Literacy for English Learners

Friday I braved the lake effects snow on the western shores of my native Michigan to meet with a wonderful group of teachers, coaches, and administrators at at professional development seminar on teaching literacy to language minority children: English language learners. I was to present both the Report of the National Literacy Panel for Language Minority Children and Youth and the What Works Clearinghouse practice guide, "Effective Literacy and English Language Instruction for English Learners in the Elementary Grades." Since I'd helped to author both, it was a nice combination. My friends at Learning Point (the Regional Educational Lab in these parts) hosted the meeting. http://www.learningpt.org/

I promised them that I would put up my powerpoint for this, so here it is. This is similar to some others posted at this site, but this is the first time that I ever presented the practice guide, so there are definitely new slides and new information.
http://sites.google.com/site/shanahanstuff/home/literacy-for-english-learners

You also might want to get a copy of the practice guide (or any of the other WWC Practice Guides--very useful stuff). Here's the link to those:
http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/publications/practiceguides/

The group asked me a question about resources to support language development. I couldn't remember the name of a book that I think highly of, but promised I would list it here. It is the book, Speaking and Listening: For Preschool through Third Grade, by the New Standards Committee. It was published in 2001. While it wasn't about English learners specifically, it is about language and I think ELL specialists will find it useful. You can buy it through IRA (get the DVD, not just the book--it helps). http://www.reading.org/NewStandards.aspx