This ESOL Curriculum will be an on-line document therefore it will be a “living” document that can be changed and updated as best-practices in ESOL teaching require.