English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

Bracken Gentry
READ 4534-620/621
East Carolina University
Summer I 2015

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

Reading comprehension is a major component of the Elementary Education
curriculum. While this is true for all students in Elementary school, English language
learners face different challenges than the average English-only student. English
language learners (ELLs) not only have to deal with the new subject content that all
Elementary students are required to learn but also the language content in which it is
being delivered. ELLs often reach their frustration level much faster than monolingual
students because of this battle that they are fighting on two fronts. This paper aims to
expose some of the main issues that are faced by ELLs and to explore research in
order to find solutions for what works for ELL reading comprehension in the classroom.
The problems addressed in the research include assessing reading comprehension,
vocabulary, non-Cyrillic alphabet languages, instructional formats and instructional
practices.
Non-Cyrillic Alphabet Difficulties
The troubles that ELLs face when reading are numerous. Students are not only
trying to learn to read in words that are foreign to them but for some students, they are
trying to decipher a completely different set of characters/letters from what is used in
their native language. Some of the differences in lettering are fairly insignificant as is
the case with Spanish language letters, while others are much more complex as is the
case with Mandarin language letters. According to the Simple View of Reading (SVR)
model both decoding skills and oral language skills are needed for reading
comprehension in monolingual students (Uchikoshi, 2013). Until the skill of decoding

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

the alphabet of the English language has been learned effectively, reading
comprehension will likely lag in ELLs.
Difficulties Assessing Reading Comprehension
Nakamoto, Lindsey & Manis (2007) explain that, across the country, students
who speak English as their second language are scoring much lower than their English
native peers on standardized tests. There are many reasons for this, one of which is the
fact that it is difficult for teachers to accurately identify ELL reading comprehension. It is
thought that English oral language competence and word recognition are the main
components of reading comprehension for ELLs (Uchikoshi, 2013). Measures of these
two components are used to predict a students reading comprehension. However,
recent research shows that some students referred to as word callers can skew those
predictions. A word caller is a student who can read fluently but without comprehension
(Quirk & Beem, 2012). Word callers were thought to have not existed in the elementary
grade levels but in one academic study as much as 15% of the participants were found
to be word callers (Quirk & Beem 2012). This group of students can distort the
measures of reading comprehension by reading with great fluency yet not understand
what they have read. This makes it very difficult for teachers to pinpoint a students
reading comprehension level and provide the appropriate instruction. In fact, the Quirk &
Beem (2012) study suggests that using data from oral reading fluency will overestimate
the reading comprehension skills for a number of ELL students and should no longer
be used.

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

Vocabulary
Taboada & Rutherford (2011) explain that teachers are not only tasked with the
responsibility of teaching conversational English but also academic English. Further,
without conversational English language skills, students will struggle to communicate
even basic interpersonal communication skills. Lastly, they explain however, that
academic English is essential for skills such as reading comprehension, vocabulary,
writing ability and concept development (Taboada & Rutherford, 2011). Teaching
vocabulary to ELLs has a higher impact on reading comprehension than almost any
other skill. An understanding of vocabulary helps to mitigate the problem of word callers
because students know the meaning of the words they are reading.
According to Crosson & Lesaux (2011) vocabulary also plays a part in reading
comprehension in another way. Connectives are words like although and meanwhile
that signal key relationships between text ideas. Knowledge of these words signals the
reader that the sentence they are reading relates to another sentence or topic that is
elsewhere in the text. In fact, Crosson & Lesaux (2011) explain further that knowledge
of connectives is so important that it is suggested that in some readings connective
knowledge plays a bigger part in reading comprehension than basic vocabulary
knowledge. Connectives are important to English-only speakers but for ELLs, they play
an even bigger role in reading comprehension. In fact, Crosson & Lesaux (2011) also
found that even when ELLs had limited knowledge of vocabulary from a text selection,
students were able to read with a comprehension level equal to that of an English-only

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

student from a low socioeconomic status when they had an understanding of

connectives. This is significant because it has been found that language minority
students struggle more than native speakers from low socioeconomic families when
reading texts that are rich in academic language (Heppt, Haag, Bhme & Stanat, 2014).
The types of vocabulary words that seem to give language minority students
trouble are something that continues to evade researchers. Heppt, Haag, Bhme &
Stanat (2014) found that compound words and words with more than three syllables
caused the most stumbling. However, another study found that verbs that changed
endings or tenses caused minority language students to become hung up on
deciphering the correct meaning (Guthrie & Klauda, 2014).
Instructional Formats
The need for ELLs to be taught vocabulary has been proven but the question
remains as to which format is the best format for delivering that information. The time
restraints which are placed on a mainstream teacher do not allow for one on one
vocabulary instruction to the degree in which would be beneficial for ELLs. In order to
remedy the situation, researchers have been looking to the computer for a possible
solution. According to Rodriguez, Filler & Higgins (2012), researchers found that over a
five year period students who received instruction in their native oral language
performed better than students who only received English instruction. As part of this
study, in order to provide this instruction, researchers used a program on the computer
to provide instruction for the first year and a half of their schooling before transitioning
them to English-only instruction. For the remaining four and a half years, students

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

received vocabulary instruction in English through the same program. The results were
significant gains in nonsense word fluency, oral reading fluency, word reading and
passage comprehension scores (Rodriguez, Filler & Higgins, 2012). Word decoding
skills were still not at the same level as the students monolingual peers.
A similar study began transitioning students to English-only instruction midway
through the students first grade year. This study used a computer program called
Esperonza for instruction and to transition students from their native language to
English. Researchers tracked the growth along a six year period. Interestingly the
students showed a large amount of growth in both decoding and reading
comprehension scores between the end of first grade and the end of second grade
(Nakamoto, Lindsey & Manis, 2007). This was during the same time that students were
transitioning language instruction. After this time period, the growth rate slowed.
In both of these studies it was found that base language instruction was a benefit
to the student. This is a format that works well for most ELLs. What is interesting is that
in both models reading comprehension tends to drop as the student ages. This could be
explained by the fact that students come to school to learn to read but as they age more
and more of their learning is done by reading (Nakamoto, Lindsey & Manis, 2007)
The computer based instruction used by Nakamoto, Lindsey & Manis (2007) and
Rodriguez, Filler & Higgins (2012) prove to be effective for jumpstarting an ELLs
reading in situations where bilingual instruction is not an option. But what is the outcome
in cases where a bilingual education is given all the way though grade school? This was
the question that was addressed in a study last year by Carlo, Barr & August (2014).

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

The language students were instructed in was monitored from kindergarten through fifth
grade. Over the course of those five years students either chose to remain in English
-only, early exit or late exit bilingual programs. Early exit bilingual programs moved to
English-only instruction by third grade while late exit transitioned in fifth grade. The
results of this study showed that students in the early exit bilingual program had the
sharpest growth rate of the three groups. The English-only instruction group was still
reading with a higher level of reading comprehension but the early exit students were on
a projected path to catch them in the next year. The late exit students were steadily
increasing but were not at a rate that would put them on the same level of reading
comprehension as their peers. Perhaps third grade is the magic year for students to
transition? But what about instruction? Which types of instruction are successful in the
classroom?
Classroom instruction
Several researchers have been working on research to determine the best way
to help students who are ELLs in the English-only classroom. Pavlak (2013) explains
that one of the methods that has been used successfully is to use an intense eight week
instructional period that focuses on scaffolding. Further, this instruction was so
successful because students were familiarized beforehand with the genre they were
studying, they deconstructed the material in order to better understand its parts and
finally, they put everything together in order to write their own biography (Pavlak, 2013).
Another teaching strategy that has been proven effective for reading
comprehension is the CORI strategy (Guthrie & Klauda, 2014). CORI stands for

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

Concept-Oriented Reading Instruction which is a kind of instruction that focuses on

integrating language arts and history together. For ELLs this means that lots of what
they will be working on will have pictures, partners or some other supporting factor. The
curriculum is set up to give students support and make them feel competent in their
studies (Guthrie & Klauda, 2014). This keeps students engaged and motivated to keep
working.
Conclusion
This paper has addressed some of the main issues that are faced by ELLs and
explored research to find solutions for what works for ELL reading comprehension in the
classroom. Based on the research covered here, these issues range from decoding
concerns due to differences in language characters, vocabulary (i.e. academic English
versus conversational English) to differences in instructional formats in the English as a
Second Language classroom. The good news for ELLs is that all of this research is
leading to solutions that just might help increase reading comprehension rates in ELL
populations. These solutions have been tested and proven to be beneficial.
Reflection
I chose this topic because of an experience I had in last semesters practicum
classroom. There was a student who was brand new to the country and to the English
language. Several times during that semester I would google articles looking for ways to
help the student but never found anything. This student was very driven to succeed in
school but he only knew a handful of English words which made things exceedingly
difficult. I met him in the beginning of the semester but didnt get a chance to begin

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

reading with him until the second half of the year. He and I struggled to communicate
but by spring we were reading books together several times a day. He was reading
books very fluently and I was very excited. I thought he had it and asked him to take
tests on the books he was reading. His Accelerated Reader test scores told another
story. I was confusing his reading fluency for reading comprehension. He was reading
the words on the page but had very little understanding of what they meant. After doing
research for this paper I realize that he was a word caller. He was reading but not
comprehending.
This paper taught me a lot about identifying issues with ELLs and reading
comprehension in general. Due to the fact that all of the articles that I used were
research articles, most of them were aimed at getting to the root cause of an issue. If I
could have changed something, I would have added some practitioner pieces in hopes
of finding some of the solutions to the issues like what to do about word callers. In the
case of my student, I now know how to identify his issue but I am still unsure of what to
do about it.
Trying to write a paper with so many sources was tough. The articles were long
and very time-consuming to read and pick apart. I learned to highlight as I read and to
use a matrix to help me identify themes. I also used post it notes on the wall behind my
computer to quickly reference authors names and dates. This helped tremendously
while citing articles in my paper.
Even though I took my time to break down the articles into bits that I could
comprehend I still had a very tough time with the statistical analysis in each article. For

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example, in the results portion of the articles the authors would often talk about their
findings showing a significant difference between x and y. I am aware that there is a
way to quantify what the significant difference is but I could not figure out how. Through
most of the data discussion I was lost and had to rely heavily on the discussion section
of the paper for insight.

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References
Carlo, M.S., Barr, C.D., August, D., Calderon, M. & Artzi, L. (2014). Language of
instruction as a moderator for transfer of reading comprehension skills among
Spanish-speaking English language learners. Bilingual Research Journal: The
Journal of the National Association for Bilingual Education, 37(3), 287-310.
DOI:10.1080/15235882.2014.963739
Crosson, A.C. & Lesaux, Nonie. (2011). Does knowledge of connectives play a unique
role in the reading comprehension of English learners and English-only students?.
Journal of Research in Reading, 36(3), 241-260. DOI: 10.1111/j.14679817.2011.01501.x
Guthrie, J.T. & Klauda, S.L. (2014). Effects of classroom practices on reading
comprehension, engagement and motivations for adolescents. Reading Research
Quarterly, 49(4), 387-416. DOI: 10.1002/rrq.81
Heppt, B., Haag, N., Bhme, K. & Stanat, P. (2014). The role of academic-language
features for reading comprehension of language-minority students and students from
low-SES families. Reading Research Quarterly, 50(1), 61-82. DOI: 10.1002/rrq.83
Nakamoto, J., Lindsey, K. & Manis, F. (2007). A longitudinal analysis of English
language learners word decoding and reading comprehension. Reading and
Writing, 20(7), 691-719. Retrieved from
http://link.springer.com.jproxy.lib.ecu.edu/article/10.1007%2Fs11145-006-9045-7
Pavlak, C. (2013). It is hard fun: Scaffolded biography writing with English Learners.
The Reading Teacher, 66(5), 405414. DOI:10.1002/TRTR.1142
Quirk, M. & Beem, S. (2012). Examining the relations between fluency and reading
comprehension for English language learners. Psychology in the Schools, 49(6),
539-553. DOI: 10.1002/pits.21616
Rodriguez, C.D., Filler, J. & Higgins, K. (2012). Using primary language support via
computer to improve reading comprehension skills of first-grade English language
learners. Computers in the Schools: Interdisciplinary Journal of Practice, Theory,
and Applied Research, 29(3), 253-267. DOI:10.1080/07380569.2012.702718
Taboada, A. & Rutherford, V. (2011). Developing reading comprehension and academic
vocabulary for English language learners through science content: A formative
experiment. Reading Psychology, 32(2), 133-157. DOI:
10.1080/02702711003604468

English Language Learners and Reading Comprehension

Uchikoshi, Yuuko.(2013). Predictors of English reading comprehension: Cantonesespeaking English language learners in the U.S. Reading and Writing, 26(6), 913939. DOI: http://dx.doi.org.jproxy.lib.ecu.edu/10.1007/s11145-012-9398-z

Digital Literacy Project Link: http://ellresearch.weebly.com/

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